The Zephyr premium economy airline seat
flyertalk.com
flyertalk.com
https://vimeo.com/394558118 shows (from 00:33) how it works in more detail. Ladder pulls out from between the seats (although see http://www.zephyrseat.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Zephyr-... for newer built-in ladder design), and arm rest holds upper chair passengers in place. The cushion that completes the bed appears to fold out from just below tray table.
Luggage goes to upper right of seat, so is securely stored and accessible during flight, a win versus traditional overhead lockers. Seat appears to be a little lower than normal. It looks like there is some additional storage space to the right of the footwell.
Main issues I see are slightly awkward banana shaped sleeping position, and the safety issue for evacuating top deck. The updated built-in ladder design might be sufficient for able-bodied passengers to evacuate quickly enough.
This would be much more attractive than existing premium economy to me and would compete well with business. The main differentiator of business that interests me is the lie-flat bed; the enhanced service and food / beverages, lounge access, and priority boarding and luggage delivery is less important.
More details at http://www.zephyrseat.com/, a few additional videos here http://www.zephyrseat.com/about/ and further pictures here http://www.zephyrseat.com/work/
An alternative flat bed in a premium economy cabin with half the density is described here https://thepointsguy.com/news/new-design-premium-economy-fla...
These seats produce the same cabin density at today's premium economy, while trying to offer a business-class-lite experience.
Airlines might buy these, because if they can differentiate premium economy a bit more from regular economy, they might be able to sell more of it.
Most airlines are installing only 25-30 seats in their premium economy classes, even on big birds like 777-300. If this makes the class more appealing, they may be able to install 40 seats or more instead.
The fact that they are stacked, and that they don't lie flat, will keep them sufficiently distinct from true business class not to cannibalize business class sales.
But, these seats won't leave room for overhead lockers. The seats have an amount of small-item storage that will feel extremely generous in Premium Economy, but without the lockers, there's no storage for bigger bags.
This is also not an unsolvable problem, but airlines are exceptionally risk-averse and change-averse, so it'll take some real convincing.
And then there's the accessibility and safety issues with the ladders to resolve and the question of how people will feel about the low ceiling clearance (will it feel premium? especially to people who aren't regular travelers)
I do hope some airline tries it. There is a ton of room to make air travel different, but airlines are all very fearful, staid entities. For the most part, airlines consider themselves bold if they buy the same Recaro seat as every other airline, but in unique color or fabric combination.
Given trends in economy class and how carry-on suitcase traffic jams are at times causing flight delays, I can see a future where carryon suitcases are no longer permitted for economy class passengers. We’re already on this slippery slope.
Of course, enforcement is hard. Airlines moving toward "basic economy" without access to lockers is becoming a thing -- and this can be enforced by making them board last and in a separate group, so the agents can check for big/multiple bags, and if a "basic" passenger does manage to cheat and find space, since they're last, they're not taking the space from a "paying customer"
Airlines are moving toward an increasingly price-continuity model, where you can buy a ticket at whatever price feels acceptable to you, and there will always be another enhancement of upgrade available at a modest cost, pushing you to spend more to feel less discomfort.
Business and First classes already have this problem in spades, of course -- but they're expensive services and lower person density (leading to less average uncleanliness).
Maybe forego carpets and build in an automated hose-down system? (probably not)
I couldn't find weight specs for units of Zodiac Z535s or Recaro PL3530 seats, which are two of the major competitors in the premium economy market to compare with the "under 50kg per unit" claim on the Zephyrs. If you have the numbers, I'd be interested
That's a regular economy seat, rather than a premium economy one -- but still it is a datapoint.
This would be vastly superior to business class and even to most airlines' versions of first class. Not sitting next to someone (and barely even having to see them) is worth a fortune to me.
Some airlines are still doing 2-2-2 layouts, but that is rapidly disappearing on long-haul service.
Google Flights gives indications on each leg whether it is roomy, average, or tight. For premium classes, it reports recliner, angle-flat, or lie-flat.
You still can't search by it, though.
This isn't much, but it is integrated into a flight search engine.
Of course, if you really want to know, there are sites like seatguru with all the details (but average travelers are never going to look for that)
Airlines believe that they can make more money selling fewer seats at higher prices -- at a price point typically 50-100% above economy, for about 50-70% more space.
The thing is, most flights only have 3 rows of premium economy (except some ultra-long-haul Singapore Air flights) -- right now, most people still want to buy whatever is cheapest -- partially because international travel is actually out of their budget, and so taking that basic-economy cheap fare is part of finding a way to go at all, and partially for a reason that I don't think airlines appreciate (they've made people expect service and comfort to be absolutely horrid, and so many customers wouldn't pay more for better because they don't trust the airline to be capable of providing better, and assume the higher prices are just a rip-off and not actually a better product.)
I’m not sure the economics are that simple. I won’t fly economy long haul, and generally fly business. When I’m feeling broke or when I think it won’t be thaaat bad I’ll go for Premium Economy. This seat would allow me to fly PE more, and cost the airline a Business seat.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/fir...
