787 value
 

Scott McCartney in today's Middle Seat column in the WSJ talked about the new cabin features planned for the 787. These include larger windows, 'mood' lighting (i.e. LEDs rather than flourescent and windows that have adjustable tint), and most significantly much higher humidity - 20% vs 4% or so currently - plus more cabin pressure, 6,000ft altitude equivalent versus the current 8,000ft. This all sounds perfectly nice; my question is, what will customers pay up for? To the best of my knowledge, these are not features that will be able to be replicated in the A350 (which as I understand it will essentially be an A330 fuselage with a new wing and engines).

With the experience of Concorde we know that not a lot of customers (not enough, apparently) were willing to pay 70 - 100% premiums over F or 10x premiums over discounted Y to get there twice as fast. Let's presume for a second that two airlines were flying, say, SFO - LHR and one was offering an A350 with 4% humidity and 8,000ft pressure and the other was offering a 787 with 20% humidity and 6,000ft pressure. (Let's assume for a second that all the status/miles/promotions are the same between the carriers - I know, a big assumption). How much more is the ticket on the 787 worth to you as a passenger? 10%? 20%? 30%?

Why not also assume that the ticket price will be the same? :)

What makes you think it will be more expensive to fly on a 787?

Recent Airbus claims have suggested the A350 is an almost entirely new plane. The rollback of the release date and recent orders of the A350 suggest that may be true.

The 787/A350 are aiming at O/D longhaul service. This is currently mostly business customers. One thinks they might be willing to pay a premium in $ or loyalty for a higher quality product. The size of the pool of these customers remains to be seen.

The answer for me is no premium. I'm not willing to pay much of a premium for direct flights either; especially as most direct flights leave at less convenient times. Of course, most of my travel is pleasure.

All those bells and whistles are just novelty. In reality, they will pack as many as they can in coach with bigger windows nonetheless.

Well in this age of revenue and yield management, the 'same' ticket price doesn't always mean that under the hood the profits are the same... it's a bit oversimplified, but roughly speaking the last seat on a plane generally doesn't go for the rock-bottom discount rate (with exceptions of course). A plane going out with a higher load factor will be more profitable not just because the plane is full, but because there will be a larger number of people paying higher prices for tickets on that flight - even if the bottom line discount fare dollar number is the same. So, I'm wondering how much the percieved technical advantage to the Boeing plane is real or not from a business point of view. If the 787 is more expensive than the 350 (probably is, the rumors are that Boeing is not as willing to discount as Airbus) but a more comfortable plane will bring more customers (even if some of them pay higher rates through yield management) then it's a good deal for the carrier, and a win for Boeing. If not, then all this R&D on bigger windows and so on is a waste.

This is similar to the whole LCC thing. People *say* they want to be treated like people, but then if WN is $4 cheaper on a route they'll join the cattle call. I'm trying to figure out if Boeing is on to something here - in which case there will be a few people saying yeah, that's worth it to me, if you can make me feel less jetlagged when I get to London, that's worth an extra 10% or 20%. Hope that makes sense.

Last I heard, Boeing promised all these features with not much added cost.... they're supposed to be freebies, or "more standard equipment."

:rolleyes: Right, I know, "free". What I'm trying to figure out is, as a potential passenger, does it matter to you or not? Will it change your behavior when you buy tickets - will you search out the 787 flight or will you just go by lowest cost?

Will a 4% vs 20% humidity level and 8000 vs 6000 lbs pressure be noticable?

Only time will tell regarding the fares of flying on the 787. I'll fly with them if the cost don't vary much from what I'm currently paying for. If so, I'll avoid them as I'm currently quite satisfied with being on the 744. :)

My top priorities are schedule, fare, upgradeability and the program I earn miles in. Their order varies from trip to trip, but they're ahead of anything else. The difference in comfort between one airplane and another, in the form they are put into operation as opposed to the form in which they are promoted when still on the drawing boards, is well down the list. (I might make an exception for a 787 versus an RJ, but versus another reasonably large and modern plane, nope.)

The goal of all these "features" on the 787 is to make extreme long-haul travel more comfortable.

Since the O&D market will be smaller, anyway, that means prices will (generally) be higher for these types of flights, since fewer seats will be offered and you are appealing to a clientle who are willing to spend at least a "little" more for the convenience of direct service.

So, given that the "price" will be the same, Boeing is pitching to the airlines that those customers will prefer being on a 787 for 8000nm then an A350. They are also pitching that the passengers will be better prepared to "hit the ground running" when the arrive at their destination, which will appeal to corporate travel departments who can reduce "R&R" periods for their travellers.

The stronger airframe will allow higher psi's and the anti-corrosion properties of the airframe will allow higher humidities. If Boeing uses existing systems, just running them differently, then there is no additional "cost". And if Boeing has to develop all new systems, anyway, then changing the spec if also a "non-cost" issue since it will run the same to create a 8000/4% system as a 6000/20% system.

I think the real comparison here might better be 787/A350 versus 767. In the end it is economics of fuel burn/maintenance costs and longer range versus interest/lease payments that will convince airlines to look at one or the other. As a few airlines introduce the new aircraft, I think they will win over the more discerning passengers, who are often also the most lucrative. This will force others to follow suit.

