How can you give passengers more space without reducing seat count? In theory, the only way is up. But what are the true prospects for bunk beds returning to the skies?
This is the first in a series of interviews with the movers and shakers behind herringbone seats, at a time when RGN would normally be roaming the halls of the Aircraft Interiors Expo in Hamburg.
What’s the most successful business class seat in recent times? With the arrival of new products for new aircraft like the A321XLR, and updated versions still arriving on newly delivered widebodies, it has to be the “reverse” herringbone.
The first of these, débuting in 2008-09 on US Airways’ Airbus A330 fleet, was Cirrus, from the then Sicma, later Zodiac Aerospace, and still sold by Safran Seats. With the original Cirrus, all seats point away from the aisle. The single seats have window views whilst there is more opportunity to socialise with a travelling companion in the centre seats.
Balancing airlines’ desires to sell as many seats as possible on the aircraft and the provision of onboard catering and other services to allow them to price tickets at their desired levels has always been a complex task. But with the dawn of the age of long-haul, single-aisle flying with the long and extended range Airbus A321neo in particular, the passenger experience industry has a challenge on its hands.
And it’s one that has a history of falling through the cracks, because it lies across the areas of responsibility of a variety of airline or lessor departments, airframers, cabin designers and galley suppliers.
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