Dear Ryanair, A Letter Regarding Your Recent Tweet

Dear Ryanair,

We see you rocking the skies all across Europe. Your punctual track record and bargain flights make experiencing many different countries a breeze. The hard work that you’ve put into becoming a choice airline hasn’t gone unnoticed.

Then we also saw your tweet last month. With all of the kindness in our hearts, we ask you, “What the heck were you thinking?!”

You claim that when you posted an image of a young man passed out (or dead, who knows?!) on a beach with an empty bottle of something presumably alcoholic you were reminiscing about your first trips without your parents. With all of the content available with a few clicks of a keyboard, is this the best image Google spit out to represent “sightseeing, sing-songs and cultural activities?”

No offense to your social media team, but ours found these in less than one minute.

When we’re looking for motivation to book our next trip, we want to find somewhere exciting. We don’t know about your experiences, but here at BDC, we believe that hangovers suck. Big time. Spending money on a flight to be covered in sand while the roaring waves and bright sun add to the pounding of an alcohol-induced headache doesn’t sound like fun.

In fact, it sounds pretty miserable.  

Why aren’t you encouraging us to spend all day exploring the coastlines and caves of Ibiza before we take full advantage of the happening nightlife? What about inspiring us to run away from it all with a trip to the Alps for some hiking and time without cell service?

You’ve built your entire business on being better than the status quo, why wouldn’t you call us up to your level?

Let’s not forget, you’ve put a lot of effort into encouraging airports to require their patrons to drink better. You demanded that airports maintain a two-drink limit before people get on an airplane, and don’t allow duty-free liquor on some of your flights. You also cite safety and health as the motivations for your hard stance on alcohol consumption… then you tweet about binge drinking in the sand.

That’s a little hypocritical, don’t you think?

So, Ryanair, what’s it going to be? Are you committed to being part of the movement to build a better drinking culture? We think you’re capable of being a positive influence for all of us.

The next time you’re creating posts to help us get through stressful times, why don’t you ask us about our vacation memories so that we can have a few moments to relive them? Maybe provide a drawing for a free flight for everyone scoring in the top tiers of standardized tests? Couldn’t you use the enormous reach of your flight paths to help us find our next dream vacation spot instead of encouraging someone to daydream of their next hangover?

You’ve proven over the years that you aren’t a company that’s afraid to do the hard work. We’re encouraging you to keep doing all you can to inspire people to live, travel, and experience more. Not less. No one gets to enjoy where they are when they spend all day sleeping off their hangover buried face down in the sand!  

We all make mistakes. The beautiful part about it? Tomorrow is a new day to get after it better than we did yesterday.

This includes you, Ryanair. Let’s do it together.

All the best, sincerely,

The Better Drinking Culture tribe