railways

Perhaps because the fares are the same as, if not higher, than before?

BahrainLad

I gather a lot of former Leisure Select passengers (who were regulars on the service) are downgrading.

Still, if Eurostar are happy pissing off (and losing revenue from) hundreds of their best, regular customers in favour of the once-a-year or never-travelled-on-Eurostar-before "let's upgrade for a little luxury on our trip to Paris, Mildred" crowd then I suppose they're going the right way about it...

Sealink

I think Eurostar using the word 'premier' might lead some to think they will get something more.

AVSA

Eurostar do not care. I sent them an email 6 weeks ago about my Standard Premier experience, haven't receive any response (except automatic acknowledgement).

Mountain Man

I work in Paris and regularly travel by Eurostar to London. I used to buy Leisure Select when it wasn't too much more expensive than Standard. However I've stopped that practice. I'd far rather save the money now for a nice bite in either London or Paris.

stut

They do. They get much better seating (2+1 vs 2+2, with individual seats - a great advantage if you need to work while travelling).

I don't believe that's worth the supplement that they're charging, or that the decline in service vs Leisure Select is acceptable. But it's very definitely a different product.

Strawb

When Premium First was withdrawn almost 6 years ago First Class was then divided into two new categories: business and leisure. New fancy names were applied to these two products and to ensure travellers who had paid the most were not seated next to those who had paid the least. The onboard product remained exactly the same for both Business Premier and Leisure Select, apart from an express breakfast option available only in Business Premier.

Now Eurostar is distancing itself away from the premium leisure traveller who enjoys being pampered and is trying to woo the business traveller on a budget who cannot or will not travel in Business Premier. Hence the name Standard Premier. A kind of mid-class Premium Economy but on rails. The product offers space to work but not the luxury of a hot meal and unlimited drinks - at a premium price. There is now a much wider gap in the onboard service to differentiate the two "Premier" products.

Mountain Man

Strawb makes a good point. In the past there was so little difference between the Business Premier and Leisure Select product that I wondered why anyone would pay the hefty premium to travel in Business Premier (unless they needed the absolute flexibility of full refunds/rebooking on any train). It's possible that the old Leisure Select product was cannibalizing some Business Premier business, and that now with the inferior Standard Premier offering some passengers might have switched back to Business Premier. Just trying to think through the business rationale of this for Eurostar...

mcinverness

Other than full flexibility, no-one has picked up on the only other difference between the two (old) fare types - CHEESE!

Yes that was the difference - dinner in BP came with dessert and cheese, only dessert in LS. Expensive cheese...

Mountain Man

I hope it was a good cheese then. A Vieux Comté perhaps... not just a slab of cheddar!

BahrainLad

Of course, up until about 2006 you used to get dessert AND cheese in Leisure Select.

Strawb

The cheese came with crackers. The crackers were withdrawn first before the cheese went. Not a huge loss, the size of the cheese was something like 20g. Now, in Business Premier, you get the same size cheese with one grape and half a walnut if you're lucky.

Cost-cutting became apparent in both classes a few years ago when proper starters disappeared to be replaced by a tiny side salad. Main meal portions were reduced in size. Loseley yoghurt was replaced by Yeo Valley. Nuts were served with the first drink service then they too went. The lounges didn't escape the cost-cutting either. For the past few years, I've always travelled Standard, usually on points, as I could not justify redeeming twice the number of points for Leisure Select when the food onboard had deteriorated so much.

Sealink

But that wasn't the point I was replying to.

vla

What I would say, particularly to Eurostar if he or she still reads these pages, is ok, fine, you still have the franchise for now, and if you want to maximise profit by only providing a cold meal and limited drink, that is going to be what it is. But I certainly have no huge appetite, and, travelling at meal times (eg. 5-9 pm both ways), I was quite hungry and unsatisfied with my "meal". On arrival at Bxl, I promptly made my way to the supermarket on the station and bought myself the fixings for a sandwich. On arrival at St Pancras, I stopped off at Tesco's and bought a Pizza Express. And thus, I felt unsatisfied.

Mountain Man

Of course the days are numbered on Eurostar's monopoly use of the tunnel. I believe their monopoly actually ran out at the beginning of 2010. A couple of years ago there were rumors that Air France was going to run a train service from Paris to London through the tunnel, although nothing has materialized. Deutsche Bahn has real plans to run a service through the tunnel, and actually tested one of their ICE trains in October. They're targeting 2013 as a launch date, although wrangling about the safety of their trains has to be resolved. Whether the arrival of competition has any impact on Eurostar's service levels remains to be seen though. It may have the inverse effect, creating pressure to reduce costs further because of competition on ticket prices.