Lufthansa plans to introduce its new Allegris cabins in the near future, including a new first class and new business class. The airline actually announced plans for this back in 2017, yet somehow six years later, not a single plane has these seats.
Continue reading: Lufthansa Needs To Ditch Allegris, Start From Scratch
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I'm sure this all must have been planned out by the same folks that did Berlin's new airport.
Around 10yrs ago LH had the seat+bed First class upstairs on the 747. I'd have modified that concept, slapped a door to that seat, upped the tech and called it a day.
Despite having tried the seats during the Allegris-tour earlier this summer, i doubt this product will see the light of day on all planes.
Yes, LH needs to scratch this and start afresh. Meanwhile AF has managed to introduced their new seats without much ado. This is more than embarassing. BER airport anyone?
Ow no, by now they even lost their most reliable cheerleader in Ben!
They should just get an off the shelf product and modify it slightly, the various configurations don't even make sense and are super confusing. Let alone the crazy weight issues, this is just ridiculous.
Lmaaaaooooo, nearly every post about LH is just how laughably bad the airline is at being an airline. Under many of those posts I say - LH is not a serious company. And yet, somehow, with every new post and story LH somehow manages to become an even more not serious company.
I imagine they have invested so much money and time in this its too late to pull out.
What's that saying? "Too big to fail"?
The 7 different business seats in Allegris just seems so needlessly complicated. Why didn't they just go for something similar to Qsuite which has been so well regarded since about... 2017??
For real, assume you wanted to intentionally sabotage an airline and damage both the business and national brand - you likely would 1) offer an uncompetitive product; 2) make up excuses for not introducing a new one despite customer feedback; 3) abandon long-term planning or vision; 4) abandon seeking financial synergies and efficiencies via fleet, operate all kinds of useless brandless subsidiaries; 5) regularly overbook; 6) lose luggage and not seek to improve; 7) operate a 2009-style website in 2023; 8) have at best a consistently mediocre customer service, at worst non-existent/outright bad.
These are some of the things LH has been consistently doing for years now - while supposedly being run as a serious airline by 'skilled' executives who obviously as C-suite make tons of cash. Hard to make this up.
They probably think the 747 refresh plan is genius. Imagine the seat fees they can charge for the new lower level J seats vs old upper deck ones!
This is very unusual for LH. Generally their planning for a cabin refresh has been well thought out and executed in a timely manner. Makes me wonder if they just got such a great price they are balking at a total reset of the project.
I'm sure the executives are all patting themselves on the back and happy with how great a job they did on those seats.
Now on to the next task of the day, cut jobs since the executives earned their bonuses...
Since Germany does not have republican politicians and maga imbeciles in control, hopefully someone will demand accountability.
Not surprised at all. Emblematic of the state Germany and much of its industry is in. The country produces some of the most incompetent management talent anywhere in the world.
No, they just don't want this new business class. Less density, less seats, less revenue. Currently they don't have any problems filling their old abysmal business class. They don't even need to discount it. So they're thinking: Why even introduce a new seat? SkyTrax 5* could be achieved without actually installing these seats.
Well, Lufthansa is a serious company. They're making good money and don't have any issues filling their old, abysmal business class without even having to discount it. So of course their motivation to introduce a new costly product with less seat density isn't exactly their priority.
Leo Apotheker (the guy who crashed HP/Palm)
Thorsten Heins (the guy who buried BlackBerry)
...
In the end, it doesn't matter what LH plans to do. What matters is what LH is doing right now in all aspects of product and service. For customer service reasons, I haven't flown on an LH Group flight in 10 years and won't unless there's absolutely no alternative. LH will do fine without me.
How did they not consider the 747 configuration issue? The PM for that project has got to be completely incompetent, or the management team for allowing this to go forward with such an obvious flaw. Changing the weight balance of an aircraft is a basic thing to consider. They didn't or couldn't figure this out in the beginning of the RFP/design process?
"This is very unusual for LH. Generally their planning for a cabin refresh has been well thought out and executed in a timely manner."
You must be new here.
Just ditch this and install the same reverse herringbone seats that everyone else has been installing over the past 10 years. Why is Lufthansa making this so needlessly complicated?
I think the cause of the problem is the unavailability of the 77X, in which they initially wanted to put Allegris (if memory serves me right). Now, with the 77X further out on the horizon, and the existing product being seriously outdated, they seem to start desperately think about retrofitting their existing fleet.
But I agree that the product itself is not well thought out at all. The 3.5 seat First Class is a joke, and the 7-variants-business class is a manifest of corporate greed, but not something which is easily manageable. From that point of view going back to the drawing board, or simply using a version of the existing excellent business and first class seats available seems the more reasonable way to go.
Your remark on the quality of German management is unfortunately spot on. The only thing they are truly good at is increasing their salary referring to the international market, and that they could earn so much more somewhere else. The problem in their thinking is: no S&P 500 company in their right mind would take them.
Well paid management not doing their job, and slowly, at that, in this cabin renewal scenario.
Even better, the current eco and footsie biz seats are painful for passengers.
The basics, ladies, and gentlemen. That includes jobs being terminated if training and supervision don’t create change in a timely manner.
