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Upscale to Europe
Cheap Charlie · June 18, 2002

Earlier this month, I was invited to fly transatlantic, from Newark to Lisbon on TAP Air Portugal and then from Madrid to JFK on Iberia. Here is a tale of two different airlines.

As you know, I focus on bargain travel for the most part, but if faced with an opportunity to travel business class, I won't turn it down. However, once again, there are varying degrees of value even in the business class equation.

Since I don't normally fly in this luxury, I was fascinated and took a good look. My bottom line is, "I like it, but can't afford it." I found the most important part of the business class experience wasn't food and wine, but space - space to get lots of sleep or get lots of work done. It's your choice."

Both Iberia and Air Portugal provide good service between the New York area and their respective nation's capitals. TAP Air Portugal only flies from Newark and JFK. Iberia also service from JFK, Chicago, Dallas and Miami. Both have comparable tourist class service, but Iberia offers a clearly superior business class product when it comes to pitch (the distance between seats) and service elegance. Unfortunately, I compared different aircraft - the TAP Airbus A310 with Iberia's 747. Air Portugal's newer Airbus 340-300 have more pitch.

I'm six foot two inches tall. Stretching out on the Iberia was easy and there was still room to move between seats when passengers were fully reclined. On TAP Air Portugal, moving from the window seat to the aisle required either climbing over the person next to you or waking them up.

The lumbar support on the TAP Air Portugal Airbus seat was wonderful.

Both TAP Air Portugal and Iberia have excellent airport lounge affiliates. TAP Air Portugal is affiliated with Virgin Atlantic at Newark and Iberia is affiliated with American Airlines at JFK and has an excellent new club at Madrid Barajas airport.

The new Iberia Business Class lounge at Barajas Airport in Madrid now features free Internet connections in small rooms that are perfect for checking email and getting some work accomplished.

Meals on board were both acceptable. Iberia features Spanish wines and Air Portugal features Portuguese wines of course.

Inflight entertainment in both business classes was with individual videos but Iberia offered more diversity on the small screen. To be fair, I didn't have much time to click through the Air Portugal offerings since I slept most of the way from Newark to Lisbon. On the return from Spain to JFK, I had plenty of time to check out Iberia's entertainment offerings.

All in all Iberia provides an overall classier business class, but TAP Air Portugal provides excellent service, just with a bit less pitch and elegance. My vote goes to Spanish wines and I loved Iberia's space to stretch out. And I still think a well-configured Boeing 747 is one of the most comfortable planes in the air.

Lisbon is served with nonstop flights from the USA by TAP Air Portugal and Continental Airlines. For nonstops your choices are limited.

Madrid is served by almost every major airline in the county and Iberia is comparable in business class service with all of them.

Many travelers to Lisbon and Madrid plan to change at airports such as London, Amsterdam, Paris and Frankfurt then backtrack a bit to Lisbon and Madrid, but the Iberian Peninsula is most comfortably and most quickly reached directly from the USA without changes in Europe.

Charlie Leocha is the Boston-based author of Travel Rights: Know the Rules of the Road and the Air Before You Go. Cheap Charlie appears every Monday on this site. E-mail him at leocha@aol.com or access his Web site.