3 seats - wow. I have been trying for end of July to Spain and even though 1st class cabins are basically empty on a lot of the flights, I cannot get a second seat (have one booked and need the second). I keep trying every day and hope that one more may get released.
Looking on expertflyer there are some JFK-LHR (on mondays generally) with up to 5 business seats available. Never seen that before. I assume you’ve been calling AA to check on IBeria inventory? THough I find that Iberia usually releases a year out and then nothing else.
I’ve called a couple times to check Iberia but no luck…will keep trying. Interesting on the JFK-LHR, but JFK-LHR doesn’t help much because it would mean three legs and I am trying to avoid that. I have noticed that there typically seems to be more BA availability through London perhaps because of the very high fees added to the mileage tickets. What is frustrating is that there is often one seat available on many days both through Miami and DFW but not two seats.
The posts yesterday prompted me to call AA again about Iberia and low and behold, they now have 2 seats available on a direct flight from Chicago to Madrid in their business class (only 2 class plane which is fine) but we lose one day in Spain. While I hate to lose a day, it saves us 25,000 miles overall (since business and not first class) and is a direct flight and gets us in 2hrs earlier so probably worth going for it while I can.
Never flown Iberia - Anyone have any experience flying Iberia? Any idea if they have good business class seats/service?
We had a good experience on Iberia. Almost lay flat chairs, quick meal versus full meal option, good not great Spanish wines, pleasant service, etc…
We had the new business seats back in december. Lay flat was less of a concern as it was a day flight MAD-ORD
IB does not do first class. I’ll take their J seat/service over AA any day
Not a fan of the staggered, I’d take the biz seat on the 773 on AA over Iberia’s
well he is basically guaranteed new J on IB. AA is a crapshoot.
Does the 773 even fly to europe?
The AA flights all seem to be on a 777 - I’d expect 1st to be pretty good even on AA.
Tyler - what do you mean staggered? Is the IB seat uncomfortable or tight in a way the AA seats aren’t?
I should add that I am assuming that even if the seat is not as good, it is likely worth the trade off for a direct flight which saves hours of travel time and a connection…it does cost me $350 more but we save 25000 miles which are worth at least $350 to me…
as in the layout. I really like these seats
check your AA flight seat map to see if there are 8 or 16 seats in F
The AA seat map shows four rows of four seats for F so 16 seats.
Dan,
Sitting upfront on IB last summer ORD/MAD was a very nice experience, except for one thing. I’ve never had food that tasted that bad.
Thanks for the comments - too bad about the food - hopefully the wine/drinks were ok… Its been many years probably since the 90s since I’ve had “great” food in 1st or business (vague recollection of great vintage champagne and good quality virtually all I could eat caviar on one trip in first class on on of the European airlines), but I’ve always found the food at least pretty decent. Sounds like IB is really falling short on that aspect of their upper class service.
Our food was good on IB from JFK to MAD. That was about 4 years ago.
I’m sure the seats are plenty comfortable. I haven’t flown Iberia’s new J product but it’s similar to what others offer. I just find better privacy in the biz beds that CX and AA fly. I think they are the gold standard biz bed in the sky excluding singapore and QR, although QR’s seat is very similar.
The food might be good, ok or it might suck, these days in biz it’s mostly about the hard product and if the soft is decent it’s a plus.
I liked the IB J catering more than Dan
And our discussion, between 2 mile mavens, was refreshing. You’d a thought we were discussing the differences between 1997 and 2007 California cabs. 
Speaking of catering, the wife and I recently flew QR’s A380 out of CDG to DOH in F. Best food and wine list I’ve had sitting up front thus far. I haven’t flown the other big two gulf carriers in F so not sure how they compare but QR was fantastic. Great caviar service, excellent lamb dish and filet prepared to perfection, Arabic meze was excellent as well. Highlights of the wine list were Krug and 08 PLL which was drinking great.
Gorgeous aircraft, the onboard bar/lounge is not to be missed. Booked as a AA award, Europe to Asia 2.