Paul,
I think a more interesting point is that a significant number of airlines have dropped first class on some/all of their long haul services, and many of these have also introduced premium economy services. The irony is…their new business class cabin has the same seat pitches as First would have had in the 80’s and 90’s and their premium economy products deliver seat pitch comparable to their old business class. So perhaps the truth is, in many markets fare levels required to sustain the ‘super-first’ product are not achievable. The airlines cannot however rename their business back to first class, because they would still be compared to those airlines operating the ‘super-first’ type seats!
Looking at
http://www.airlinequality.com/Product/seats_europe.htm
again, we can see:
Only 4 airlines have first class: Air France, British Airways, Lufthansa and Swiss. But even Swiss has 48 inches in business class, and BA has 73.
Airlines which have business class and no premium economy include
Aer Lingus – 52”
Aeroflot – 62”
Air Madrid – 47”
Alitalia – 55”
Austrian – 61”
Bmed – 50”
CSA – 47”
Delsey – 62”
Finnair – 63”
Iberia – 60”
KLM – 60”
Lauda – 50”
LOT – 57”
Olympic – 58”
Sabena – 62”
Spanair – 45”
THY – 54”
Airlines with business and premium economy include
bmi – 60”/38”
Excel – 45”/34”
SAS – 60”/37”
Virgin – 79”/38”
So… wherever the airlines are back at, it is not where they were in 1970-s before they invented business class, because then they had 42” and less in their highest class.
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