Obviously the idea behind making economy plus more attractive like this is to be able to sell more of it and charge more for it, so it may be that airlines want to install this on maybe 25% of a cabin, at which point it might start affecting evacuation etc. But if it's a simple swap in current economy-plus sections it wouldn't be a big issue because of how few seats that is.
[1] https://www.seatguru.com/airlines/British_Airways/British_Ai...
[2] https://www.seatguru.com/airlines/SAS_Airlines/SAS_Airlines_...
>Will Airlines Buy It?
>Mr. O’Neill says that because the seats are stacked, airlines will not forfeit capacity. The same number of seats in today’s wide-body cabins can be accommodated using Zephyr, so it should not impact an airline’s bottom line. Mr. O’Neill explained, “The best part of this seat: it has NO heavy mechanical/electronic components. The entire seat has only 2 moving pieces inside, so the weight and direct maintenance costs for the airline are significantly reduced! Using advanced composite materials, we can build this seat at less than 50kg per unit.”
This doesn't really answer the question though, right? The real question is if airlines would be willing to invest in the R&D to have stacked seating at all. Personally I'd be fine with it, but I can see a lot of people having problems with it - to say nothing of how expensive it would be to redesign the cabin.
This would never be used in an economy cabin. The whole point of economy is that at times is so uncomfortable that you have moments where you consider upgrading. If they change this to improve economy, people wouldn’t have a reason for upgrading to an upper cabin.
I might have a strong case of selection bias but on nearly every 3-4 class config flight I’ve been on in the past 5 years had business me premium economy classes fully seated whilst economy was 60-80% full.
Business travel is now economy premium by default and nearly everyone else upgrades at the airport.
It seems that charging people $400 during booking then $100 at the checkin twice for upgrades is psychologically easier than charging them $600 when booking.
Of course, if you're 7' tall, I'm betting you can't fit at all. If you're north of 300lb, or 70yo, or have physical disabilities, you might not be able to clamber into the upper seats. I don't think that will impede the airlines though.
The answer of course is that there isn’t enough demand for first class seats, so airlines just fill the remaining space with cheaper, lower margin product. Exactly the same will apply here: if they try to upgrade the whole cabin to this scheme, and try to charge premium prices, other airlines with lower prices cannibalize their customer base. Solve for equilibrium.
Every time I fly, that class is full.
If this layout gives you an efficient way to increase the capacity of that class without sacrificing the economy capacity that would totally make sense for the airlines, even if they don’t sell that class fully in each flight.
I don’t know if it’s technically feasible since I know airplanes have some weight limitations, but in theory this would be a way to have more seats for a class that is expensive but not prohibitive to the economy passenger.
If passengers were to show a strong preference for these seats over traditional premium economy, they might switch airlines. But of course it remains to be seen whether passengers would these better, like them less, or have no strong preference.
Imagine 20 ladders jutting out into the row as passenger frantically exit an aircraft in an emergency.
For safety, it would seem that in order to work you’d just need to show you can evacuate in 90 seconds. Whether that means ladders must be locked in when in an emergency, or that the ladders can be used but the fact you don’t have multiple people in each row makes up for the ladders blocking some space. I’m guessing it’s the former.
How about this counterpoint: the manufacturer knows exactly about the emergency requirements of an airplane and that's included in the design. An average size male need to half turn sideways going down an economy aisle already.
When not in use these aisles would be a joy due to the buffer space, for both those in transit and those sitting.
The rampant Dunning-Kruger that exists on this forum is honestly quite concerning some days. Take a step back and think whether this company has not dealt with this problem? The onus of proof is on all the commentators saying otherwise.
In other words, in my case, it's not a matter of thinking I know better than some experts. It's that I question whether this has been vetted by any experts at all. It would not be the first time.
Premium economy in my limited experience has been closer to the front. Even if you shift it towards the center, you suddenly have a section of the plane that's far heavier than the rest. (Not to mention higher)
The article was really quite brief, but I'd love to learn how that issue would be addressed.
At any rate, the concern is about egress in an emergency. In a train, every window is an emergency exit. In a plane everyone has to go down the aisle to the nearest exit. The ladders are in the aisle during use and will inhibit that process. They could of course disable the ladders during an emergency so people would have to jump or climb down, but that would certainly lead to injuries and other mishaps that would also inhibit the escape process.
Hard to see the FAA certifying this unless the aisles are made wider. That would reduce overall packing density, so there goes airline's interest in the approach.
It is beautiful in concept. Who wouldn't want to get horizontal during that redeye back to the east coast or the long haul to Japan? Its just hard to see the profitable and safe path to adoption.
It’s a bit limited, i wish they just fill the plane with them.
An example? Staggered seats to avoid "elbowing" or "shouldering" - common problem in the US where people are "bigger" than elsewhere, compared to e.g. Asia.
Who am I? A CS engineer with ~1,000 flights in the last 12 years, ~97% in economy, all over the world except Antartica. My comment here is simply based on some common sense. No specific skillset.
