Other Middle East and Africa Frequent Flyer Programs - CO's EWR-TLV

Last Thursday I tried something new – Continental’s BusinessFirst from EWR-TLV. As a very frequent (25 times a year) flyer on El Al’s NYC-TLV, I was eager to test out the competition, and CO’s $2,000 fare special provided just that opportunity.

Overall, after this experience, I simply don’t understand why anyone buys C class on LY when you can get a near F experience in C on CO for the same price. Not to say that LY’s C class is lousy – it happens to be pretty darn good. But when push comes to shove, on a long-haul flight, nobody really cares about the service (which is comparable between LY and CO in C) as much as they care about the seat – which CO wins hands down. The CO seat is awesome. It lies flat at a 170 degree angle and is the widest seat I ever had on an airplane. I was able to roll over and it was plenty comfortable.

Overall, on CO I felt like they really wanted my business, whereas with LY I often feel like they are doing me a favor by selling me a seat. No question that for the kosher traveler LY has the edge with everything being kosher and that goes for the flight as well as for the lounge. But on CO, the overall feeling was much more positive than on LY.

Thanks for the feedback about your CO experience.

In april I flew to EWR and back using CO earning my NW points and It was great because then it was passover so LY could not serve bread but CO did!
for my dinner I recieved beef a roll and cake which was perfect for me.
My friend who flew LY to JFK durring the same time told me they served vegtable meals which he claimed was "awful".
I have to agree with you latus that it is strange why people still fly LY to NYC.

On Passover, CO serves bread on the EWR-TLV route. However, they serve "Kosher for Passover" meals on TLV-EWR (no bread). This is because the catering company in Israel does not make non Passover meals during this time.

Of course, LY is Kosher so they have to serve Kosher for Passover on all routes on Passover.

Well for those of us who do not eat bread during Passover, I prefer not to have to suffer and see the bread or be tempted to eat it. I never travel anyway during Pesach.