Fiji Airways business class drops inflight dining for preflight dining

I have been doing that in Houston at the Polaris Lounge and do feel better eating a full meal and hour or so out from departure. I think it is a good idea, plus if they can decrease waste that can't be a bad thing in a lot of ways.

It makes sense particularly for flights that depart late at night such as MEL-NAN which takes off at 23:35; no one wants to sit up for an hour waiting for an airline meal if it can be avoided.

I definitely eat in the lounge before I fly. Most of my trips these days are to Singapore and Hong Kong, so in Sydney as a Platinum frequent flyer I can visit the Qantas First lounge and skip the main inflight meal. But it's most useful ahead of the overnight flights from Singapore and Hong Kong back to Australia, otherwise you can lose two hours of your potential sleeping time waiting for and then eating the meal. However I still like the option to have something light to eat on the flight if I am running late and my lounge time is reduced due to having a shower.

While I totally understand the logic behind this move, will the price of the fares be dropped? Otherwise the cynic in me says this is just an airline cutting costs to the detriment of the passengers' service level experience.

Oh I would agree this was driven more by cost-cutting than anything else. Fiji Airways will save a lot of money in not loading a full meal service with all the different choices they need to have. It's just funny that as the article indicates they chose to listen to one-third of their passengers to justify this.

And what about those passengers who come to flights quite late to avoid the lounge, that is the two thirds of flyers. The next step will be the American thing of charging an arm and a leg for any food.

Sounds like a good idea as long as the meal in the lounge is a quality offering. It would have to be more economical for an airline to offer a small quality steak with sides for example in the lounge than an airline meal on a plane, a win win for both pax and airline.

Super late dinners on flights is one of my pet hates!
I recently took a CX flight out of HK a few weeks back departing at 2am. Dinner was served around 3am and I was astounded the amount of people that wanted to eat at that time!
Imagine if you were shook awake at home at 3am and someone tried to feed you a full dinner!
I'm a big fan of dinner on the ground well before.

I have been eating the lounge more frequently and rarely eat an evening meal onboard.

Cant say I'm impressed by this, especially as the emphasis of discussion has been evening flights (where there can be a case), but morning flights are similarly losing the meal service.

Also, from the picture it doesn't appear like the buffet is going to be that appealing. It just appears to be some fruit, simple lettuce salads, some bread... Part of the enjoyment of business flights is occupying the time during daylight flights with a meal, but now it appears to be a simple breakfast on the ground, and seemingly not much in the air, so chase a late lunch on arrival, impacting your plans afterwards... Doesn't seem a great experience, especially for the cost.

id love to be able to eat well in a lounge before flying - so i can sleep on board - but i live in adelaide!

the spin on this cost cutting (and cost cutting is all it is) is amazing...doubt the flight will cost less $$s but the food option now is the swill from the typical lounge.

Not sure about early morning flights but I would be a fan of this on late evening departures. I think often people eat food because it's offered to them, not because they're hungry. I recon if airlines stopped serving such meals there would be very few complaints.

For those who have viewed the Fiji Air promo material, it isn't "all about cost-cutting". The emphasis is on customer convenience, better in-flight service delivery and ecological considerations. Food wastage (non-consumed) - particularly on flights to Australia - is cited as a major concern to FJ, according to their CEO.

Seriously??? For those that choose it, and MANY do, inflight dining is a key component to any reputable business class service offering. The assumption that FJ is somehow improving the customer experience by removing key meals is astounding! Surely the paying business class customer can decide how and when and where they want to dine, and how they choose to maximise their rest or not.

The principle is great - however I want to reduce time spent waiting around and would rather eat on a plane (when I can't do much else) than spend an hour of my non travel time getting to the airport earlier

I recall FinAir used to do this on their late night long haul flights out of Helsinki . There was a really nice restaurant you went to and had what you wanted then jumped on an MD 11 and straight to sleep. Even QF's Sleeper Service just isn't quick enough and it really kills sleep time on the shorter long haul e.g. Sin to Syd or HKg to Syd. I suppose the better lounges have really replaced the need to keep the lights on during the late night flights. Wonder if they might mandate it one day..

would not fly Fiji Airways anyway meal or no meal . They cancelled my flight SYD to LAX in business class due to pilot shortage at last minute and replace with premium economy with Qantas and compensated only $300 per ticket ( original ticket costed $2500 one way) Shame Fiji Airways

Will it decrease the price in the airfare? One would hope so, for example an airline taking out the Chauffeur service, nice amenities in the lounge and in the air (in your set) to save costs yet still charging the full (normal) fare....

The late night one makes sense, not sure about breakfast. We will be on the flight to Sydney in late August, so can experience first hand. It’s not a very long flight, so I don’t see how too many people would be sleeping. I don’t like early mornings, but even so don’t anticipate sleeping on that flight. The whole thing sounds a bit like Qantas’ cafe breakfast debacle. I feel if you are paying for business class then you should have the choice of a decent meal on board and not have some executive making that decision for you.

Are FJ hoping that no onboard meals will also lead to less alcohol being consumed? I am sure many passengers enjoy a few glasses of wine when dining. Maybe not so much would be consumed if no food is served...

Ain't that the truth, as AT observes above, of having to adjust? This is a cynical cost-cutting move that doesn't fool anyone. Mind you, the culinary offerings on Fiji Airways are decidedly below par anyway. On AKL-NAN-AKL Economy flights not so long ago I was offered a barely edible pasta and frugal-looking other things on the tray, and the service was also skimped to the point of non-existent. You were lucky to get more than one drink without summoning a crew member and even then you got the third-degree about wanting a drink. A lot of the cabin staff congregated down the back of the aircraft giggling amongst themselves for a good part of the flight. Never again. It's Air NZ for me, and even they are a bit Nannyish as well. .

I think this move to "pre-flight" dining is a cop out for the airlines who have chosen this. They are cheap skates, and offering poor service. A reasonable meal at a good airport eatery would cost anything from $80 to $150... On the other hand, the business class ticket is often double or even triple the cost of a standard economy ticket, so it is clear the airline is doing this for cost-cutting reasons. If they are not prepared to cater to passengers, are passengers then entitled to bring their own hot food packs onto the plane.... or would they be confiscated at the gate? I bet that the airlines do not discount the cost of their tickets to reflect this removal of proper and appropriate catering on their flights.

We experienced the breakfast last week when flying from Fiji to Sydney. It actually worked better than I thought. When checking in you get given a card and that lets you order a hot option in addition to the buffet available to people in the lounge via status. We both had eggs Benedict served with smoked salmon. Nice sauce and eggs lovely and soft, so I guess better than what you could do in the air.

On board they served a brunch of fruit, pastries and a choice of either a frittata, chicken Panini and an Indian option, which they ran out of very quickly. No change to alcohol that they served.

I think I would still prefer a meal in the air, as who sleeps on a short flight like that, but it was OK.