Emirates new luxury amenities, Cathay ex EU business class and cheap avios

Emirates new luxury amenities

Emirates has introduced some rather luxurious sounding products for new First and Business Class alongside its new First product which you can read about here. There is currently a good Emirates Business class deal from Amsterdam here and First one way from Johannesburg here.

BYREDO for Emirates Wellness kit

Emirates First Class customers will find the BYREDO travel wellness range of skincare in their private suites. The collections were exclusively created for Emirates for relaxing and hydrating you. The collection by European luxury brand, BYREDO, was first introduced in Emirates’ new fully enclosed suites on the Boeing 777 last year and is now being rolled out across the fleet. Despite having flown the Etihad first class apartments last year, this looks like one of the smartest First Class amenity kits I have seen for a suite. I love the look of the notebook – that is definitely a very covetable memento from a First class trip.

Products included in the BYREDO for Emirates Wellness kit are:

• Cleansing Face Towelette,
• Facial Toner
• Eye Cream
• Chamomile roll-on Sleep Oil to apply on pulse points for relaxation.
• Chamomile Pillow Mist spray

Bowers & Wilkins Active Noise Cancelling E1 headphones

Emirates is also rolling out brand new Bowers & Wilkins Active Noise Cancelling E1 headphones in First Class. These headphones were designed by award-winning audio brand Bowers & Wilkins and created exclusively for Emirates using a unique hybrid noise cancellation technology optimised for the Emirates First Class cabins.

The headphones are lightweight with top quality materials, including aluminium and sheepskin leather. You can test the headphones’ sound quality con The Bowers & Wilkins Superior Sound playlist, a selection of tracks selected for their acoustic excellence available on ice, Emirates entertainment system.

Bulgari Amenity Kits

Emirates continues its partnership with Bulgari for the latest version of their amenity kits. The new set of amenity kits for both First and Business Class feature Bulgari’s fragrance – Eau Parfumée Au Thé Vert (Green Tea) – and contain skincare essentials too.

The First Class kit bags, made from faux leather, come in eight designs with a new range of colours for men and women. Eight additional designs are available in Business Class – four for men and four for women. The amenity kits are available on long-haul overnight flights and designs are changed every nine months. The bags have been designed to be used after the flight to store headphones, make-up or jewellery for example.

First Class customers will also be given Hydra Active moisturising sleepsuits on long-haul overnight flights.

If like me, Emirates First Class is still on your bucket list you can still buy the Emirates sleepsuits, First Class blanket or the Bowers & Wilkins PX headphones from the Emirates Official Stores.

Fine wines on Emirates

There has been something of a battle in the skies for the best First wines and spirits recently with many of the top airlines upping their game in First class. Emirates recently revamped its spirits offering across all classes to include exclusives like the Hennessy Paradis Imperial and introduced the Emirates Vintage Collection – a selection of fine wines which have been stored for up to 15 years. This includes the Château Cheval Blanc 2004, Château Haut Brion 2004, Château Mouton Rothschild 2001 and Château Margaux 1998 served in First Class on select routes.

I shall be reviewing Emirates in a few months time though sadly only in business class although I am still debating that one way Emirates offer….

Cathay Pacific ex EU business class – Avios & TP too

Cathay Pacific are a great airline but it is rare to get cheap fares under £2000 even in a sale. Amsterdam is the current hotspot for easily accessible cheap deals to the Far East and it looks like Cathay have jumped on the bandwagon. Being part of oneworld you can, of course, earn Avios and tier points on Cathay as well as enjoying their great onboard service and the lounges in Hong Kong. The flights are not direct except Hong Kong but this means you would get an extra 80 tier points return plus any positioning flights to Amsterdam if applicable. I had a look at the equivalent flights from the UK and they were well over £3000 return so this represents a good saving!

The fares start from:

• Bangkok £1670
• Seoul £1807
• Singapore £1856
• Tokyo £2025
• Bali £2072
• Shanghai £1637
• Beijing £1637
• Hong Kong £2237

The rules are:

• Travel dates: 1 Nov 18 – 31 Mar 19 or 1 May 19 – 31 Aug 19
• 3 days minimum stay
• 90 day advance booking
• Purchase by 30 September 18
• Cancel or change for a fee

You can search for the latest prices on Cathay Pacific here. The fares are also available on Expedia so it could be worth looking to see if you can add a hotel to lower the price here.

Cheap Avios – with a catch

Every now and again Iberia offer a cheap buy Avios option through Groupon Spain. Those of you that have had dealings with Iberia before will know that their IT is pretty bad and thing often go awry. That is the catch with this offer. There are numerous reports of people having hassle with the previous offers but the purchase rates are a good discount from the usual prices and if you want to top up your Iberia or BA balance you may be interested. The ‘combine my Avios’ lockdown has been lifted now so you should be able to transfer to BA without issue if you have before.  If not they can usually do it by phone.

There are a few extra things to get extra value. You can go to the Iberia website, change your country to Spain with English as the language and visit the IberiaPluStore. This is exactly like the BA estore.  Groupon offer 8 Avios per €1 spent until 31 August 2018 so you can get a few more on top of your purchase.

If this is your first time using Groupon Spain, you might be able to obtain a discount by using the discount code: VIVEGRPN

There are sometimes issues with credit cards being accepted but paying by Paypal should solve this. The Groupon page is in Spanish but google translate works well with the page.

There are number of different packages to choose from which present different value for money. Once you have bought your package you then have to exchange it for Avios by 31 September 2018 which is usually the tricky part. You do this by inputting the voucher code into a special portal which should then mean you get your Avios 10 days later.  You can see people’s success rate from the reviews.

Here are the packages:

• 2,000 Avios Iberia Plus for € 19 instead of € 54 SOLD OUT
• 4.000 Avios Iberia Plus for € 54 instead of € 91
• 8,000 Iberia Plus Avios for € 99 instead of € 164
• 15,000 Iberia Plus Avios for € 189 instead of € 293
• 20,000 Avios Iberia Plus for € 249 instead of € 385

You can buy more than one of each package as follows:

• Limit of 5 coupons per Iberia card for the option of 4,000, 20,000
• Limit of 10 coupons per Iberia card for the rest of options: 8,000 and 15,000 Avios.

Here is the link for Groupon Spain