A great business class can feel like a vacation in itself. Lie-flat seats, free flowing champagne, on-demand films, and no contact with the outside world can make 11 hours in the sky fly by. After a trip to Swedish Lapland, we had the opportunity to fly business class from Stockholm to Los Angeles in the newly outfitted Scandinavian Airlines A330.
HOW TO FLY BUSINESS CLASS
Like most airlines, SAS business class is not cheap. A round-trip ticket from Stockholm to Los Angeles would cost upwards of $4400 USD. We purchased our flight using our Chase Sapphire Reserve reward points (~$1000 USD). Once our SAS Plus (similar to economy plus) seats were purchased, we then visited the SAS website where we were able to bid on our business class seats. We both bid ~$900 USD and our seats were confirmed within 36 hours of our flight. Overall, our ticket in economy cost half the price of a typical business class fare.
THE SEATS
We’ve flown on over a dozen business class airlines, but the seats on the SAS A330 from Stockholm to Los Angeles were some of the best in class. The 1-2-1 seat formations ensure that these sizeable seats cocoon their guests in clouds of comfort. The seats have adjustable firmness, a mattress pad, blanket, and pillow to guarantee a cozy ride for each and every guest. Additionally, each seat has its own large television screen with plenty of entertainment options as well as a cubby to hold personal items.
Seat Tip: We would highly recommend choosing row 1 for your business class experience, as it appeared to have a bit more room than the other rows.
Seat Tip: We would highly recommend choosing row 1 for your business class experience, as it appeared to have a bit more room than the other rows.
THE AMENITIES
Each business class seat has a gift bag complete with a night mask, hand lotion, lip balm, toothbrush, toothpaste, and socks. There was supposed to be WiFi on our flight that is free to all business class passengers, however our WiFi wasn’t working on our route.
THE FOOD
As we were flying from Stockholm to Los Angeles, we wanted to ensure that we received adequate rest on the 11-hour flight (with an 8-hour time difference). Thus, we asked the flight attendant in the beginning of the trip if they could please hold our food until after we slept. This is a fairly standard request in business class cabins, however the curt flight attendant would not hold our food. That’s right – someone could pay a few thousand dollars for a seat and not be allowed to have their food held. This seemed silly, but we went to sleep knowing that sleep was more important than food at the time.
When we woke up, we asked a different flight attendant if there was any food left. This second flight attendant told us that we, “should have asked to have our food held before the service” if we had wanted to eat. Hmmm…that’s odd. We DID ask for our food to be held! We informed the second flight attendant of what happened and they apologized, but unfortunately that didn’t fix the situation.
On the plus side, the second flight attendant was able to find some leftover roast beef. Unfortunately, this roast beef gave both of us a slight case of food poisoning. Overall, the food situation and the in-flight service were highly disappointing. There were no snacks, few choices in fare, and lackluster service.
THE DÉCOR
The SAS A330 was newly refurbished to a modern 1-2-1 seat formation with 5-star business class seats. The expansive cabin had beautiful mood lighting, modern amenities, and an overall crisp and clean aesthetic. This was definitely one of the most well equipped business classes that we’ve flown.
IS IT WORTH IT?
If you have a hard time sitting in traditional economy seats, it is definitely worth splurging for SAS business class. The lie-flat seats and bevy of entertainment choices make for an extremely comfortable 11-hour flight. However, if you were looking to sleep on the flight, we would highly recommend asking for your food to be held (and insist on it if anyone tries to refuse you).
Don’t be obsessed with your wishes for a morning dinner. The breakfast is pretty sturdy and should get you going. Second, I think your price comparison is a bit biased. From where I live (Sweden) a premium economy lowest fare is around $1.000. Lowest business is about $2.500. FUll flex in PE around 2.000 and business $3:500. Maybe you have different prices when flying out from the us, but the way you put it overestimates the value of the upgrade. Finally I have flown this cabin >10 times in different seats. I would say the window seats on the even rows gives you the most privacy. I agree that row 1 has slightly more legroom, but for my 180 cm it doesn’t matter. Best seat of all in my opinion is 8H, last row right hand side.