An intriguing hint about the new British Airways Club World business class seat

Links on Head for Points may pay us an affiliate commission. A list of partners is here.

As most Head for Points readers know, British Airways is launching a new Club World business class seat this year.

It will debut on the A350 fleet when they are delivered, with retrofitting commencing at the same time on the Boeing 777 fleet. By Christmas there will be six aircraft with the new seat. Oddly, they will not be used to fly on ‘flagship’ routes such as New York because there is no First Class on the A350.

My expectations for the seat are not high. My money has been, at best, that we get the Iberia seat on their A350 fleet which I reviewed here. BA has confirmed that the TV will be fixed to the back of the seat in front, which supports the Iberia thesis. Everything we know about the way British Airways behaves leads to that.

British Airways BA 777X 777 9X

And yet …..

British Airways has launched a questionnaire via its Future Lab customer panel to shape the name of the new seat.

Let’s ignore, for a second, the fact that asking people to suggest names for something that they haven’t seen is not necessarily sensible.

Four concepts are presented:

Name it in a way that describes the product

Name it with a model number, like an iPhone (eg Club World XIX as it will launch in 2019)

Name it using a random word pulled out of the air (eg Club World Vector, Contrail, Ventral)

Name it using an evolutionary phrase (eg New Club World, New Generation Club World)

Here are the examples for the first option:

This is very interesting.

We have to assume that whoever set this questionnaire has seen the new seat. This means that ‘Club Suite’, ‘Club World Suite’ and ‘Club World Space’ are being seriously considered as names.

Now, there is chutzpah and there is chutzpah. I doubt even the most confident marketing guru would call the new Iberia business class seat a ‘suite’. The same goes for the American Airlines seat.

Yes, they are very impressive. Yes, I like to fly them and I would be happy if British Airways introduced them, but they are not ‘suites’ in the sense the word is used now.

In 2019, a ‘suite’ on a plane, if you follow the definition used by Qatar Airways with their business class Qsuite:

Qsuite

….. has a door which opens and closes.

See also the new Emirates First Class Suite which – spoiler alert – I am flying on Thursday and am quite excited about:

Whilst it seems hard to believe, there is a chance that British Airways is really planning to launch a Club World ‘suite’ with a door. This is a phrase I never expected to write.

How to earn Avios points from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards. Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways BA Amex American Express card

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways BA Premium Plus American Express Amex credit card

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points, such as:

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital On Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios:

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company Read our full review

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus:

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

(Want to earn more Avios? Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)

Category

British Airways and Avios

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

JK says:

30 Jan30 January 06:24

The most important question about the new seat is whether the pitch / length will be increased so that fully grown adults can actually lie flat as described. How they they got away with calling that mini bed ‘fully flat’ without asterisk, small print and disclaimers is amazing.
- BJ says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 07:38
  
  Are you suggesting we are not fully grown adults if we fit a CW seat?
- Alan says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 07:42
  
  Eh? The CW bed is wide open and better than many that stick your feet in a foot ‘cubby’ making it difficult to turn on your side.
- Tilly says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 11:16
  
  I am a fully grown adult and fit perfectly on the CW seat/bed with room to spare.
Nick says:

30 Jan30 January 06:34

future lab topic and came with strict warning about not sharing – guess BA won’t be happy it’s on head for points.
- Rob says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 07:10
  
  I’m not in Future Lab.
- Mr B says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 07:59
  
  Rob is so anti BA, I doubt they have ever been happy with anything he’s written.
  - Rob says:
    
    30 Jan30 January 08:36
    
    There is a lot I like about BA. CW is not one of those things. If you had flown most major business class products you would be mad to think otherwise.
    
    A lot of HFP readers, mainly those who spend their own money on travel, think I am too soft on BA.
    - BJ says:
      
      30 Jan30 January 12:01
      
      Well, I certainly disagree and I pay around half my flights in cash. I still believe differences between J seats on airlines are overhyped. A good example was the first 121 J seats on SQ a380 and 777. People raved about them but to me they felt like a bench, slid all over them, they had a really weird width to pitch ratio and you had to sleep diagonally across them. Give me CW any day. I think it all comes down to whether you fit the seat comfotably or not, too tall, too heavy and all that. I like CW as a seat and a bed, I like that the TV is not fixed, I like that you can sit on adjacent seats and be face to face with travelling companion, I like that if travelling alone it offers reasonale privacy. Most of time on flights I sleep so I don’t care about anything as long as I’m sleeping comfortanly which all comes back to whether we fit the seat.
  - ChrisC says:
    
    30 Jan30 January 08:42
    
    Lol Rob is many things but he is so not anti BA.
    
    If he is so anti them why would he write so many articles about them and also provide useful info like the routes that you can earn 160 tier points on?
    - TripRep says:
      
      30 Jan30 January 09:32
      
      IMHO, Rob is balanced about BA, reports the good, the bad and Mr HiVizVest 😀
  - Doug M says:
    
    30 Jan30 January 10:55
    
    Would it not be fair to say Rob writes a lot about BA because this is a UK website so….. Also, and I think it’s biggest critic would accept this, BAEC is a very good FF program, so there’s room to leverage real benefit without being a true frequent flyer, Tesco, 2-4-1. I don’t agree with Rob on the BA seat, I do think he’s over critical on something I personally find very comfortable. But it doesn’t matter, you fly and decide yourself, after that who really cares what someone else thinks.
Rich says:

30 Jan30 January 06:48

Someone, indeed many people on the inside, knows what the new seat will look like – it’s amazing that there have been no leaks as of yet.
- BJ says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 07:42
  
  A bit like iphone, nobody bothers spilling the beans because it looks much the same as the previous one. Unlike iphone I hope they don’t decide to use old parts from their competitors to put together their new model.
- ChrisC says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 08:43
  
  Same as the new Vs seat. Lots of conjecture but no leaks either.
S P says:

30 Jan30 January 06:49

Rob, are you overlooking the fact that ba already describe existing first as “suites” on their website despite being nothing close to the examples you mention? Not sure this implies a door at all.
Hunter says:

30 Jan30 January 07:10

BA already describe their F seat as a suite, and that doesn’t have a door.
BJ says:

30 Jan30 January 07:30

Suite is just given as an example? it could simply be meaningless. When IAG order new aircraft now don’t they do so in such a way that they can be deployed and switched between BA, IB and Vuelling? If so that points to the IB seat. Also, I just don’t see BA going for anything that markedly reduces their CW density; why should they when they can easily sell current CW at twice the price of say QR or AY? Only way I see this being a propersuite is if BA plans to totally ditch First in the medium term.
Paul says:

30 Jan30 January 07:39

More jam tomorrow from the world leaders in jam tomorrow stories. Nothing to see here move on
Daniel Evans says:

30 Jan30 January 07:57

Seaty McSuite Seat.
- LB says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 08:20
  
  🙂
- Nick_C says:
  
  30 Jan30 January 08:24
  
  Genuinely laughing out loud at that one!