Fly to the most availabe European city then use discount airlines within Europe

If your flights to your destination don't look good, use your airline to get to another European city as close as possible and then use one of the regional discounted airlines like RyanAir or EasyJet. Most are very cheap, especially if you buy a ticket online BEFORE you go...as cheap as 5 euros!! :o Just be careful of add-ons as bags can be costly! Here's a good list. Low cost airlines in EUROPE - Complete listing

You can also use your affiliated European airlines to get a ZED fare but again, try to buy before you go and the good part is you can even use this as a back-up plan b/c they are all refundable. I once flew Lufthansa's regional carrier from Nuremberg to Amsterdam as it was much cheaper than taking a train back to Frankfurt and the flight looked better in AMS.

Hmm, interesting. Our flights to FRA look most open for Easter weekend, but looks like just about everything in that city shuts down for the holiday... So contemplating going elsewhere. What are the costs like if you buy at the airport?

That is true. I live in europe, and if I am to travel to another european destination, I will most of the time just use a low cost carrier instead of travelling standby. As a matter of fact, in most cases, travelling ZED would be more expensive for me or the same price.

On that note, skyscanner.net is the one site that will give you connections with RyanAir automatically, along with other airlines, which can really come in handy.