It’s time to start calling out the mainstream media on fake upgrade and premium cabin stories.
Several days ago a friend at United Airlines forwarded me an internal communication heralding the high ranking of United Polaris from Harper’s Bazaar. I laughed out loud. According to Harper’s the top 1o business class products include:
- Emirates
- United Airlines (Polaris)
- Finnair (A350)
- Delta Air Lines (Delta One Suites)
- Turkish Airlines
- TAP Portugal
- LATAM
- Air France
- South African Airways
- Norwegian (Premium Class)
This list just boggles my mind. For someone who reviews business class products for a living, I find it a laughably ignorant list.
How about ANA, Cathay Pacific, Etihad, EVA, JAL, Qatar or Singapore? Surely there is room for debate, but not a single Asian carrier appeared on the list. It is simply not a reasonable list by any objective measurement.
I filed the story in my trash can and moved on.
But yesterday United tweeted about it–
Number 1 business class of all US Airlines – Thanks @harpersbazaarus! #DreamPolaris https://t.co/HpCm46fSda pic.twitter.com/fnOPiEdNfQ
— United Airlines (@united) February 28, 2018
One Mile at a Time promptly covered it, giving the story the due scorn it deserved.
And perhaps that is the best way to deal with these stories. Because it’s not just that the list seemed arbitrary…and dare I say driven by ad revenue or some other concern than the truth. The main problem was the mistruths in the story.
Confronting Mistruth
For example, in discussing United Polaris–
United Airlines has rolled out a fantastic new business class experience on all intercontinental flights called Polaris. On these flights, the central focus of booking business class is sleep. If you’re traveling on an overnight flight, you can expect a completely lie-flat bed that can fit even the tallest of the bunch, at 6 feet, 6 inches in length.
Only that’s simply not true. United has rolled out its new Polaris seat on just a handful of routes. The vast majority of the fleet still features the old business class seats.
How about Finnair, one of my favorite airlines?
Leave it to Finland to design one of the most visually stunning business class experiences in the world (and the clouds). Flying from one of the airline’s U.S. gateways like New York, Chicago or Miami gives you an opportunity to sit-back and enjoy the large cabin of the Airbus A350 XWB, which delivers you to your destination flawlessly–without feeling like you’ve been on an airplane for hours.
Small problem. Finnair does not fly the A350 to/from the USA. But I do concede it is a beautiful aircraft.
One more. Air France.
Seats aboard Air France’s business class are lay-flat for even the tallest of passengers–they stretch to six feet and five inches long.
I wish that were true and the new business class seats abroad the 787-9 and 777-3ooER look great. But many Air France planes, including the flagship A380, do not have true lie-flat beds in business class. Instead, Air France uses “angle-flat” seats that slope downward in the fully-reclined position.
There were further examples, but you get the point.
Secret Comps
The author, has a nice website. He claims to travel over 200,000 miles per year and has visited more than 80 countries. But his advice is sloppy and his experience too narrow, it seems to me, to offer accurate advice.
And then there’s the issue of comps. Airlines and hotels love to comp. In fact, that’s why many turn to blogging. And since disclosure rules are a bit murky, we often never know what was free, what an author paid for, or what an author was paid to write. Like in this case.
Standards
My blog is built upon honest, reliable, fair, and consistent reviews and analysis. I will take “media trips” once in awhile, but that is the exception and not the norm. When I do take them, they are clearly disclosed…like my Singapore trip on United. And as you well know, I had already published dozens of fair, sometimes scathing, United reviews before the flight and that impartiality has continued after.
I would hope that more mainstream media outlets would hold their writers to similar standards. The recent upgrade article in Bloomberg and now this story indicate an opening for talented writers who actually know what they are talking about.
While poorly-researched stories riddled with mistruths are nothing new, I’ll do my part in my small niche of the travel world to #keepthemhonest.
“It’s time to start calling out the mainstream media on fake upgrade and premium cabin stories.”
I have been doing that for years, my friend. I am glad my colleagues are on board with calling out these articles with misleading advice…
Leaving out JAL and Oman, both of which use the Apex suites for business class, is insane. Oman doesn’t fly to the US but JAL’s Apex business class is available on multiple routes to and from the US mainland. Lazy reporting, lazy editorial standards.
How did you not point out the most ridiculous one on the list….Norwegian???
American isn’t on this list, even though their hard product on the 77W is quite excellent (the soft product needs improvement though). Virgin Australia has one of the best business class products on the planet, yet it isn’t listed either.
How on earth Norwegian’s “Premium Class” features on this list is baffling, as is the lack of qualification for the European carriers with their awful short-haul “eurobusiness” non-product.
QR is not listed. Neither are SQ, CX, NH, JL,OZ, KE, etc. Heck, there are plenty of other carriers that, while not offering top notch products would beat those in the list.
