Airlines keep upgrading their ever-competitive business class offerings – so should you succumb to the temptations or go with the majority in economy?

Pros of flying in business class:

• Makes one of the more stressful part of traveling into one of luxurious coddling
• May be the only way for some of us to get much sleep on the plane

Cons:

• Expensive – and not just a little bit…
• May spoil you forever

Those comfy lie flat seats, the fancy lounge access and fine dining in the air. Ah, the food – I’m looking at you (fondly), Turkish Airlines… I think most of us would be tempted. I’ve been fortunate enough to fly in the deluxe business class dozens of times, mostly, for, well, business. On occasion, I’ve also had the pleasure for vacations by leveraging my elite airline status.

The first time I luxuriated in a lie-flat seat was when an Eva Airways gate agent stopped me as I was about to walk onto the jet bridge. She scanned my boarding pass, confiscated it and gave me a new one without explanation. It was a short flight from Hong Kong to Taipei so I wouldn’t have quibbled even if they foisted me to a middle seat. It was only after I got onto the plane and found my mini-throne did I realized that I was upgraded! I enjoyed the welcome glass of champagne and, just on principle, laid flat even though I wasn’t that tired. Such serendipitous fun! While Eva did respond to my brief thank you email, I never figured out why I was upgraded for free – I wasn’t even a member of their frequent flyer program.

To this day, I have a soft spot for Eva Air and have flown with them a number of times since. I supposed whatever upgrade algorithm they used worked, in this case, to increase their business long term 😀

Though much of the novelty has worn off, I still very much enjoy the elevated experience. That said, even after all those flights, I don’t have an easy answer to whether the upgrade is worth it. I know of people who would just shrug if they got a complimentary upgrade (e.g. they will just sleep through the flight regardless) and others who are spending around $20k USD per year from their own pockets to be more comfortable on their company-mandated trips.

Note that the experiences are hardly universal partly because many airlines are constantly investing in improving their business class offerings. That means that the quality can vary quite a bit between the carriers and even among different aircrafts of the same airline. On one extreme, it could just be economy seats with the middle seat left empty and on the other end, spacious pods with sliding doors, equipped with 4k monitors, nice pajamas and noise-canceling headphones. In addition to the seating environment, the relative excellence of the service, cuisine and lounges all attract fervent discussions on many websites. Do your research!

Personally, I’m not that picky as long as the seat can be straightened, the dining decent and the service not surly. It’s not that I don’t appreciate the better meals or the friendly staff – I just give more weight to departure/arrival times, trip durations and the stopover locations. Taking slight control of my destiny, I’ve been known to bring my own fancy headphones, food (especially if there is some local delectable that I can’t get enough of) and even disposable slippers.

Accompanying the variable quality is the wide range of prices. We can discuss at length about the merits (or lack of it) of these purchases but ultimately the worth of money is very much in the eye of the beholder. I offer two frameworks to do your own evaluation according to your value system.

1. À la carte Summing Framework

Let’s say the flight is 10 hours, how much are you willing to pay each hour for the additional comfort? Let’s say your legs were quite long, what would you pay to avoid the physical discomfort of economy seating? Perhaps productivity skyrockets given more tray table space? Or if you could only get decent sleep in lie-flat seats and you had to hit the ground running the moment you land?  For instance, the value placed is $150/hour x 10 hours = $1500. If lounge access, priority check-in, early boarding or additional luggage allowance are significant to you, add those in. Let us assign their worth to be $70, $20, $30 and $80 respectively and so the grand total is $1700. For this example, if you have the budget and the upgrade cost is $1700 or less, then go for it!

2. Replacement Value Framework

Let’s say the premium over economy for a given flight is $2000 and your trip is 10 nights long. Would you rather fly business or spend an extra $200/night on your lodging? Or maybe $200/day on entertainment/food? Would you rather spend the $2000 on bungee jumping out of a helicopter flying over the glaciers of the Andes? (I just made that up but I got curious and found one that’s over an active volcano!)

There you have it – simple, n’est-ce pas? I hope one or both of those frameworks help in your Travel Which Way Decision when it comes to which cabin to fly in!