No Starclass?

[sydstar]

I have just come back from HNL before Easter - travelled Star. JQ3/4

When we were leaving, the checkin girl SYD said something like JQ are upgrading and shortly there will no longer be any Star.Class. She also mentioned the revamped web site. The class was to be called business. I still can't interpret this. (Although Star is still available on the web site since the web upgrade)

Another point, departing HNL(20/04) there was a QANTAS flight which was leaving about 2hrs later for SYD -767 aircraft. Didn't take any notice of the flight number.

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Surely JQ must be kidding themeselves if they are going to call *C 'Business' officially - everyone knows *C is not even comparable on long-haul J on the likes of QF, VA, EK, EY, NZ, et al - pricing had better not change too significantly...

 

[Awesom Andy]

Surely JQ must be kidding themeselves if they are going to call *C 'Business' officially - everyone knows *C is not even comparable on long-haul J on the likes of QF, VA, EK, EY, NZ, et al - pricing had better not change too significantly...

If I was running the joint, I would've "re-classed" them as Y+ a long time ago, and priced them as per normal discounted economy class tickets from full service airlines. In return for a bigger seat, you lose the support of a full-service airline which, for non-essential travel, would probably have a bigger appeal given a LCC's target market.

 

[oz_mark]

Surely JQ must be kidding themeselves if they are going to call *C 'Business' officially - everyone knows *C is not even comparable on long-haul J on the likes of QF, VA, EK, EY, NZ, et al - pricing had better not change too significantly...

They refer to it as business class now....and FWIW my last flight SIN-MEL did appear to have business travellers on board.

However, there have been whispers of them lifting the quality of the product.

 

[Robmn]

See post #11 of this thread.

May have been QF4 flight which is a 767. Where would they send a 767 for maintenance? Certainly didn't have a flight number inconsistant with the general numbering.

 

[eastwest101]

May have been QF4 flight which is a 767. Where would they send a 767 for maintenance? Certainly didn't have a flight number inconsistant with the general numbering.

Besides maintenence on a JQ A330 as others have mentioned - Maybe a permanent positioning flight to retire a QF B767? i.e. kick off or reschedule some JQ pax booked on the original JQ3/4 A330, and get revenue for a B767 positioning flight via Honolulu and then onwards to the desert/scapyard or for sale? It frees up an A330 for that day, and gets revenue for a ferry flight that would have been non-revenue and have to tech stop in Honolulu for fuel anyway.

 

[sr81]

If I was running the joint, I would've "re-classed" them as Y+ a long time ago, and priced them as per normal discounted economy class tickets from full service airlines. In return for a bigger seat, you lose the support of a full-service airline which, for non-essential travel, would probably have a bigger appeal given a LCC's target market.

They do, bought OOL-NRT-OOL for $900 round trip today in Star for travel in June. Given that CX, JL etc are all $1200+ in economy this was a complete no brainer.

 

[eastwest101]

Once james1 or sniksnak get back from their holiday we may actually find out what happened on the flight in question.... I bet they are still lying on a beach chair somewhere....

 

[Robmn]

Besides maintenence on a JQ A330 as others have mentioned - Maybe a permanent positioning flight to retire a QF B767? i.e. kick off or reschedule some JQ pax booked on the original JQ3/4 A330, and get revenue for a B767 positioning flight via Honolulu and then onwards to the desert/scapyard or for sale? It frees up an A330 for that day, and gets revenue for a ferry flight that would have been non-revenue and have to tech stop in Honolulu for fuel anyway.

Well it was HNL - SYD flight.

But another thing June last year saw a smaller A/C (737 think - not good view.) at LAX.which was unusual in itself. Maybe this was a ferry flight from Seattle.

 

[Robmn]

They do, bought OOL-NRT-OOL for $900 round trip today in Star for travel in June. Given that CX, JL etc are all $1200+ in economy this was a complete no brainer.

Yep noticed that this afternoon - good fare.

 

[lovestotravel]

Interesting to see what happens here

I doubt the product will be improved much until the 787's come along

The Qantas A330's with the 2-3-2 J layout were designed to be interchanged with the J* fleet...

 

[JohnPhelan]

The Qantas A330's with the 2-3-2 J layout were designed to be interchanged with the J* fleet...

Yes they were - BUT the situation has changed, with QF deciding that its domestic A330s will be configured 2-2-2 (and the couple of aircraft that carry the original configuration will be changed back to 2-2-2).