We laugh when Skytrax gives LH their 5 star because somewhere in the next 5 years they’ll introduce a business class that is barely competitive today. The list featured above could only be from the Onion Travel department …
Thanks for writing this. I commented on onemileatatime as well. The people behind these poorly written articles need to be called out. These post you and Ben wrote about this are a joy to read.
That Inspired Citizen guy just looks like someone you want to punch in the face.
I believe airlines simply pay to be on these lists… not worth paying attention to at all.
Clearly they hadn’t forked out the $$ to try all of the airlines. It was, however; a great distraction to the orange headed sh*t gibbon
It’s people like these that give the rest a bad name.
Cash ( or in-kind) for comment is pretty normal at the sleazy end of the travel blog industry. That is one reason, of many, I prefer to read sites such as this one…the integrity of the author is not in question ( even if some of his judgements/opinions are, ie , as it should be). Maybe 8-10 travel blogs pass the ‘sniff test’ but some are decidedly ‘on the nose’
It becomes problematic when mainstream publications pass off nonsense as fact.
Is it too much to ask for airline reviews that actually describe the flavor of the dishes served, how the wine pairs with the menu items, how the crew pays attention to details and special needs are met? When certain blogger raves about scrambled eggs, oatmeal and diet cokes in F, all I can say is oy vey!
You know…I have to say that it seems to me that what the author wrote is an opinion piece. It’s something that is an opinion based on his experience. We don’t know if he’s flown the other airlines you list, or if he hasn’t. But, he does a good job of describing the experience on board. At the end of the day, the Harpers reader probably doesn’t care about which aircraft is on which route.
I’ve flown all those he listed and many of the Asian carriers. They’re all good – in their own way. It seems he lists Norwegian because you can’t beat the price, which is very true.
This seems like an attack and not very constructive. Are people upset because his list is in Harpers and not yours? I’m not sure. But, there will be many more lists from many other authors in the future. No reason to try and tear someone down.
His list is not objectively acceptable, but the bigger issue is that his writing is sloppy and riddled with factual errors. I point out three blatant errors above.
Matt,
Did you know that Finnair did operate the A350XWB on the NY route at one time and now flies it from Helsinki to Bangkok and other Asian routes? He does mention Asian routes as a focus in his blurb about them. Though they might not fly that aircraft to JFK any longer, as we know, airlines switch up planes and never guarantee a specific aircraft on a route. So, in actuality, they could reschedule an A330 and use an A350XWB on this route at any time. No?
I do. But that was for month two years ago. I don’t hate the author or think his intent was necessarily malicious. Just very disappointing.
I think we shouldn’t complain… let people book these subpar products with their life savings of points and then be out of the system. More for the informed.
This is no different than the attention the media pays to anything else. The topic doesn’t matter, we just happen to be expert in this one. Let them talk, it doesn’t hurt our strategy. Keep the useful knowledge away from the masses. We don’t need every tom dick and harry knowing how to accumulate and transfer SPG to Alaska to then use on JL.
Let them transfer 60k UR to UA from their one big cc sign up and use it for a RT econ to Europe for that “once in a lifetime” trip.
I agree with the article. I just flew Turkish Business, and it was an outstanding experience. Of course there are more than 10 different carriers that offer unique and luxurious business class options, but this is one travel experts opinion. Just because you have a difference of opinion doesn’t mean the writer is wrong. Im actually more disgusted with this comment section. To all of you ‘men’ that sit behind a computer and spew rants and threats that you want to punch someone in the face because you feel intimidated by someone else’s success, grow up. It’s people like you that discredit the blogs that you are commenting on in the first place. I suggest next time before you type a negative personal attack on someone…. look in the mirror, and contemplate why your life has gotten to the point on why you feel the need to comment on a travel blog that you want to punch someone in the face. I feel sorry for you that you don’t have better things to do with your time.
I had a look at the website, just for interest. It’s an attractive, well-designed site. Checked one of the hotel reviews ( The Muse, Bangkok, a Sofitel Boutique property, a hotel I rather like).
His ‘review’doesn’t say when he was there, how long he stayed, not even ballpark cost, says nothing about how to get there, doesn’t mention affiliation, no photo of the bedroom ( the photos there are look suspiciously like professional hotel ones), no photos of the food ( doesn’t describe a single dish he ate), claims to have had a room overlooking the river….interesting as the hotel is in Soi Langsuan and has absolutely no view of the river ( maybe an old klong, whatever), not within a bull’s roar.
The bedroom has “sexy glass partitions diving (sic) the shower from the sleeping area”
It’s a pathetic review ( far, far better can be found on FT any day of the week) and raises in my mind doubts over wether this guy has actually been there. Maybe he has but the review is so thin on key detail, and just wrong on others, that it looks a bit fake to me.
Pity because it’s a nice hotel and it deserves better.
Agree. Sad reviews.