Pretty much. You can outfit pretty much any airframe you want to be business class only seating but not enough people will buy when it pops up on Expedia at 2+ times the price of the alternative.
I don't love Economy on long flights either but I'm mostly not willing to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket for a more comfortable alternative for 8 hours or so.
That is, in no small part, because business/first class is being subsidized by economy (and a lot of the passengers in those classes are status upgrades).
So, yes, sticker price for upper class service is pretty expensive. In a world where upper class service was the norm on certain routes on certain planes it would probably be pretty expensive but probably cheaper than the upgrade on mixed class service.
> That is, in no small part, because business/first class is being subsidized by economy (and a lot of the passengers in those classes are status upgrades).
That's the complete 100% opposite of truth. For most airlines, the economy class is just a nice addition to the business class.
Do you have a source showing $/sqft of economy vs business/first class? This video is basically saying the opposite of you: that business/first class subsidizes economy.
It might be better to say that they form a system which is economically optimized as a whole. It is genius, for instance, that frequent fliers get upgrades from coach to first class when they're available because it means if a first class flier changes their plans or wants to fly on short notice an economy flier just says in coach and won't feel mad about it -- the first class seats are 100% occupied in terms of providing somebody a somewhat premium experience but are 50% occupied with full revenue customers and that 50% occupation is part of the completely premium experience because it means it is always available.
Yes, I was imprecise in what I wrote. There's a lot of cross-subsidization in various forms going on that makes all-business class at business-class prices tough for airlines even on routes like NYC to London--which have existed but not sure they do at the moment.
I heard only place where business + premium economy works is ultra long routes. Where people are willing to pay the premium of single leg over multi leg. So it seems people might be willing to pay for time, but not for comfort.
There is a business-class only airline (La Compagnie) that flies from Newark to Europe and they're profitable. A little more expensive than 2x the price though, but less than 10x.
Never heard of this airline so I just checked: Over the next few months the cheapest flight from EWR to their base in Orly is ~$2,500 vs ~$365 for Economy (French Bee to be exact). That seems like its still a separate class and would exclude most Economy flyers.
I don't love Economy on long flights either but I'm mostly not willing to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket for a more comfortable alternative for 8 hours or so.