FlyerTalk Forums - Guide: Flagship First Dining at JFK (2024)

No.

You need to be arriving on a same day AA international First flight or departing AA international or transcon First.
The only partner airline inbound F pax granted access is CX, and then only depending on the mood or knowledge (or lack thereof) of the FL dragon.

No. If you were inbound on AA in F, then yes. But not on BA.

Realize you are responding specifically to the circ*mstances of the poster, but worth clarifying that in any other circ*mstance, arrival off of Transcon Flagship First also grants access.

I was there in November 2019 and arrived around 1015 pm and no problem with ordering. We stayed about 45 minutes

So outbound BA F grants access?

No, not at JFK. The only partner airline with access is CX, whose F pax get access on departure and (typically) on arrival when connecting to AA in any class.

Is champagne served in the mornings?

I seem to remember that the Flagship lounge doesn’t serve alcohol until late morning / early afternoon. I have an upcoming JFK LAX trip with a 9am departure and am wondering if I can have a glass of LP with breakfast.

I take it that the flight needs to be the same day, and not simply a connecting flight on the same itin? I.e. If i arrive on an AA Flagship First flight from LHR to JFK, i'd be entitled to access to Flagship dining if connecting on to a transcon flight to LAX in business if it was the same calendar day, but not if i was overnighting at JFK and continuing on the next morning (even if it's less than 24 hours and not classed as a stopover)?

Correct.

Starting at 8AM per NYC liquor laws.

I was here yesterday morning shortly after opening (around 5 am). I was the only patron. Service was awful. Server took my order and brought my food. There was no follow up to ask if I wanted anything else (like more coffee, for example) or how the food was.

And the food was not very good. I got the cornmeal pecan pancakes. Dry as sawdust and about the same amount of flavor. Bacon was undercooked and inedible. Also had the avocado crostini. Nice ripe avo, but just two tiny slices of toast and there was no flavor at all. I had to go up to counter to request salt and pepper. The only real bright spot was the coffee which was freshly made. But it took them 15 minutes to bring it after I sat down. Server spent entire time standing at the bar chatting with the host. So annoyed by lack of service I did not leave a tip (very unusual for me).

After finishing I went to the flagship lounge. The food in the buffet there was much better. At least it was properly cooked and had flavor.

The service was terrible when I went a couple weeks ago as well. I had to go up to the bar to order another drink since the waitress never came back to check on me. There were about 3 people in FFD and I think 3/4 servers but still awful service. I remember pre-covid, the service was great - not sure if this was covid related change, but service has been a noticeable drop. Food was fine, the burger was meh at best and the fries were well undercooked and not crispy at all.

Also I think it's funny that if you google the wine bottles (I only looked at red), they were all less than $30 per bottle. Nothing says exclusive first class dining like a $3-15k flight (depending destination) with a $20 wine bottle! They do have a good liquor selection but they really need to improve their wines. The two I tried were not good.

While I totally agree that, other than Champagne, FFD wines are now swill and service could be much better and (more) polished... if you are spending anywhere near $15K, you should be flying AF, LH, LX or EK... and never AA.

That's a bit of a trend these days - airlines spend on reasonable liquor and champagne and go cheap on wines. At least FFD still has LPGS. Unusually the FFD champagne is generally much better than what they serve in the air.