Irish airline Ryanair ends rewards program

Irish airline Ryanair ended its Prime subscription rewards program just 8 months into its launch. It did this because although it generated $5.13 million in revenue, it cost $7 million to maintain, according to a report by Mens Journal.

With the program, customers could pay $91.50 annually for free seat selection, travel insurance, and fare sales. It aimed to enroll 250,000 members, but only ended up with more than 55,000.

"Over the years, customers have asked for a Ryanair members scheme, so we trialled this 'Prime' scheme over the last 8 months," Dara Brady, CMO, Ryanair said in the report. "To date, we have signed up over 55,000 Prime members, generating over €4.4m in subscription fees. However, our Prime members have received over €6m in fare discounts, so this trial has cost more money than it generates. This level of memberships, or subscription revenue does not justify the time and effort it takes to launch monthly exclusive Prime seat sales for our 55,000 Prime members."

Other experts, such as Ben Schlappig at One Mile at a Time have suggested a lack of interest may be the primary reason the airline is shuttering the program.

"With just 55,000 of the 250,000 possible memberships being purchased, it sounds like the airline may have misjudged the amount of interest there would be," he said.