Lufthansa vs. United Airlines

If I were to give a customer service award to the airlines that we used it would most definitely go to Lufthansa. Lufthansa, you win the Burgers and Gelato favorite airline award! Congratulations.

Das Lufthansa gefällt mir! Can I say gefällt again? Gefällt..odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo! 

Now, why does Lufthansa get the award? Well, they were perfect. A whole 10 out of 10. I have never flown in any flight and sincerely enjoyed it as much as I did Lufthansa. I felt taken care of, respected as a paying client, and even pampered. I will compare them to United Airlines that gets a 6 out of 10.

Riding on United was a pain in the bum. Not to mention the tush of this man who constantly got  up to shift my coat and his bag around in pointless circles. Dude, your saggy bum made it to my blog.

United in so-so service

United did the bare minimum to qualify their services. My categories will be:

Food

Beverages

Entertainment

Customer Service

Promptness

Bathrooms

Food

No one likes airplane food. It is expected to all be the same chewy meat, burnt gravy, and vomit inducing salad. 

Lufthansa: Well, Lufthansa's chicken was out of this world!

 It seemed to have been freshly braised, taken right out of the oven and made with love. If I were to go to a restaurant and they had Lufthansa's chicken on the menu, I would order it. The meat was tender, juicy and the skin was crispy and delicious. The rice they served as a side was also moist and had a sweet and sour sauce that wasn't too heavily spiced. The apple strudel they served for dessert was out-of-this-world buttery appley good.

For breakfast they also served a yummy and healthy breakfast of fresh fruit, yogurt and a muffin.

 Way to go Lufthansa! It is important to eat well on a flight because the pressure can make water retaining people, like me, bloat like a fish. 

United: I was left disappointed with United's food.

The flight attendant had no idea what it was when I asked. She was cranky and didn't care at all one way or the other. But the food was equally gross as the flight attendant. Chewy beef that a dog would need to work on, pasty potato creation and charred carrots...gross. The lunch menu was equally disgusting. They served some wrapped sandwich that tasted like wax and the bread was dripping with grease. Yuck. It is of no wonder a few people threw up after the turbulent landing. If the food had been healthier and cooked well I don't think Newark International would be vacuuming vomit from Gate 19. 

Beverages

Lufthansa: the crew was professional and classy. They offered each adult an option of beer, wine or spirits to accompany their meal.

Red or white? Dankeschön!

 Then after the meal we were offered coffee and our choice of top shelf liquor.

at midnight 30,000 miles over the Atlantic Ocean, this little nightcap helps tuck people in. Goodnight! Sleep tight. 

Now that is what I call quality service! Oh, they were also super fast at serving the first round of drinks and often came about the cabin with a choice of flat or mineral water to keep the travelers hydrated. 

United. The flight attendants were not as organized as Lufthansa. They started the drink service after more than an hour in flight, the flight attendants ran out of several beverages. During the meal we were left looking for something to drink because they didn't have the beverage cart following the food one. And they in no way offered a glass of any alcohol on the flight. Not one drop.  

Entertainment

Lufthansa: They chose a good selection of current releases and classic films. I was happy with their content and the format they had for the touch screen was easy to use, bright and fast.

United: They had a huge selection of movies like over 200 and I found myself scrolling and scrolling down the pages to find something. It seemed like they wanted to include as much as possible. Even though the inclusion was nice, it was also a bit too much.

Customer Service

Lufthansa: the days of professional and cheerful customer service still exist! Lufthansa's staff was very prompt and polite in everything. They got the passengers seated, served drinks within minutes and were approachable and friendly offering water, magazines and extra pillows. Their knowledge that flying can be physically stressful for passengers was evident and they did everything possible to make the flight go smoothly and comfortably for each passenger.

United. Several of the flight attendants were rude, ignored me (and other people) and snippy. Yes, snippy. As I said earlier, it was as if they just wanted to do the bare minimum and grouched even at that. Snippy.

Promptness

Lufthansa:  The plane, first of all, had a very smooth take off and landing. This was helped of course by the excellent weather and I know the captain is not to blame. I was happy with how smoothly the plane went up and landed. Then there is the staff service. They were diligently prompt in serving drinks, food, explaining over the intercom system the process for the flight in English and German. The staff knew exactly what to do and when to do it. Their service was flawless. 

United: Again, I know the air current is out of the control of the captain, but we had a horrible take off and terrible landing because of the wind. The captain didn't announce that we would hit turbulence. It would have been nice if he had. Several people vomited as we got off of the flight. The staff, on the other hand, was choppy in all of it's service. They would announce one thing in English, wait 5 minutes then announce in German. They also took a long time serving drinks, picking up garbage and seemed to be uncoordinated.

Bathrooms

Lufthansa:  I really like the system they had for bathrooms. Lufthansa utilized the lower portion of the aircraft to build the bathrooms and this was great because it kept people waiting at the top of the stairs rather than in the isle of the plane. Leaving the bathroom in a normal airplane requires wiggling around the line of people in the isle waiting to go pee pee and it is just really uncomfortable to manuver your groin around the groins of strangers and in the face of people sitting in their seats. Lufthansa's bathrooms located at the base of the plane will never have you scooting around others.

Clean. Lufthansa's bathrooms remained freshly clean and smelling clean. 

United: The usual groin airplane dance happened way too much here. And there was a nice puddle of urination and soggy toilet paper on the floor of the bathroom and a smear of some strange dark cream/poop on the wall....gross. I doubt the flight attendants even cleaned it once during the flight.

And there it is. My favorite airline is now Lufthansa and if their prices stay good I will do what I can to fly with them again and again. I wonder if I can find a Lufthansa recipe book to copy that amazing chicken?