Originally Posted by
BudaBound
PHL - LHR makes sense but I was surprised that PHL - ZRH will be such an early adopter. But then I don't run an airline, nor do I have any insight on their business model. It must make sense to the bean counters.
Yeah although if you took PHL and a Sept 3 start as constraints (not saying PHL is right, but going with AA's line of thinking), where else could you send a high-J/PE aircraft to without bleeding money? There's not a lot of options and PHL has never been a big source/destination of premium traffic.
Maybe the play is trying to win some of PHL/southern NJ customers that fly UA/EWR. Could be the pharma in the area makes AA think ZRH is the best place to slot the aircraft. Then ZRH maybe gets better leisure premium traffic during winter with ski traffic, compared to other intl destinations from PHL.