Air New Zealand’s $500m makeover: Whats in new cabins for Dreamliners

Air New Zealand has started overhauling interiors in its Dreamliner fleet, a $500 million project to allow the airline to compete harder with rivals in its premium cabin.

Out goes the dated herringbone layout in Business Premier and in comes new seats, including for high-end luxe seats and new entertainment screens throughout the plane.

But the airline is warning the nose-to-tail cabin revamp will take more than two years and the first of the retro-fitted aircraft won’t enter service until early next year.

Air NZ general manager of strategy, networks and fleet Braden Smith said the arrival of the aircraft in Singapore for remodelling marked a key milestone for the project, which has been in the planning stages for the past five years.

“It’s been a very long road to get here with a lot of blood, sweat and tears and there may be more to come still.”

He said it was possible supply chain problems — that have afflicted all of aviation — could still be a factor in the refurbishment programme.

It was the first time 787-9 series Dreamliners had been completely overhauled and the work is being done at Air NZ’s heavy engineering partner in Singapore, ST Engineering. Seats are being supplied by two manufacturers and being made in Wales, Germany and the United States.

The retrofit programme will involve all the interiors being removed and replaced.

The aircraft will then come back to New Zealand where it must go through a series of checks and crew training.

The work includes:

• New seats in every cabin, including four new Business Premier Luxe seats in the Business Premier cabin
• New carpet throughout the aircraft
• New curtains between cabins and galleys
• New wallpaper, hands-free waste disposal, and amenity holders in the lavatories
• New inflight entertainment screens and system
• Sky Pantry installed in the Economy cabin

Not included in the revamp is the much-publicised SkyNest sleep pods for Economy passengers. Those are being fitted on new Dreamliners due for delivery from the end of next year and those aircraft will help alleviate a shortage of aircraft in the Air NZ fleet.

It has pared back its network because of engine maintenance issues on Dreamliners but the refurbishment job would not force any more flights to be cut.

“The whole programme has been built around the concept of only removing one aircraft at a time to preserve the networks — so there’s not going to be any additional juggling,” Smith said.

“Rolling out this retrofit programme before we get our new aircraft also puts us in a good place to continue delivering an exceptional flying experience for our customers.”

While the new ‘hard product’ would be superior to that of existing planes, market forces would determine whether the airline could charge a premium.

He said it would also face the dilemma faced by any airline incrementally rolling out new product that is preferred by passengers to existing planes. It would not be overstating the chances of flying on refurbished planes when they start entering the fleet.

“We’re trying to be measured and careful about this. We’re not going out there with a big bang. This is a 2.5-year programme.”

There will be more space on remodelled planes for premium seats.

The aircraft layout of passenger accommodation (Lopa) on all 14 aircraft would be reconfigured to have 272 seats; featuring 4 Business Premier Luxe seats, 22 Business Premier seats, 33 Premium Economy seats, and 213 Economy seats, including 13 Economy Skycouch.

Currently, the airline’s 787-9 aircraft have two different configurations; nine aircraft with 302 seats, and five aircraft with 275 seats.

It has been estimated that business class seats have up to three times the carbon footprint of those in Economy.

Asked how the new configuration fitted to the airline’s sustainability goals he said: ‘‘What we’re doing is reacting to the demand that’s already there, and that has become gradually more premium over the years. At the end of the day, the aircraft is still operating in the same way as it did before and producing the same amount of carbon dioxide’'.

Smith said low-cost carriers with high-density Economy seats and cut-rate fares encouraged high volumes of flights.

Air NZ is spending about $3.5b on eight new Dreamliners as it moves to an-787 long-haul fleet.

But planemaker Boeing is in trouble, hit by scandals around the safety of its smaller 737Max jets, whistleblowers sounding concerns about Dreamliners, industrial action and faces laying off a tenth of its workforce as financial problems mount. The strike by more than 30,000 workers is in Boeing’s manufacturing heartland near Seattle in Washington state, whereas Air NZ’s planes are being manufactured at Boeing’s non-union Charleston plant in South Carolina.

Smith said Air NZ remained hopeful of delivery of the first of the new planes by the end of next year but it was keeping a “weather eye” on events at Boeing.

Air NZ board members and chief executive Greg Foran had met top Boeing officials in Charleston recently and had full confidence in the planemaker.

But manufacturing disruption was common throughout the aviation sector.

“We’re not so naive as to think the programme will be, totally immune to some of the broader impacts that the strike action might have,” he said.

Grant Bradley has been working at the Herald since 1993. He is the Business Herald’s deputy editor and covers aviation and tourism.