BA Club World Cabin – 2006 (Image Credit: British Airways)
British Airways has announced it is to introduce a series of improvements to in flight catering in World Traveller economy and Club World business class.
British Airways First Class Cabin (Image Credit: British Airways)
British Airways has today announced it is to upgrade its recently launched London Heathrow – Austin route from a three class Boeing 787 to a four class Boeing 777 from Sunday 25 October 2015.
The announcement has been confirmed in a press release from the city of Austin.
This will increase capacity from 214 to 224 seats on each flight. This may seem a modest increase, but the difference is 14 first class seats, 13 additional business class seats, from 35 to 48, and 15 additional premium economy seats, from 25 to 40. The number of economy seats will actually fall from 154 to 122.
This continues the trend of very successful new transatlantic route launches by BA in recent years. At a recent investor update, International Airlines Group CEO Willie Walsh said he considered that there are three-five additional US cities BA could serve profitably, so we should expect to hear more new route announcements in the coming years.
Club World on Boeing 787 Dreamliner (Image Credit: Nick Morrish/British Airways)
Some time ago we wrote about a patent application by British Airways in respect of a new business class seat which would afford all business class passengers direct aisle access.
With American Airlines, Air France, Cathay Pacific, Finnair and others introducing new business class seats which provide all passengers with direct aisle access, British Airways has maintained its typically eight across “yin-yang” business class cabin on all recent deliveries of new aircraft.
The reason for this is the efficiency of the cabin layout and that BA flies a number of routes with very high business class demand (such that some 747s are to have business class seating increased from 70 to 86 seats and its A380s have 97 business class seats).
The patent application did prompt speculation that BA would abandon the “ying yang” layout on future deliveries of Boeing 787-10 and Airbus A350-1000 aircraft.
British Airways is once again offering the chance to win free flights to destinations from London Gatwick to the Caribbean at London Victoria railway station this week.
25 pairs of tickets are available each day.
The BA stand is located towards platforms 15-19 and is open from 8am to 8pm. As you can see from the above picture flights to Barbados were on offer on Tuesday.
Flights to St Kitts were on offer yesterday (Wednesday) and flights to Grenada are on offer today (Thursday). The stand is likely to be very busy at peak commuter times, so be prepared for queues.
Full details of BA’s network at London Gatwick are available here.
British Airways is to launch two new routes from London Heathrow to Reykjavik in Iceland, and Salzburg in Austria.
BA will fly to Reykjavik three times a week from Sunday 25 October 2015 and to Salzberg twice weekly from Saturday 5 December 2015.
In the case of Reykjavik this marks a return by the airline to Iceland after a hiatus of over seven years. The Heathrow – Salzburg route will complement an existing BA service from London Gatwick.
BA World Traveller Paid For “Gourmet” Meals (Image Credit: British Airways)
British Airways has announced that passengers travelling on selected flights in its World Traveller long-haul economy cabin from 12 May 2015 will have the option of purchasing an alternative three course meal tray, in lieu of the standard “Chicken Or Beef?” meal offered to all passengers.
The alternative meals will cost from £15 to £18 and will be available for passengers to pre-order in advance. The trays on offer are “Gourmet Dining”, “Taste of Britain”, “Great British Breakfast”, “Healthy Choice” and “Vegetarian Kitchen”.
Passengers will be able to purchase a meal between 30 days and 24 hours before departure. Full details are on the BA website.
BA Club World Cabin – 2006 (Image Credit: British Airways)
Some time ago, we wrote of British Airways’ plans to refurbish 18 of its 40-odd fleet Boeing 747 aircraft. Full details of the refurbishment programme are here.
As part of this refurbishment programme, BA is to also reconfigure the capacity of its Club World business class cabin on these aircraft.
Currently, BA has two Club World configurations on the Boeing 747, with either 52 or 70 business class seats.
The former is a relatively unusual arrangement introduced just under ten years ago whereby World Traveller Plus premium economy is located between first and business class. Although many bawked at the idea at the time, it did allow BA to increase its business class capacity by 8%, which was roughly the entire business class capacity of Virgin Atlantic.
On 6 Boeing 747 aircraft the number of business class seats will be reduced from 70 to 52.
On the 18 aircraft earmarked for refurbishment the number of business class seats will increase from 70 to 86, with an additional two rows of Club World seats.
This means there will be 66 business class seats on the main deck (with the remaining 20 seats on the upper deck). This will make for a very large cabin, so it will be interesting to see how this works in practice.
The number of World Traveller economy seats will be reduced to accommodate the extra seats. The number of First class and World Traveller Plus premium economy seats will remain the same.
The new larger cabin is expected to operate on routes with high business class demand such as New York, Boston, Chicago and Lagos.
NB. We should add we receive a lot of search enquiries about the condition of BA’s Boeing 747 aircraft, so it’s clearly a very live issue for passengers.
Paul has followed up his illustrated history of British Airways (published last year) with “Better By Design – Shaping The British Airways Brand”.
This is an illustrated guide to BA’s visual identity from its predecessor airlines BOAC and BEA to the BA of today. The book explores the evolution of advertising, aircraft interiors, on-board experience and crew uniform fashions, and how these have come together to shape not only the BA brand but the way we view commercial aviation.
The 160 page paperback title is published by Amberley Publishing which has a special pre-order offer (at the time of writing) of £13.79.
For an example of more recent work for BA, we suggest visiting the website of David Davis and Stuart Brandon who have worked on the most recent brand identity for the airline.
London Gatwick Airfield (Image Credit: London Gatwick Airport)
British Airways is to launch a new route from London Gatwick to Vienna from 17 September 2015.
BA will fly from London Gatwick to Vienna daily, except Saturdays. The service will reduce to four weekly from the start of the winter timetable from late October 2015.
British Airways Short Haul Economy Cabin (Credit: British Airways)
Two years ago, British Airways introduced “Hand Baggage Only” fares on its short-haul route network. As their name suggests, passengers purchasing these fares have to pay a separate fee if they wish to check in a bag into the hold of the aircraft.
BA has long claimed that these fares have been a success. They enable the airline to keep headline fares low when competing against low cost carriers (who have the advantage of generating considerable ancillary revenues from pasengers).
In a somewhat surprising move, BA has today announced that Silver and Gold Executive club cardholders will no longer be able to choose a seat free of charge at the time of booking when booking a hand baggage only fare from Thursday 26 March 2015.
