SteveCostello

My head is swimming over here in airline ticket jargon and class codes. Quick intro: don't do a whole lot of international travel (yet). We have the Southwest Visa and put everything on it, so we rarely pay for a flight. That also means we are not part of another award program.

We are planning a long-ish (~3 week) trip to Italy in August/September. I would like to try to take that trip in Business, as our last trip to Europe was on an AA 767 that hadn't been updated in a very, very long time. To say the seats were uncomfortable would be an understatement... we could feel the seat pan the entire trip.

Like anyone else, trying to find the best route/airline/equipment/cost combo. I'm in STL, so I was initially very excited about LH running nonstop to FRA, however they are using A330s for this flight, and I hear they are also long in the tooth, and I've also heard recently that LH J is below average.

Long story long... just looking for a place to start. Should I bother still considering LH to FRA (then presumably on to ROM) or should I explore another carrier from LGA, EWR, BOS, etc.? Is it too late to get into an awards programs to get any kind of benefit? I have 3,500 other questions, but I'll stop there.

Thank you, very much, for any guidance thrown my way.

guv1976

Welcome to FlyerTalk!

I think that you will be hard-pressed to find even one -- let alone two -- Business Class award roundtrips between the U.S. and Rome for travel during the Summer at reasonable redemption rates.

By all means compare prices on flights from and to U.S. gateway airports, but you might find that such flights are no cheaper than starting from and returning to STL. And with a single ticket from STL, you would not have the hassle of collecting and rechecking your bags at the intermediate airport, and would be protected in the event of irregular operations (IROPS).

I think that your best chance of saving any money on this trip would be to sign up for one or two credit cards that offer substantial sign-up bonuses that can be used to defray the cost of travel. The cost of Business Class tickets to Europe would go a long way towards satisfying the minimum-spend requirement to receive the sign-up bonus on such cards.

SteveCostello

These are both excellent points. We had been considering hopping to a gateway (or even staying over a day in Lisbon or something) but the idea of IROPS being a possibility definitely puts the kibosh on that. On the other point, I know that Points Guy is one resource for research, any others I should be aware of?

guv1976

There are several credit-card blogs, including "One Mile at a Time," "Nerd Wallet," and "Million Mile Secrets"; and we have our own credit, debit, and prepaid-card forums right here on FlyerTalk (under "Miles & Points").

Unterwegs

You could also look at Premium Economy.
Also check Condor, they have an excellent business class on their new 330neo.
Personally I would try to minimize connections and have at least 2 hours for any connection in europe getting intio the Schengen area.