The New Fourth Class

Image: Jason Hetherington/Getty

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On a flight to Amsterdam last week, I moved past seat 2B and plopped myself down in seat 11B instead. The taupe-colored leather chair was built for wide-bodies like me and was outfitted with a huge, adjustable headrest and a comfy footrest. Even before I reclined, there was so much room between the seats that I could extend my legs all the way without reaching the seatback in front of me.

The meal—salmon appetizer; beef bourguignon with fluffy mashed potatoes and crisp green beans; flourless chocolate cake; good wines; cheese—was fresh, nicely plated, and surprisingly tasty. The clever personal-entertainment system, which operated either as a hand-held video player or holstered in an at-your-seat rig, offered dozens of on-demand video options and hundreds of albums. There was an at-seat power socket, a fat, linen-covered pillow, and a large, soft blanket.

All in all, quite a posh ride on OpenSkies, British Airways' wholly owned boutique airline that now flies from New York's John F. Kennedy Airport to Amsterdam and Orly Airport in Paris.

But here's the kicker: I wasn't flying business class. I was in a cabin the four-month-old airline calls prem+. And the introductory, advance-purchase fare, complete with taxes and surcharges, was less than $1,200 roundtrip. Just the ticket for these dreary economic times, when a traditional transatlantic business class flight can cost upward of $8,000 roundtrip.

The creature comforts of OpenSkies' prem+ cabin are the latest and best-articulated developments in the nearly 20-year evolution of a fourth and entirely new class of international airline service. Prosaically and generically named "premium economy," this class aims to offer many of the perks and comforts of business class for about the price of a full-fare coach ticket. Airlines believe premium-economy cabins are an opportunity to keep business travelers paying the full coach fare rather than downgrading to one of the deeply discounted coach prices aimed at leisure flyers. They also hope that a fourth class will convince some leisure travelers to upgrade, paying a little more to get a little more.

Besides OpenSkies, Japan Airlines and Qantas have introduced full-blown premium-economy cabins this year. Next month, tiny Icelandair will unveil a premium economy service too. They join a number of carriers that have decided as many as four classes of service makes economic sense. Virgin Atlantic officially added its premium-economy service—first called Mid Class—back in 1992. Nippon Airways and E.V.A., the Taiwanese carrier, have been in the game at least that long. British Airways, which has experimented with a premium-economy section since the early 1990s, standardized the cabin in 2000 and calls it World Traveller Plus. Air New Zealand jumped into the market in 2005. And while no U.S. or Canadian airline has yet added a fourth cabin, carriers as diverse as China Southern Airlines and S.A.S. Scandinavian have.

But unlike coach, business, and first class, which have strong consumer identities and generally comparable levels of service, the offerings in premium economy are erratic. Take Icelandair's new service, for example. Like OpenSkies, Icelandair flies narrow-bodied Boeing 757s and will offer premium-economy passengers two-by-two seating. But its seats will have just 33 inches of legroom. That's not only 19 inches skimpier than OpenSkies, it's an inch less than coach on JetBlue Airways. In fact, the 52 inches of legroom in prem+ on OpenSkies is more than the 39 inches that Icelandair offers its business-class fliers.

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