Maybe they'll take it to an extreme and start stacking the current seats without increasing the amount of personal space.
A side effect also meant it was almost impossible to use airline points to upgrade from economy, since the number of "reward" seats is very limited anyway, and always seems to be "zero" on popular routes.
At the time, I always wished they would increase their premium capacity at the expense of losing some economy seats, which I figured would have reduced the cost of premium economy a bit too.
I can only assume downvoters are confusing premium economy (the cabin class) with "premium plus" (or other names) that is offered by some airlines, which is nothing more than an economy seat with 1-3" of extra legroom, or sometimes just an economy seat in an exit row.
I think the only serious answer to this issue is to reduce the number of seats everywhere on all flights, raise prices heavily, and let the high prices and scarcity of seating dissuade people from flying except in extreme cases when it’s worth the money.
Especially finding ways to force businesses to do this, and simply refactor to use teleconferencing, regional offices, etc., and stop having commercial business activities that require flights.
If they need widen the aisle, there goes the cost savings for seat capacity, or narrower seats.
Many airlines don't even have a business section anymore, and the business fare just confers an earlier boarding priority.
5 or 6 years ago it was different and business class had a separate section with much roomier seats with more storage, upgraded entertainment, meals and alcohol options, and for large enough flights sometimes even a separate entrance.
You are right that ticket prices can be 5x economy (probably more like 2x or 3x usually, 5x on crowded flights). But these higher prices are only for the “slightly more legroom and early bin access” tier. The quality has gone down while the prices keep shooting up.
I’ve also noticed that when I paid for business class flights before, if any delays or issues came up for the flight, I would get comprehensive and immediate customer assistance to rectify it, usually even free transfers to more expensive flights or very generous hotel and meal vouchers, no questions asked.
In the last two years I’ve had several issues with flight cancellations or delays and business class fares confer no advantage. No customer support, no free upgrades or transfers, and you have to set your dignity aside and act like a crazy angry person if you want even the smallest concession from the airline on hotel or meal vouchers - and this has been consistent across every major international airline.
Do you mean domestic business class? I have seen few international business class that didn't have lie flat seats.
Now, on domestic, business is not usually that great in the US, though the seats are generally still much more spacious than even premium economy.
That isn’t true at all. Not on any trans-pacific flight, and not on most trans-Atlantic ones. The only time I can think of business class as being kind of like Economy are on some cheap biz class seats to and from SE Asia (e.g. on HK Express, but even then we got lie flat seats). I’m sure discount international airlines like Norwegian do something similar as well.
Would be interesting to hear where you saw business that was just bigger economy seats with better food. Is it simply old planes?
“The carrier said revenues per square foot are 6 per cent higher than in business class and 33 per cent higher than in economy. ”
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.ft.com/content/41866d20-11f...
If there a list of these weekly stories?
Out their idea, anyone can design seats including aircraft manufactures, so if it works they will just do it themselves, except they know what regulations to follow and what passengers will actually want.
Same with the monthly better boarding stories.
Tickets are a fraction of what they were in the 70’s due to deregulation. And in terms of comfort, based on how full flights are, it seem like airlines have struck the right comfort versus price balance.
The vast majority of customers always pick the lowest price.
Way better solution is what’s already being rolled out, optional bunk beds below deck.
Twice the passengers; same number of restrooms.
I wonder if the extra airline profits will cover the possible payout of a lawsuit where a mother's lap baby twists out of her arms and plonks six feet down onto the hard aluminum floor.
I can't wait for the first flyertalk post asking how many air miles they should get as compensation for being urinated on by a passenger overhead, or dealing with a gassy passenger overhead.
Too funny.
Is the article really that cryptic?
If you're in a bottom seat, you've got someone's, well, bottom, right in your face - not a very appealing prospect.
They also don't recline, which will make sleeping impossible or very difficult on long haul flights.
I also wonder about this from a safety perspective in the even of an evacuation - I imagine you'd have panicked passengers in the top seats jumping down onto those below.
And finally, even if these seats have a bigger pitch (more leg room) as a concept, airlines will simply cram more in, while keeping the same, horrible pitch of 30-32". That's not a problem with any particular design, of course, but it's what any airline is unfortunately going to do.
None of the static images show it, but at the end of the video it shows that there is space on the window side so that you can actually lie down across you seat with your legs going into that space.
Is this really an issue when there's a solid steel floor + seat that separates someone's ass from your face?
As for safety, I imagine they could just run simulations and then get it validated worth a working prototype.
For the final point, again, its a New Zealand airliner, so they have different constraints at work. Everything is just very far away.
As somebody who sleeps facing right (and occasionally left) I don't see how this would be more comfortable than a reclining seat.
I am a person that struggles to sleep on planes due my length (6"7) and basically never sleep on flights. Especially, when the person decided to recline their seat the whole flight. Which I find really rude to do on a 12 hour flight.
Normally I end up sleeping most of the day when I arrive at my destination. I slept for 24 hours after not sleeping for 32 hours (stopover plus too windy to land) when I flown to NZ.