Saturday, February 28, 2009

International Baniyadom

From HT, Business, sat, feb 28 2009

'Ryanair may charge for toilet use. London. Irish carrier Ryanair, Europe's largest budget airline, might start charging passengers for using the toilet while flying, cheif executive Michel O'Leary said on Friday. "One thing we have looked at in the past and are looking at again is maybe the possibility of putting a coin slot on the toilet door so that people might actually have to spend a pound to spend a penny in the future" he told BBC television'

Now i'll tell you why this is such a sound business move:

1. You got people by the balls: they don't have a choice

2. It opens up the possibility of additional revenue creation: you can charge for toilet paper by the half foot, for example, or soap by the drop ('petit, medium or grande drop, ma'am?')

3. It creates incentive to use the loo as little as possible, so people will, for example, not drink water in flight

4. If people need less service in-flight (no asking stewardesses for water), then you can also cut in-plane staff salaries

5. If people pay to use the loo, they may think of it as a higher-value place, and perhaps treat it with more care: this means less organizational spend on cleaning supplies

6. On the other hand, people may actually use the toilet even worse than they already do. IF that happens you will need to hire labour for cleaning. You can then probably apply to the government for a tax break as a source of job creation during these bad times

but mostly its point 1. you got people by the balls. Its very easy to make money if you have that.

Who says that it takes centuries of labour division hardening into socio-economic systems to produce a people who can extract the maximum out of what they have:)))

2 comments:

Beq said...

Ryanair has only said it might do so....chances are Indian carriers will probably operationalise it before Ryanair....more money in Mallya's coffers?

Abhijit Gupta said...

amar to kelo hoye jabe...I will be a pauper if I ever ride that airline.