As you may know, AA is rolling out Premium Economy on their long-haul fleet, which is basically a domestic F seat in a widebody. AA currently has a 10F/20C/36Y+/36Y config on their A321T subfleet, which primarily flies between JFK-LAX/SFO. Would it be worth AA's while to add 4-abreast Premium Economy on this subfleet, since it's a big jump from lie-flat business class to regular economy plus (or whatever AA calls it)? I could see a configuration like 10F/20C/8PE/24Y+/36Y. I don't know if AA would want to fragment their product so much on these transcon routes when they could just cede the PE market to Alaska, but I think customers would appreciate the extra choice.

I don't see the interest of doing this. Because the A321T is already configured in four different classes, if you consider Y and Y+ as two separate cabins. It's not even a wide body. It only seats 102 people in all classes. Customers who are flying Economy (Y) already have the choice to upgrade to Main Cabin Extra (Y+).

717atOGG wrote:

As you may know, AA is rolling out Premium Economy on their long-haul fleet, which is basically a domestic F seat in a widebody. AA currently has a 10F/20C/36Y+/36Y config on their A321T subfleet, which primarily flies between JFK-LAX/SFO. Would it be worth AA's while to add 4-abreast Premium Economy on this subfleet, since it's a big jump from lie-flat business class to regular economy plus (or whatever AA calls it)? I could see a configuration like 10F/20C/8PE/24Y+/36Y. I don't know if AA would want to fragment their product so much on these transcon routes when they could just cede the PE market to Alaska, but I think customers would appreciate the extra choice.

The A321 can have economy premium at five abreast. Could this be an option for AA?

reidar76 wrote:

717atOGG wrote:

As you may know, AA is rolling out Premium Economy on their long-haul fleet, which is basically a domestic F seat in a widebody. AA currently has a 10F/20C/36Y+/36Y config on their A321T subfleet, which primarily flies between JFK-LAX/SFO. Would it be worth AA's while to add 4-abreast Premium Economy on this subfleet, since it's a big jump from lie-flat business class to regular economy plus (or whatever AA calls it)? I could see a configuration like 10F/20C/8PE/24Y+/36Y. I don't know if AA would want to fragment their product so much on these transcon routes when they could just cede the PE market to Alaska, but I think customers would appreciate the extra choice.

The A321 can have economy premium at five abreast. Could this be an option for AA?

Not really, because AA's Premium Economy seats are the same as Domestic F which would be 4-abreast.

The aircraft already barley holds 100 passengers. They are probably already making a lot of revenue off of F and J so it's probably not worthwhile

717atOGG wrote:

I don't know if AA would want to fragment their product so much

That's exactly what this proposal would do. It's worth noting, I think, that many comparable carriers overseas treat W as somewhat-improved Economy hard product but with many of the perks and soft-product touches from Business. There are some exceptions, of course - Aeroflot's Comfort Class comes to mind, which is much closer to an Asian carrier's regional J - but by far and away most carriers offering W deliberately keep it far away from their full J offering.

To use QF's long-haul configuration as an example:
On the 747-400, W is 2-4-2 at 38" against Y at 3-4-3 31"
On the 787-9, W is 2-3-2 at 38" against Y at 3-3-3 32"
and they don't offer an Economy Plus other than exit and bulkhead rows which are treated as normal Economy, but either withheld for passengers with status or sold for early selection at higher prices.

I could see it happening if AA introduced a modified W to replace Y+ (so Y-style seats at 4- or 5-abreast with pitch around 36 or 37 inches with meal offerings closer to J), and even then on such a small aircraft it's dubious, but either way definitely not as an additional class.

I could see premium economy, similar to standard domestic first, being offered on the A321T if AA decided to remove F or reduce J. Adding PE while keeping F and J the same would drop seat count below 100 which may not be sustainable.

The A321T classes are already sliced enough, no one has put a true Y+ on an A320 yet. Y+ is an international product not an domestic even from LAX to JFK, if AA used a 777 that would be another issue.

The A321T classes are already sliced enough, no one has put a true Y+ on an A320 yet. Y+ is an international product not an domestic even from LAX to JFK, if AA used a 777 that would be another issue.

No because those planes are already too premium heavy. I would actually argue that perhaps American should be using internationally-configured planes on JFK-LAX and JFK-SFO (Delta uses only internationally-configured planes JFK-LAX and JFK-SFO, where every seat has Delta One, and UA is using p.s. and international planes between EWR and SFO and LAX.) Perhaps AA could compete better by flying a B789 JFK-LAX and JFK-SFO, as they have 30 J and 21 W class (W is the same as domestic F). There is less F/J on the B789 than the 32B fleet, but more W seats. (I say the B789 instead of the B772 or B77W because they're lighter planes, although I have seen AA fly a B77W from MIA to JFK.)

jfk777 wrote:

The A321T classes are already sliced enough, no one has put a true Y+ on an A320 yet. Y+ is an international product not an domestic even from LAX to JFK, if AA used a 777 that would be another issue.

DL’s and AA’s international Y+ product is essentially the same as their domestic F product.

They could do it. The BE MiQ seat (which they use for Premium Economy) can easily fit at 5-abreast in an A321 fuselage (and a 737 Fuselage for that matter), and so could ZIMFlugsitz ZIMMagic (which Singapore Airlines uses for their Premium Economy).

The issue is "should" or "would" they. Its possible but honestly I don't know. It may depend on how they position/reposition Main Cabin Extra for one, and what the market segmentation is.

Business Class on the 321T, ar least on LAX-JFK, runs at 100 percent load factor across all flights. Upgrades are rare. Creating a Premium Economy could potentially cause a "bleed-off" of fare-paying passengers from Business. The question would be, "What is the tipping point whereby the incremental value of passengers "buying up" from Coach to Premium Economy would exceed the loss of revenue from Business?"

AA's 321T offers a very nice product and runs at very high load factors in all cabins consistently. I don't see it happening.

This would remove too many seats.

Flyers already have the choice of economy if they want the lowest fare, Main Cabin extra if they want more legroom, splurge for Business if they want real space, or really splurge for First class if they want privacy and space. There would be zero need for it, so many options already.

aemoreira1981 wrote:

No because those planes are already too premium heavy. I would actually argue that perhaps American should be using internationally-configured planes on JFK-LAX and JFK-SFO

Um.... they are.

Their A32Ts are one of only two models in their fleet that has an int'l configured F product.

F on this plane is probably too big by 2 seats but the door configuration makes anything else difficult. J could probably be 4 seats bigger but see above. Y is probably just right. Lots of trips on this plane and you see patterns of who is sitting where and how many upgrades get through and how many staff are in F. Given the cabin limitations imposed by the doors I think AA has this aircraft about as good as it can get.