The Aer Lingus business class service between Dublin, Ireland, and JFK, New York City, USA is good value for money.
In Dublin the Green and 51st lounge is nice, but closes about an hour before the afternoon Aer Lingus flight to New York at 4 pm. You have a great advantage when traveling from Dublin to the United States and that you can go through passport control in Dublin, very much speeding up You're getting out of the airport in the USA.
A great perk of Aer Lingus flights to JFK is that they have internet access during the whole flight and it works pretty good. This is great to get some work done.
The seats are completely lie flat and there's plenty of storage space around the seats. The amenities packet you receive is somewhat limited and pillows and blankets are rationed by the crew. I had to find the place for hanging my suit jackets and do it myself. The crew only helped with the reminder that I shouldn't forget it but I leave the plane. Indeed, and if I had not remembered they offered no help in retrieving my suit jacket.
The seven and a half hour flight has a reasonably good selection of entertainment on a reasonably sized screen.
There is a good meal in a small snack serves on proper plates with proper cuttery. My main meal consist of a starter of smoked salmon and a main course of beef with vegetables. There were a couple choices for the menu and, of course, you can order a special menu in advance.
The ticket price, CDG-JFK return was not bad, making this flight Good value for money. Although I have seen that their prices have gone up significantly and recent days, Aer Lingus still remains a reasonable price and comfortable alternative or flying from Europe to the United States. The main drawback is getting to Dublin as a linguist doesn't offer any real business class connections.
Aer Lingus Transatlantic Business is so much better than short-haul intra-European Business. I've really enjoyed the few long-haul flights I've done with them in J and was impressed with how good the catering was. EI's pre-meal canapé service is better than the bag of nuts you get on big sister British Airways. A nice touch of class. I also love the small Business cabin on the A321neos. The cabin crew-to-passenger ratio makes for good service.
EI often have really good fares between Europe and the US/Canada, but as you mention, the downside is that the intra-European part isn't great and is essentially like being in Economy...unless you can catch the A321neo on an intra-European flight---I think they do mostly LHR and maybe some CDG and other cities thrown in here and there.
Thanks for sharing!
The cabin looks like an A330.
Your right, Ryan, it is definitely a Airbus A330. Stated wrong on my reservation printout.