The article makes a most sensible suggestion. Ther have been many innovations in the last seven years. Plus: they should have focused on Airbus and not Boeing... Who wants a 777x and then fly 10 abreast. Torture.
For the business class, they try to emulate the concept of Swiss, which is horrible.
Oh Lufthansa... What have you done?
Plus: they should have focused on Airbus and not Boeing... Who wants a 777x and then fly 10 abreast.
1) that makes zero sense when viewed from the perspective of the airlines: they'd WANT the extra seat per row.
2) Airbus wouldn't have gotten the A350 certified for 10abreast, and be carving out the walls to make that configuration more attractive to mainstream airlines; if they didn't.
They originally planned to discard it, and had already done so for several. They brought it back after being surprised by the speed of the post-pandemic traffic recovery.
Casue they're German, emperors of needless over-engineering and agonizingly slow execution
The former and famous CEO of Qatar is now ready and free to take over LH CEO's Mr. Spohr job...
And I wouldn't be surprised if he would be able to install a new Business and First within short time...:-)
My comments is very simple, Too many chiefs and not enough Indians.
Luthansa and is ideas now too old and too slow.
Where has the german efficiency and knowhow gone to.
Lufthansa is currently reliably filling its old abysmal business class without having to discount the tickets. They’d be stupid to now rush the new, less dense business class. It would only increase CAPEX while reducing total revenue.
Not surprising from the airline of a country that is complicit in its support for Genocide in Gaza
Lol so funny people abusing LH for going 3.5 in First class. People crying coz they won't be able to fly LH first class anymore as no seats would be available for redemption. Poor Lucky who flies everywhere in LH first needs to think about a new strategy to fly in First in LH.
Not my lane, but Allegris sounds like an antihistamine. "Ask your doctor about it today."
At this point by the time LH gets a new Business class we will be in sleep pods with feeding tubes headed for a flight to Venus.
The Stuttgart station renovation is almost making Brandenburg look like a well planned project.
This customer does not believe a word of LH PR-speak when they say Allegris business offers “choice”. Yeah, choice to charge you more for some seats. The only people who have choice are the first handful who book - everyone else could end up with a config they don’t like. I love reverse herringbone because mostly every seat is exactly the same, and practically it makes no difference when you book, you are guaranteed a certain experience.
Swiss are adopting the same stupid seat system albeit in a different colour. As for First, what a joke. Couple travelling together have a choice of a seat either side of the aircraft with a wall in the middle, or a claustrophobic box in the centre, with one having climb over the other. Dumbest thing I have seen ever, what committee decides this nonsense.
We bailed on LH group years ago, The Swiss seats are like sleeping on a narrow plank of wood, and LH still has mostly tight twos on the side, more night time clambering. As previous poster noted, just put in a quality reverse herring bone, or a Q Suite variation, and we will all be happy. It’s not brain surgery.
I've seen plenty of stupid comments on the internet and this one is up there near the very top.
As a German friend of mine one said, "An inherent Teutonic demand for perfection"
Sounds ridiculous. Personally I like their first class seats - they need to upgrade TV, that's for sure, as it's tiny and low definition. Business class seats should be changed completely.
They should just copy what Korean Air does to its 748 and it would be 10000 better
Thompson Aerospace (the seat manufacturer for Allegris) isn't excatly German...
For that, LH would have to go with Recaro instead.
Personally, I wish they'd just keep their fantastic current business class product for another 10-20 years.
I could be wrong, because memory is short. However, my recollection is that the original plan was to retire the B747-8i fleet already 2025-27 (something like this). I am not convinced the retrofit of this sub fleet was included in the original design. So for that matter, the specific ridicule of the B747-8i issue is perhaps overstated.
Having said that, the entire Allegris concept is a joke. In 2019, I had dinner with a very senior Lufthansa executive and I learned a few things:
* Despite the internal resistance to Premium Economy, it was the best revenue/margin utilization of the aircraft.
* First Class was an ever debate for the other reason. The total cost including dedicated lavatories and galleys. Back then, it was revealed that four seats was maximum.
* Swiss is always different due to the captive market around greater Zurich who are both loyal and willing to spend.
The "customer choices" of seven business classes options is nothing but an up-sell. Has nothing to do with our wishes. It's all about revenue management.
My wife said she would never want to sit next to me in the double seat in F. Who decides content on the screen? Even my five-year old son I wouldn't want next to me for that reason.
It's classical Lufthansa. Overthinking, overengineering, inside-out perspective.
Why would any airline want seats that are so heavy it throws off the weight of a plane? I mean, every kg adds cost over time. Surely it is not an insignificant cost to have such heavy seats...
What happened to all the eco-conscience steps airlines are allegedly taking, such as less paint, beverage & food trolleys etc. Adding weights in the tail to account for a heavier business class product?
Actually alot of those 747-*'s are pretty new planes. They easily get another 25-30 years from them and in my opinion its an opportunity to pull ton of business away from other transatlantic premium products from other airlines. They are the only airline flying the 747 which is, in my opinion, by far the best flying experience in the world. Whether up in the nose or on the upper deck - nothing quite feels like the 747. The A 380 feels like a bus in comparison. I for one hope that Lufthansa keeps them in the sky as long as possible.
The A380 rides smoother & quieter than the 747 and has more space on either deck.
You sound like another salty seattler