Well said
davem4
@
funkydrummer I hope you'll forgive me if I say it, but the slavish apologia in support of BA is a little tiresome. I don't dispute T5's First/Concorde Terrace foodservice offers are pretty decent -- but that, frankly, makes the quality of the current onboard BA product even more difficult to understand or accept. Who'd seriously suggest anyone is going to make purchasing decisions about flights entirely heedless of quarantine rule or personal safety? Certainly, I didn't. But I think your point about preferring LX over BA in the example you've cited isn't quite as simple as you suggest: with the guaranteed year-long extension of BAEC Silver, Gold and GGL status, there may be plenty of, otherwise loyal, BA customers who will happily switch to other carriers/alliances that offer better onboard soft product, knowing that they do so without BAEC status penalty. That's even more the case in relation to medium and long haul in J and F where BA's onboard product is, frankly, a disgrace.
Gallego and Cruz may think that this modest incremental addition to margin will flatter IAG in the eyes of analysts and investors but, honestly, serial and gratuitous brand value erosion, practised on and at the expense of high value, ultra-loyal BA customers isn't the way to achieve it.
And, as for the woeful and sanctimonious claims of BA that removing premium wines and spirits, canapés, entrées, together with its flatware and stemware, is somehow making the airline and its staff safer and more Covid-compliant, this is a level of cynicism unworthy of the airline. It is also entirely transparent to its premium customers, and is a level of disingenuousness that will damage confidence in the brand in the longer term, when the recovery comes. If other airlines can produce decent onboard fare in a Covid-compliant way, so can BA. This is naked cost cutting for the sake of it. And the airline should have the honestly to own up to it.