Our Perspective

Progress works hard to downgrade the air travel experience. First Class Flyer works hard to upgrade it.

Our ultimate upgrade is coach to First Class achieved for less than the cost of coach. This is of course easier said than done. And yet, on the occasions it can be done, not as hard as you might think.

Our penultimate upgrade is coach to First Class for the price of coach. Not far behind is First Class for a lot less than a First Class ticket. Then: Business to First Class, or coach to Business, again for less than you might expect to pay (should you have to pay anything at all).

Nice to know, not one of these upgrades is won by complaining or fibbing or lowering your own standards of dignity and civility. The most disagreeable thing you might have to do is ask, but even the thought of you doing that that leaves me feeling like a failure. If I can’t coach you out of coach and into Premium, or from Business to First, by digging up and pointing out previously undiscovered anomalies, loopholes and disparities I’ll give the game away. If I can’t get you accumulating more miles – and getting more boing for your points – I’ll fold First Class Flyer and start raising chickens.

And when I surface from those days of fine-print mining that deliver the aforementioned upgrade gems, I like to wrestle with the question, How might the rest of the air travel experience be upgraded, beyond the cabin class upgrade itself?

Seats themselves can vary so much in the same class, on the same airline, and on the same route that just getting onto the right flight can constitute a major upgrade. And airline to airline, well the variations there are a whole other story.

Discovering un-thought of ways to upgrade the airport experience too, even the booking experience, and especially the loyalty program experience, and the hotel experience is for me a buzz.

That’s why they call me Mr. Upgrade.

See you up front,

Matthew J. Bennett
Mr.Upgrade[at]firstclassflyer.com