Virgin America Brings New Meaning “In-flight Entertainment”
Posted by Belushi on August 15, 2007
August 8th was the maiden flight for Virgin America in the United States. Flights from San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York will mark the first time that Virgin Airlines offers flights within the US. So the big question now is how is Virgin America going to compete in the already crowded US airline industry?
The answer: Virgin America is going to provide luxurious features that few (Jet Blue) other US airlines offer. And they are going to offer them to all passengers, and still price their flights reasonably.
The key to Virgin’s in-flight experience is their entertainment system, called RED. It will allow travelers to choose between satellite television via Dish network, video games, internet access, on-board email, chat and pay per view movies. The chat feature allows users to chat between seats on the plane. RED also allows users to select from a list of thousands of MP3s on the plane to listen to music during the flight. They will also use RED to order food and then pay via credit card. Virgin also offers minibars on the plane that let people get their own drinks. And Google Maps is bundled into RED, for those that want to chart their journey.Each seat also provides 110-volt power, a USB port and Ethernet jack for all tech needs.
In first-class all of the entertainment features will be free. In economy class seats, there will be a charge for the services.
And the mood of the Virgin America planes is different. Each plane has special mood lighting, that will adjust from “dawn” to “blue sky” to “dusk” to give passengers a more relaxed feeling. And they offer fancy leather seats, that were designed by the same company (Recaro) that builds seats for Mercedes, Ferrari and Jaguar. Virgin planes even have music playing in the bathroom, to cover up the sounds of couples interested in joining the mile high club…or people who had a bad lunch.
A look inside the cabin of a Virgin Airlines America flight. Mood lighting gives a new experience to air travel.
So the question is when are the rest of the airlines going to be able to offer these same features? I think American, Continental, Delta and United need to step up their game to provide this level of service.
