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The Lufthansa Group of airlines are announcing their figures for 2018 today and SWISS has used its presentation to announce that it will be introducing a Premium Economy cabin on its long-haul aircraft starting in 2021.
SWISS New Premium Economy Cabin – What We Know
With the ink on the press releases barely dry we were never going to get images of what seat SWISS has in mind for its new Premium Economy cabin but the airline has offered up a few facts to give us an idea of what to expect.
- The new SWISS Premium Economy Class will debut on its Boeing 777-300ER aircraft in spring 2021
- The refurbishment work will take place over the winter of 2020/2021
- SWISS says that, in the medium term, it plans to roll out the new Premium Economy cabin across the whole of its long-haul fleet (which indicates a return to the shop for the airline’s A340s which have only just started flying with a full interior refit).
- The total cost of the project is expected to be around CHF 40m (~$40m).
- The new Premium Economy cabin on the Boeing 777-300ER will have 24 seats set out in a 2-4-2 layout.
SWISS has also released this graphic to show what it envisages its new Premium Economy cabin will offer.
Based on the information above and the information we have about the SWISS 777-300ER from SeatGuru we should expect to see SWISS install seats which are ~19″ wide and which offer ~38 of seat pitch.
Essentially this sounds very like the Premium Economy cabin in the American Airlines 777-200:
SWISS has confirmed that it will still offer a First Class cabin on its Boeing 777-300ERs so the aircraft will fly in a 4-cabin layout from 2021….but that leaves us wondering where the space for the Premium Economy cabin will come from.
Right now SWISS offers 8 First Class seats, 62 Business Class seats and 270 Economy Class seats on its 777s and, while it may seem logical for the carrier to give up a few Business Class seats to make way for the new cabin, I think the space may come from Economy Class:
Right now we’ll just have to wait and see.
Bottom Line
With more and more long-haul carriers introducing a Premium Economy cabin and with Lufthansa already offering a Premium Economy cabin it’s not at all surprising to have SWISS join the Premium Economy club….if anything its just a little surprising that it has taken this long for it to be announced.