There was a huge cheer on the AC board when they announced the purchase of 777/787 followed by 20+ pages of frustration when the pilots killed the deal.

From what I've seen/read it looks like the 787 has the edge in operating economics and likely passenger comfort but Airbus will likely be cheaper thanks to lower development cost.

All else being equal, I'd rather fly the 787 than the 350 and certainly over a 767! I hope to be able to cheer loudly once more when AC's pilot union settles their petty (albeit not to them) internal squabbling over seniority rights from their merger/acquisition of CAIL 5 years ago and agrees on rates/rules for the new birds.

Cabin humidity is usually a function of how much air is recirculated v. how quickly the air is exchanged. Recirculated air is moist while outside air is very dry.

Where will all that extra moisture come from? Cabin Misters? Less air exchanged (higher % of recirculated air)?

First off, the price to the airline is probably not the same, due to Airbus' willingness to throw in the kitchen sink during negotiations versus Boeing's somewhat harder line on discounting. Or so it sounds, anyway, from the coverage of all these deals.

So the question is - do you believe Boeing's pitch? Are you going to be one of those passengers that says aha, by traveling on the 787 I will be able to hit the ground running when I arrive at my destination - thereby increasing your loyalty to that carrier and/or making you willing to pay slightly higher prices than on airlines with other aircraft types?

My ultimate question is, who wins? Airbus, because an airline seat is an airline seat - it's a commodity? Airbus is focusing its R&D money on efficiency, whereas Boeing is spending more to build from the ground up? Boeing's plan works great if passengers actually care about the levels of comfort they're promoting on the 787. Airbus will be in great shape if passengers don't care if it's different from what they've got today.

So far, it sounds like the FT conventional wisdom on this issue is somewhere between "huh..?!?" and "a few % humidity or thousand feet of pressure aren't relevant to me."

Larger windows and humidity will be possible due to use of composites, not because they will cost much more to develop. The reason aircraft now are not more humid is because moisture would condense of the cold fuselage and accelerate corrosion and metal fatigue (very expensive). That is why the airplane's environment must be constantly dried, so I imagine in the 787 more moisture from perspiring human bodies will be allowed to remain in the air. Composites do not suffer this problem of fatigue in relation to corrosion. Also, larger windows are possible only because a stronger composite structure allows for larger holes in the fuselage.

As far as LED lighting does... my guess is is actually cheaper, considering it weighs less, takes up less space, and possible makes customers happier? I doubt dimming windows is so expensive either... it if were no airlines would agree to have them. Maybe they are even cheaper because there no need for shades that take up weight, break etc.

The real cost of Concorde (as any aircraft) is not small, little frills but rather engine (in)efficiency, fuselage and wings costs. The rest is mere pennies... I think.

Quite right. There's no reason to believe that there are elements of the new design that will be a lot more expensive on a variable basis (i.e. each unit of LED lighting versus flourescent, and so on). It's not quite as bad as the pharmaceutical business, but still there are huge costs up front in R&D that impact profitability as much or more than the actual cost of making one plane, or one pill.

Specifically, Airbus, by adapting an existing airframe, has a lot lower R&D cost for the A350 than does Boeing for the all-new 787. Boeing's bet only pays off if the new stuff inside the fuselage that they're paying to research and develop actually makes for a product with a meaningful competitive edge. If not, then Airbus made the right call by simply adapting an old design with a new wing and engines and paying less out in R&D costs.

So far based on the responses here, it looks like advantage: airbus.

787 vs A350 - Cabin Pressure
 

Scott,

I think this should be the number 1 issue Boeing exploits. On a typical plane I and 1000s of other people get dried out, get headaches (especially the kids) on landing due to cabin pressure changes and can never see out of the windows very well.

Imagine for a moment that the prices are the same for either flight. People will get a chance to fly both flights. If the cabin pressure and humidity make that much of a difference, which I believe they will, let me ask you this.

Would you prefer the plane with or without the babies yelling due to cabin pressure and humidity differences?

Would you prefer the plane that has bigger windows that you can see out of?

Would you prefer to arrive feeling fresher (more humidity, more pressure) and less tired or not?

Now, what you should be asking is, what does an Airline do with its A350s once passengers have flown on a 787? How much of a discount does it give and is it worth it to the passengers?

All I know is if the pressure and humidity claims are true about the 787 I will refuse to fly any other plane whenever I travel and will fly the airline that offers me a 787 to the destination I want to go.

...or close. :p

Welcome to FT, brasil2!

I fear that you will be in a minority, just as current airline pax who have any views at all about the aircraft type on which they're flying are a minority. Most pax neither know, nor care, nor will they ever put in the smallest bit of effort into finding out or remembering.

Until you have to go someplace not served by a 787, in which case you'll fly on whatever the airlines use to get there (even if it's made by Airbus). You will then, in all likelihood, realize that the experience wasn't so bad - wasn't even all that different from a 787 - and will be less dogmatic from then on, to the great relief of your travel companions.