So ..... does that mean JQ may change Star Class to 2-2-2 ? If not, then the interchangeability issue will be a major problem.

 

[Awesom Andy]

It's still a 2-3-2 config, with the middle seat being converted to a semi-permanent workspace. I would assume they can be easily removed/installed so interchangability between JQ and QF would not be an issue.

 

[lovestotravel]

It's still a 2-3-2 config, with the middle seat being converted to a semi-permanent workspace. I would assume they can be easily removed/installed so interchangability between JQ and QF would not be an issue.

Yep that's what I have heard as well, so QF are not going back to 2-2-2 but instead blocking the middle seat from being booked and it's a semi-permanent space for stuff.

This keeps interchangeability between JQ and QF easy

 

[V1213]

If I was running the joint, I would've "re-classed" them as Y+ a long time ago, and priced them as per normal discounted economy class tickets from full service airlines. In return for a bigger seat, you lose the support of a full-service airline which, for non-essential travel, would probably have a bigger appeal given a LCC's target market.

Jetstar could always go the other way, like AirAsiaX.
I wonder how well D7 does with it's "Premium" class. They're the other large long haul LCC in the region and they have lie flat seats compared to Jetstar's domestic J / long haul Y+ seats. Although, D7's "Premium" seems to be more expensive than Star Class.

 

[mannej]

Jetstar could always go the other way, like AirAsiaX.
I wonder how well D7 does with it's "Premium" class. They're the other large long haul LCC in the region and they have lie flat seats compared to Jetstar's domestic J / long haul Y+ seats. Although, D7's "Premium" seems to be more expensive than Star Class.

What is the capability of the JQ A332's to have Skybed/flat beds installed. I remember that some of the A332's did not have this capability as the floor was not enforced enough to be able to handle the Skybed.

 

[MH_fan]

Jetstar could always go the other way, like AirAsiaX.
I wonder how well D7 does with it's "Premium" class. They're the other large long haul LCC in the region and they have lie flat seats compared to Jetstar's domestic J / long haul Y+ seats. Although, D7's "Premium" seems to be more expensive than Star Class.

Well, if they're planning to fly to Europe, they need to seriously consider it in order to compete with AirAsiaX.

 

[oz_mark]

Well, if they're planning to fly to Europe, they need to seriously consider it in order to compete with AirAsiaX.

The original A332's, with the not so strong floor, didn't really have the legs to get to Europe anyway.

 

[Awesom Andy]

I won't expect JQ/3K to fly to Europe until the 787s arrive. And when they do, I would expect them to be sent/leased/lent to 3K in SIN, similar to the arrangement they currently have for the SIN-MEL/AKL sectors.

AirAsiaX has marketed their premium product as a flat seat, which JQ can't do at the moment. AirAsiaX also never promised/marketed it as a "business-class" product, which truthfully speaking, wouldn't really qualify as a normal long-haul business product anyway.

As a marketing* exercise, I think AirAsiaX has done extremely well - we've got flat seats to Europe, and you can get it if you pay us a bit more, and pax have responded to that. JQ tries to sell all the bells and whistles along with StarClass, but in the end, you only get a slightly larger version of the cattle class seat, so pax can't see the value in that, especially when they chose to forgo all the bells and whistles in the first place by choosing to fly on a LCC.

While I haven't looked at AirAsiaX sales, whenever JQ/3K has one of those really crazy sale on in SIN, for routes with StarClass, all the JetSaver tickets would disappear within hours, while virtually all of the StarClass tickets would remain unsold througout the entire promotion.

*When I say "marketing", I don't mean just selling, but using the more academic terms of identifying a need/want and how these can be resolved.

 

[medhead]

If I was running the joint, I would've "re-classed" them as Y+ a long time ago, and priced them as per normal discounted economy class tickets from full service airlines.

When there was newspaper discussion of JQ flying to Europe the stated approach was to price starclass at the full economy level. Rating it as business allows you to charge at that level. IMO protests about it not being business class are missing the bigger picture. What you get as a package at the same price as full economy, and cheaper from sales, is better than economy.

 

[TheInsider]

When there was newspaper discussion of JQ flying to Europe the stated approach was to price starclass at the full economy level. Rating it as business allows you to charge at that level. IMO protests about it not being business class are missing the bigger picture. What you get as a package at the same price as full economy, and cheaper from sales, is better than economy.

I agree. What people have to remember JQ isn't comparing it's cabin to other business class products. JQ's product is JQ's product, and it's Jetstars business class.