Rage over Ryanair

Polish air carrier Lot wants to sue Ryanair for unfair competition if the Irish budget airline doesn't apologize publicly for its comparative adverts. In a letter sent to Ryanair, Lot's attorney, Xawery Konarski, stated that Ryanair advertisements in Gazeta Wyborcza were aimed at discrediting the competitor.

"Press advertisements [...] clearly aim to discredit the business activity and trademarks of PLL Lot. The components of the advertisements being: placing a Lot trademark on garments worn by a thief shown in the advertising; placing slogans such as 'daylight robbery' and 'on the two who stole the moon,' which refer to the alleged PLL Lot practice of excessive pricing of fuel," reads Lot's letter.

Ryanair seems unimpressed by the threat of a court battle and the airline's sales and marketing executive, Tomasz Kułakowski, said the company is not going to apologize in the form required by Lot.

"Lot is not the only company named in the advertisement - Wizzair is also mentioned but only Lot voiced reservations. Why? Because the advert actually shows the truth," he said, and added that the accusations of using Lot's trademark are "ridiculous." "Still, we are taking Lot's letter seriously and we sent a relevant reply," he said.

According to Polish law, comparative advertising is allowed only if it is not aiming to discredit goods, services, trademarks, commercial names or other distinctive marks or circumstances concerning the consumer. It is illegal, however, to make make references to a competitor that do not aim to promote the offer itself.

For Ryanair, this is not the first conflict over the company's advertising strategy. Recently, it had to pay DKK70,000 (zł.370,000) for breaching Danish marketing regulations by releasing an advert in which it compared the prices of its fares to those of its competitor SAS. Comparative advertising also put Ryanair in trouble in Belgium and the UK. The Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson also protested when his photo was used in a Ryanair advert.