Chris9642

Why do BA not consider offering a Club product on domestic routes given that many are no different in flight length to a lot of European routes where CE is an option ?

Do they not anticipate demand? I always travel First Class on domestic rail and would equally consider a club domestic product on my weekly flights (putting aside any current CE bashing)

Just interested if anyone has any perspective?

jerry a. laska

Some discussion in this thread:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...a-flights.html

See also:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...B+%26quot%3Buk

headingwest

Hi Chris9642, I actually asked this a while back. You might find this interesting.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...a-flights.html

Oh! Pipped to the post! You're quick jerry a. laska!

joe19924

I would suspect that they do anticipate demand, but it's just not there.

LHR-EDI you're in the air for 30-40 minutes, I suspect that's quite a bit shorter than many European flights. There's only just about enough time for a quick drink and packet of crisps on domestic hops let alone anything more extravagant in a premium cabin. I doubt it's be financially viable, or turn a substantial profit considering the investment it'd take to adapt, to put on a CE style service on their domestic services.

However, I could be completely wrong

headingwest

I'm sure some passengers would pay for it just for the snob factor.

headingwest

Come to think of it, they could do a Club Domestic and give them a jumbo packet of crisps instead of the individually wrapped crisp pack.

Down Low

Some of the domestic tickets are £350+, expensive enough anyway.

I don't think there is a business case for domestic club. They get as much money out of the aircraft in it's current setup I think.

Genius1

The UK domestic market is where much of the connecting traffic for longhaul flights comes from (more so than Europe), and connecting traffic for shorthaul flights too. This means domestic routes require 100% Y seating to meet demand.

flieduk

Unless people are connecting to J/F? Surely there will be a broadly similar percentage of connecting Pax connecting to premium cabins as there are % of pax in premium cabing on l/h flights

headingwest

Well if Club Europe is anything to go by, we can see that they've almost given up on business class on SH anyway. Only a matter of time before the middle seat goes if bookings stay high. I'm really starting to think that's what they want.

HighlandExpress

I only flew domestic J with BMI once. I had been double booked on the first sector of a KLM EDI-AMS-SFO trip, so I'd been rebooked on BMI and BA EDI-LHR-SFO. J on the flight consisted of myself and one other person, Y was absolutely packed, and I only got a bacon roll to eat anyway. Not impressive.

thepinkponce

Because they can still charge club Europe prices with a higher seat configuration on an Airbus a319 / 320 / 321 and make it more profitable rather than limit the number of seats on the front few rows IMO.

Sixth Freedom

I think that in order to understand the reasons why there is no Club UK we first need to look back into history.

In the days of Super Shuttle and international BA services from regional airports the domestic service may to all intents and purposes have been Club, albeit in 6-abreast configuration. Remember that in those days signing up to the Executive Club (and hence premium ground service) was non-trivial and flying was expensive in real terms compared with today.

That the boarding cards still quote 'C' as the class of travel may bear this out.

Fast forwarding to the present, did BA have any incentive to change the product? Arguably not, for two reasons. First, it would be unfortunate to lose passengers on a longhaul sector due to lack of capacity on the domestic. And second, even in a data-driven organisation like IAG human nature still tends to cause people to favour the status quo unless there is an extremely obvious case for change.

Calchas

A substantial number of domestic pax are connecting to onward flights in W/J/F. My guess is that they would be the principle beneficiaries of a "club UK" product, in the sense that they would comprise the bulk of the pax. You would be giving them a free upgrade. To make this viable, under the assumption that no further international business is generated because of it, the cost of a domestic J ticket would have to be sufficient to cover the extra space required not only of the domestic J passenger but the (say) ten connecting international J passengers for every domestic J passenger. That delta is, say 1/3 fewer passengers for the middle seat blocking (let's say domestic-only are preferentially offloaded) and the monopole+hot food (negligible). My guess is the numbers don't stack up.

You might argue that given the competition with KL, AF, and LH, which all offer J to the UK regions, this is necessary; but the numbers don't seem to support it. Compare that domestic French is also all-Y on AF but it doesn't appear to lead to a leeching of passengers even to KL, where the fare is often identically priced; nor to LH nor to BA.

HilFly

BA would not be giving me a free upgrade on a domestic connection - they would be giving me the J product that I would have already paid for! Unlike now when I pay for a J seat on domestic flight, and if I want an empty seat next to me one way LHR - MAN, BA want $610!