It’s a small gesture, but an important one: United Airlines is bringing back pre-arrival meals on longhaul flights in economy and premium economy class starting next month.
Hot Pre-Arrival Meals Return To Economy + Premium Economy Class On United Airlines
In a catering update to flight attendants shared with Live and Let’s Fly, United Airlines will be bringing back a more subtanatil pre-arrival service starting on May 1, 2022 on international flights longer than nine hours in both United Premium Plus (UPP) and and economy class:
International flights over nine hours in UPP and economy will receive a pre-arrival meal tray service with a hot entree.
Prior to the pandemic, the hot pre-arrival meals made economy class much more bearable on flights from the West Coast to Europe. In fact, the breakfast was often the same as business class, only served in plastic:
But during the pandemic that breakfast was reduced to a cookie and yogurt:
In another sign that things are slowly moving back to normal, United will be reintroducing the heartier pre-arrival meal.
Importantly, this comes not just for economy class but also for premium economy class, which has only received a small breakfast sandwich during the pandemic:
Premium Plus pre-arrival meals will now look like this:
Does it really matter? Does anyone choose an airline based upon food? While the answer is ostensibly no, consumers do notice the overall quality of a carrier and over time that can lead to loyalty and move consumers beyond purely price-based decision (that was certainly the case for me over the years).
The move will mean United offers a far better economy class dining experience than American Airlines, which serves a light snack pack prior to arrival on its flights between London and Los Angeles, despite being over 10 hours.
CONCLUSION
Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day and I am very happy to see United return a pre-pandemic favorite when I get stuck flying in the back. While a small move, it is meaningful in that it recognizes that economy class fares and demand have greatly rebounded, even surpassing 2019 levels in many markets.
Food can absolutely be a differentiator. For example, I sometimes have connections to Greece via FRA/MUC on LH tickets. Whether it’s in business or economy, the Aegean operated codeshares offer vastly superior catering to the flights op by Lufthansa, and that’s why I go for them and have them share some revenue with A3 instead of keeping it all. Similarly, if I am flying on a direct flight on a route with a lot of frequencies, catering can be a tiebreaker between two similarly priced airlines.
It’s intresting to see this, as I was flying UPP from DEN to OGG in Feb 2022 and I was more than surprised to have two full meals with a choice of two meals after the start and prio to landing. The flight is a little over 7 hours and leaves around 1130, so we started with lunch shortly after 1200.
I can recall the arival meal was a burger, which was according the “build on your own” style.
Interestingly, the Hawaiian flights have the best catering in the system…not sure why, since even DL and AA don’t offer something similar (though they offer a much better initial meal service).
While your sitting in the gate area and you see the crew carrying food for themselves to have something to eat.
Hint
Their either is no food service or we don’t want those chemical filled meals! So don’t be so fast to state the crew had their choice.
Everyone has a choice and it’s called don’t depend on the airline to have food or a choice! Take responsibility for yourself & your family!
The majority on this site seem to fly for the food before safety
Safety is a given on a U.S. carrier. A carrier wins no accolades for not crashing.
Find out when they are getting rid of that dreadful “revive” first class ‘snack’ box.
I sent a long email to the 1K support desk today complaining about the current food offerings. I listened to the United earnings call this week and Scott Kirby repeatedly said they are trying to become the best airline in the world, and while they have the hard pieces in place such as the best network, they need to step up the food. I fly domestic first class every week and I’ve been offered the same Italian ragu for a year straight. That is unacceptable and needs to change. The Polaris meals need to be restored to pre pandemic levels as well.
I choose airlines based on food.. for example.. I fly to Manila often.. Its 4 flights to get there on United.. TPA-IAH-HNL-GUM-MNL. No food is served from IAH to HNL (Around 8 hours) and then there is a 2 hour or less layover. Then there is another no food flight from HNL to GUM (Around 8 Hours) . Thats 18 hours without food… therefore I strongly believe bringing food to a flight is very important and passengers will be quite happy.
Good news: United now serves complimentary meals in coach on both IAH-HNL and HNL-GUM.
Wife flew from Ohio to HNL last Sunday. Paid cash to upgrade the 1st class 2 days prior. Her meal options? Vegetarian and the economy meals were blown out. Garbage. If it was it wouldve ripped the meals out of the staffs mouths cuz Im sure they got what they wanted.
Even for the pre-arrival meal? Ouch.
The price of eggs have doubled since pandemic. The restoration of dignity will cost united double. This is nothing to say about prices of food in general that have gone up through the roof.
Pretty soon people will ask if the excesses are justified when people are going hungry in the world, to which i ask, were you as vocal with your concerns when people were popping out more than two kids each? It’s time for malthus to be proven correct and I renew my call to castrate snyine with more than two kids that had ever taken government assistance, because those losers are biggest contributors to global warming and food insecurity.
I love to take my 6 kids to Europe twice a year, we all fly first class and eat whatever we want and as much as we ewant, we are doing fine. So what’s your point?
