JetBlue Unveils Its First-Ever Premium Lie-Flat Seats

Image via Flickr/ saaby

JetBlue Airlines has revealed what its first-ever business class seats will look like when they roll out in the Spring.

The cabin will sit 16 customers, including four suite-style seats with private sliding doors and twelve seats arranged in typical two-by-two fashion. The seats will easily convert into sleeper-style beds, and come with larger screens and premium meals.

Image via JetBlue

Image via JetBlue

An APEX editor’s blog wrote of its features:

JetBlue is not approaching the premium cabin layout in the same way as other airlines, which segregate the first class seats from business class. Rather, the seats are staggered in the same space allowing the airline to maximize cabin density while still offering a 6’ 8” flat bed to all customers in that cabin. In addition to the spacious seat the business class offering will include a 15” touch-screen TV with more than 100 channels of DirecTV, in-seat power (2x 110v plus 2x USB at each seat) and Fly-Fi, JetBlue’s satellite-based WiFi connection which will offer the most bandwidth of any in-flight connectivity option.”

The Wall Street Journal writes “the new seats are an admission that JetBlue has been missing out on the most profitable part of the market — premium seats — although it said it holds its own in revenue on a coach-class comparison with larger rivals.”

Introducing JetBlue’s New Interior Design from JetBlue on Vimeo.

The initial offering of premium seats rolling out in the Spring will be available on 11 aircrafts to customers flying between New York City’s JFK, Los Angeles, and San Francisco—flights where the company sees the most wealthy passengers and business travelers.

We decided to enter the premium transcontinental market in a way that only JetBlue can: with an intense focus on offering the best possible product for the best possible price,” JetBlue CEO told APEX.

Scott Laurence, JetBlue’s vice president of network planning mentioned to the Journal that the addition of the premium cabin “is a big change for us culturally” and that JetBlue, as a discount airline, will price its business class seats at a  “significant reduction” from its competitors.

An Aug. 5 search on Routehappy.com from USA Today found that, “for a midweek New York-Los Angeles itinerary with 7-days’ advance purchase turned up business-class fares on rivals’ nonstop flights that ranged from $2,854 from Newark to more than $4,000 from JFK.”

JetBlue aims its prices to fall somewhere in betweens, the Journal says.

In a mock-up aircraft plan, an area of the business class section is labeled “secret”—though no official word has been given on what the “secret” is, some people have speculated it may be a stand-up bar or self-service area.