Time for a rambling rant.....
 

Apologies in advance.

It has been mentioned on here before how things involving aviation evolve.

Things like how F becomes so superb, how J evolves into what F once was, then Y+ is introduced, and it is very similiar to what J once was and so on it goes. Eventually, F dies (it is on so very few routes these days) that J becomes the new F, Y+ becomes the new J, and then we have Y. So we are back where we started.

Just going through the JQ(Int) StarClass site, and notice the following:

StarClass website

Isn't that exaclty what international J class was a few years or so ago? Apart from the free meals (which those down the back have to pay for), isn't this a natural evolution of some sort of rotation of the on-board classes? (If you know what I mean by that).

Over to you lot.

Dave

True although J even years ago was generally 40-50 " pitch rather than the 38" that will be offered by Star Class.

I was actually talking to my grandfather the other day about this very issue. He was back in his day a regular Concorde Flyer(Y at F prices and my grandmother used to say) and flew what would be the equivalent of two AONE5's/year, so spending in the at least 50K/year 25 years ago which was not a small sum and fully self funded. Anyway he would never fly anything but F and only last year did he fly F after 20 years to visit the great grandchildren on SQ unfortunatley he wont extend that to me until I'm flying with a kid. But he said F had increased exponentially compared to the rest of the cabin, back in his day they did not have lie flat beds and the most you could look forward to was being welcomed aboard by name and enjoying a seat that was almost like a bed.

F cost a mere 20% more than Y back in the days of regulation. And FN (redeye flights) cost the same a Y on many routes. Compare that with the current F differential over Y (typically 100% and up to 300% -- but of course nobody buys Y any more, F is more like 1000% higher than the average coach fare). Even so, QF had touches like a chef and bartender on board for F on some routes. I think seat pitch over about 40 inches in F was unheard of until about 25 years ago (except on the Catalina flying boats in the 30s which had bunk beds).