By Vincenzo Claudio Piscopo
Emirates’ premium economy has achieved tremendous success in its inaugural year, owing to the dedication and efforts of the cabin crew team, which has now expanded to an impressive 20,000 members.
Since its introduction in August 2022, over 160,000 customers have traded to fly in Emirates’ premium economy. The product is currently available on flights to 11 cities, with the list set to expand to 13 cities by the year’s end as more retrofitted aircraft with refreshed cabins are added to scheduled service.
Dubai’s unique location enables Emirates to operate flights to over 130 destinations, with A380s featuring the latest premium economy cabins flying to London Heathrow, Sydney, Melbourne, Auckland, Christchurch, Singapore, Los Angeles, New York JFK, Houston, San Francisco, and Dubai. Flights regularly reach total capacity in premium economy.
The airline will offer premium economy on flights to/from Mumbai and Bengaluru starting October 29. Additional cities will be announced soon. Emirates has retrofitted 14 of its 20 premium economy aircraft in-house in Dubai over the past nine months. The airline’s multi-billion-dollar retrofit program includes the installation of over 4,000 premium economy seats, 700 first-class suites, and the refurbishing of 5,000 business class seats with the latest interiors. This program will upgrade 67 Emirates and 53 Boeing 777 cabins.
Since August 2022, the airline has operated nearly 4,500 premium economy flights. Last year, over 60% of premium economy bookings came from loyal Emirates Skywards members and regular customers.
Emirates, one of two flag carriers of the United Arab Emirates, is a subsidiary of The Emirates Group, owned by the government of Dubai’s Investment Corporation of Dubai. It has an extensive network covering 800 cities and 5,250 additional sectors. Over 50,000 travelers connect to their destinations through codeshare or interline flights operated by Emirates’ partners. Emirates has a transport ecosystem of 29 codeshare, 117 interline, and 11 intermodal rail partners across 100 countries.
20,000 Cabin Crew Members
Emirates’ cabin crew team has reached a new milestone of 20,000 members. Since 2022, the airline has held recruitment events in 340 cities across six continents. It now has an incredibly diverse team comprising more than 140 nationalities and the ability to speak 130 different languages.
Among Emirates’ cabin crew members, 4,000 have served between 5 and 9 years, nearly 3,000 have served between 10 and 14 years, over 1,500 have served between 15 and 19 years, and approximately 400 have over 20 years of service on their resumes. In addition, three crew members have been with the airline for over 30 years.
The airline’s longest-serving cabin crew is a male Emirati purser who joined in 1987 called Moosa Mubarak. He has flown as Emirates’ cabin crew for 36 years on over 3,500 flights. Today the airline has over 1,100 pursers.
The airline will host global recruitment events covering hundreds of cities all year round, still expanding in the coming months. All new cabin crew will undergo an intense eight weeks of training in hospitality, safety, and service delivery standards in Emirates’ state-of-the-art facility in Dubai.
Vincenzo graduated in 2019 in Mechanical Engineering with an aeronautical curriculum, focusing his thesis on Human Factors in aircraft maintenance. In 2022 he pursued his master’s degree in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Palermo, Italy. He combines his journalistic activities with his work as a Reliability Engineer at Zetalab.
