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As I blogged about in mid-September, British Airways recently launched their Club World London City service, an all business class product between New York JFK and London City Airport. It is operated by an A318 with only 32 business class seats. In this economy that’s a risky move, not to mention this is a tough market in general, given the number of all business class airlines that have failed.
In early October I was contacted by British Airways marketing (I assume based on the fact that my original post about Club World London City ranked pretty high on Google), and after they gave me a bit more product information they invited me to try out the new service. So in the interest of full disclosure the flight was comped, although they asked for my honest feedback on the product, which is exactly what I will provide. I wouldn’t be doing anyone a favor by giving inaccurate remarks, since I hope my positive comments can reinforce what they are doing well and that my constructive criticism can convince them to improve in some areas.
Anyway, after looking at my calendar I decided to wait until late October for the trip. The first half of the month was busy for me, so I decided to depart on a Tuesday and return on a Friday. That basically gave me 48 hours in London, coincidentally a city I have never visited, as pathetic as it might be.
British Airways has two flights a day in each direction as of mid-October, and the flight times are quite nice. I went with the following flights:
BA004 JFK-LCY 11:10PM-10:45AM+1
BA001 LCY-JFK 12:30PM-6:15PM
So why did I go with those flights? Well, the JFK-LCY flight time is brilliant for me. I like to take eastbound transatlantic flights that depart as late as possible so I can get some decent sleep. The other departure is at around 7PM which is a bit too early for me, although I realize it probably works better for people that need to work full days on both ends of the flight. As far as the return, the other flight is at 4PM, which I would have actually preferred, but the lure of flying BA001, “Speedbird One,” was too much to pass on.
As luck would have it I managed to snatch a $199 ticket on Delta to New York JFK to catch this flight (and as a Delta Platinum Medallion my upgrades cleared both ways), and I also managed to use my two free Priority Club nights from the promotion earlier this year for two nights at the InterContinental London Park Lane.
So there’s the intro. Sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride. A full report on all aspects of the trip is coming. Thanks for reading.
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