United's Boeing 767-300ER fleet has an average age of approximately 28.7 years. No-one would have believed a suggestion 29 years ago that United would one day have a substantially better in-flight product (and based on recent experiences, better lounges, in-flight service and catering) than Air New Zealand. But here we are...

Air New Zealand does, of course, face significantly less direct competition on many of its international routes than United does, due to geographic isolation and fewer premium airlines overlapping with its long-haul network. This is driven by the bewildering approval by regulators of Air New Zealand's joint ventures on a number of longhaul non-stop routes to and from New Zealand.