So, you are far from the norm! Maybe you are first class in your own plane.
How boastful you are. I’m glad I don’t know you.
Whoever thought that Scott Kirby coming to UA would actually improve service haha.
We had excellent meals first of this month PE SFO-EWR-LHR on UA Even ordered KSML ahead of time.
Return on the 12th LHR-DEN-PDX in Eco+ same story (except DEN-PDX was just snacks but we stopped by the CL in Denver).
We are booked to return from MNL on the milk run – good to hear that meals have been restored from GUM to the mainland – happy that UA metal is flying that route as we still have several grand in Amex Plat Travelbank funds to use up.
We Snagged some Polaris seats and Biz Saver for 60K to MNL last week during the sale.
We flew F/J PDX-SFO-CUN in February and the hot meal they offered to other pax didn’t look appetizing and no KSML avail out of SFO in February.
Meal makes a huge difference. Even for folks who takes east to west coast flight for a connection to somewhere else. Having some food inflight makes a huge difference in travel planning. We just took a ito-lax-ewr flight with 1.2 hour layover at LAX. I had to plan hard with clumsy food items so that we don’t starve on a 5+5 hour flights.
While I have long lamented airlines skimping on meals, the one exception was that little breakfast on East Coast to London/Paris flights in the old days. Maybe they still do it. If you left Boston at 8pm, you would have your dinner about 9pm. You arrive Paris about 2:50am Boston time, so your little breakfast snack gets to you about 2am Boston time. Who wants to east breakfast at 2am? Never understood that except as a way to help one adjust to the new time zone. But that never made me hungry. The airlines never got that one right in my opinion. A cup of OJ is all you need.
To be clear, this only impacts flights longer than nine hours (so mostly West Coast + Denver + Houston to Europe), so the BOS/EWR/IAD-LHR flights are not impacted.
Flying in most aspects these days compared 1960s and 70s leaves much to be desired. Even the boxed meals served on US military personnel passenger flights look better in comparison .
Dexter, what’s your point? Are you throwing the fact you all travel first class to europe twice a year? Or you all eat as much as you want for the privilege?
Nice looking improvements, if they will put the determination into making sure the caterer can support the effort for the next several years. I look forward to these efforts trickling down to my ATL-ORD and ORD-ATL flights. Bigger bags of pretzels, multiple pre-packaged cookie choices, and the addition of rooted beer to the non-alcoholic beverage selection. IF I desire anything beyond that, I can usually get a Chicago style hotdog to carry on the airliner. Lots of onions and mustard.
Looking forward to this…flying on United in the end of May in economy from SFO to Europe and glad that there will be some better food
I flew UA SFO-FRA last week (UA58, so typical of most of United’s west coast-Europe which depart mid- afternoon and arrives around 9-10am ) and returned CDG-IAD-SFO last night, all in Y. I would argue that the current food offering for transatlantic flights from the west coast arriving before noon is adequate, but maybe that’s just me since the breakfast I usually eat on the ground is about the same size as the continental breakfast most airlines serve on east coast-Europe (I tend to not be hungry in the morning and then eat more in the afternoon/evening). Also, a lot of these eastbound flights have people trying to maximize sleep.
What I would really like to see (if this is an either -or thing) is to have United invest in complimentary hot meals on select transcon flights (especially those with a lot of people connecting from long haul flights) and maybe serve something compact but still filling like muesli for breakfast on eastbound transatlantic routes. It seemed silly that we were served a full meal + pre-arrival sandwich on a 7.5 hour CDG-IAD flight while the 5 hour IAD-SFO flight departing at 6pm had only BOB snackboxes with no fresh options available.
Just returned from a round trip from Phl to Ord on United. Outbound in first class and return in economy exit row. From a flight standpoint all went extremely well with on time departures and earlier arrivals with safe travel conditions.
Service was another matter and quite disappointing even for a short haul route. As a 1k and 3m miler I have experienced many levels of service but this was surprisingly sparse. Always had to ask for a beverage whether in front or economy. On return when I asked FAs if this was standard service or some extenuating situation, they commented that taking a tray around cabin with oj and water was now the status quo. I like to think United is a step above the discount airlines but apparently not on short haul routes. I hope leadership rethinks it’s service package on such routes.
We flew UA Long Haul Premium Plus from DEN to MUC and back same route in early June on a 787-9. Schedule was flawless and aircraft condition was like new. However, the food was fair at best and arrival meal was still the “Covid” packaged format. FA’s were nice enough, but only offered bottled water in a plastic blue cup about every hour or so. I did request a “Baileys” on the rocks at the initial beverage service and was provided a full glass with no issues. The 787 is by far the best way to travel long haul as the reduced cabin altitude is far superior than any current 777 in service. Flying UA PP again this week from IAH to LHR and hope the meal service has improved considerably! By the way, Polaris Class is OK, but feel it is way overpriced for what the service provides. I’m 6′ 6″ tall and actually just as comfortable in PP with the enhanced recline and leg room / foot rests for far less $$$$.