To What Extent Do You Think That Cutting Costs Is the Best Strategy for Businesses to Adopt in the Recession?

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A recession is the part of the business cycle which is characterised by falling levels of demand, very little investment, low business confidence and rising levels of unemployment. It is neither as long lasting nor as severe as a depression. A recession is two successive declines in quarterly gross domestic product. A recession provides extremely harsh conditions for businesses to survive in, in order to survive a recession businesses have to adopt strategies that they believe are they best way for them to see through the recession and continue to make a profit on the other side. One strategy that a business can implement is to cut costs. This could be done through either cost optimisation or cost minimisation. A cost minimisation strategy is one which will see the budget in all functional areas of the business be reduced in order to keep costs as low as possible. A cost minimisation strategy will be focussed on the short term and is therefore only a temporary strategy; the aim of a business that adopts this strategy will purely be to survive a recession and then continue to spend once the recession is over. One company that have adopted a cost minimisation strategy is Ryanair. Ryanair were forced into adopting this strategy due to two main reasons; the EU recession and higher oil prices. In order to cost minimise Ryanair chose to cut capacity by grounding 80 of their 270 planes, leaving only 190 available for operation, by doing this it allowed them to fill their operating planes easier as the demand for a seat on a plane had increased, due to less planes flying. Ryanair were also faced with the huge problem of the increase in oil costs and therefore needed a way of increasing their prices without losing a high proportion of customers to competitors. Ryanair were successful in doing this because of their option to cut their capacity and ground 80 planes. By

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