JetBlue Blog

Airline food has always been a sour topic for discourse. Historically, meals often lacked flavor or quality and post-September 11, fewer airlines serve meals at all, certainly least of which on domestic flights. Many people have some scribble in this regard for the complaint box, but what most don’t know is the level of planning and detail that actually goes into onboard meals.

In addition to thinking about the taste of onboard meals, airlines have to think about several other factors that restaurants and other food establishments do not ever have to concern themselves with. The weight of the food is a major consideration and so is the preparation. Is this something can be made or reheated or assembled or stored on the airplane, is a huge question when it comes to planning onboard meals.

In a recent ABC News story to address this topic, with Singapore Airlines as the central focus, they report that,  “for roughly every three pounds of weight on a plane, the airline needs another pound of fuel. ” Adding a single ingredient to a dish onboard could result in a huge increase in expenditures on the other end. American Airlines saved $40,000 back in 1987 by removing one olive from each salad in first class. Considerations also need to be made for just how to keep each part of the meal as fresh as possible between the time it is first cooked in a kitchen on the ground and when it is served at 30,000-plus feet in the air.

As a New York-based airline with our international flights not exceeding a handful of hours inflight, we do not currently offer meals onboard, but we are proud to be one of the only such airlines offering free, unlimited brand-name snacks and beverages. To the best of our knowledge, our snacks taste just as good in the air as they do on the ground. Oh and be sure to keep an eye out for new offerings in 2010.  Based on positive feedback that we received from both Customers and Crewmembers during a food trial in 2009 we intend to roll out the next phase of our Onboard Food Sales program, shelf-stable foods on long haul flights, during the second quarter of 2010.