Originally Posted by
EWR764
Everybody that isn't BA/AA is 'extremely weak' on the route. All the other airlines in the NYC-LHR market combined equal about 60% of the capacity of the oneworld JV.
With that said, I don't think it's a given that a F cabin on NYC-LHR is a must-have. I have heard that many of the pax in BA F cabins are connecting onward to Africa and the Middle East, and that BA has taken a hit there with the entrance of Gulf carriers to the nonstop JFK market. The business class cabins are critical for NYC-LHR terminating pax, many of whom are under corporate contracts (and BA/AA have a great deal of those).
UA cannot reasonably serve the NYC-LHR-CPT F passenger, and would prefer to send the NYC-LHR-DXB F traveler via IAD. That's why I'm not sold that EWR-LHR must be an exclusively 3-cabin product as a competitive necessity.
On the other hand, there is probably a stronger business case for 3-class service on EWR-FRA, with ATI and revenue sharing with LH.
Agreed 100%.
While NYC-LHR is indeed probably the single most premium TATL route, outside of BA/AA, there is virtually nothing.
Even VS, which has only J, albeit pretty nice J, has many of its 744's configured with only 14 J seats.
I do agree that one of the issues is that, while LHR is clearly a premium market, it is not a *A hub.
Also, I think another issue is that UA's international F would have a pretty tough time competing with BA (even AA) international F, at least in its current iteration.