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You can buy British Airways First Class crockery and bedding: the sale is now live

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And now, from Waterside …. it’s the Sale of the Century!*

Over the course of the last few months lots of airlines have been selling off their excess stock of amenity kits, snacks and even entire (stocked) bar carts.

Whilst some of BA’s catering partners have sold off their stock (such as the Speedbird IPA by Brewdog and Pickering’s Centenary Gin) British Airways has not sold anything directly …. until now.

BA First Afternoon Tea William Edwards crockery

British Airways is selling a number of items from the First Class service including a range of bedding and crockery. In the press release it said:

“Although the at-home experience is no match for the real thing, customers or collectors can pick up items such as William Edwards plates, soup bowls, cups, saucers and even a butter dish for reasonable prices, allowing them to create an authentic First Class dining experience at home.”

Bread baskets, hot towels (which arrive cold!), hot towel plates, champagne flutes, coasters and the Club World casserole dish are also be available, as will the First Class slippers and day blanket.

All of the crockery and bedding is brand new, for clarity!

William Edwards crockery British Airways First class

Why is BA selling First Class stock?

Given none of the items listed are perishable, you would think that BA would be happy to hold on to them rather than sell them.

It would not be the first time BA sells off excess stock. Staff sales are a semi-regular occurrence at HQ; Covid-19 may just have pushed this online.

There are a few reasons why BA might have chosen to liquidate its stock:

BA thinks it can raise some cash from the sale of the items, which can only be positive given the flying outlook for the winter;

The retirement of the 747 fleet and the significant reduction in available First Class seats means BA now has an abundance of crockery and bedding, more than it can realistically make use of in the coming years;

The lack of flying in the past months means that breakage has significantly reduced, leaving BA with a mountain of items;

It plans to introduce a new service in the near future (this is, I accept, very unlikely given the current situation and the fact that the William Edwards crockery is only 18 months old!)

Anything off the trolley dears?

The sale is now live and it turns out that the range of items is far more eclectic than we first expected …..

In addition to the family china, British Airways is also selling a range of general items, where you can buy stuff such as aircraft catering boxes or a waste top loader trolley for £150!

Notably absent, however, are amenity kits or first pyjamas.

The bargain of the day? You could get a set of 6 larger (28cm) dinner plates for £5! However, it turned out that this was a BA IT error and it should have read £50 ….!

How to buy

Looking at stock sales by other airlines, these items are likely to sell out fast.

The link to buy is here, and is now live. Click on ‘British Airways’ in the menu bar.

Let us know what you manage to pick up! If you want to use your British Airways American Express to pay, select PayPal as your payment option as Amex is not accepted directly.

We have bought a few items which we intend to give away in a reader competition in a few weeks.

*We know this is a misquote. You can see the Sale of the Century title sequence here, featuring a brief glimpse of a BA aircraft in Negus livery.


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Comments (438)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Andrew says:

    Most of the First stuff is back in stock if anyone missed out and is still interested.

    • Publius says:

      Thank! Managed to pick up some first plates that were out of stock yesterday.

    • Lady London says:

      not at those prices (for crockery)

      It’s the words ‘British’ and ‘First Class’ that have got this thing going. Who knew BA still had that (now sadly far from the truth for around the past 20 years) image to fall back on?

      They really didn:t need to sell that ‘artwork’ to send a message to the world, did they ?

    • Nigel W says:

      Thanks for this, managed to get my hands on the large dinner plates which were sold out by the time I placed my original order.

  • sloth says:

    I do wonder about the mental stability of people who complain about stuff written on websites, that isn’t what they want to read. It’s no different to an article in a newspaper. just turn the page…

    in the interest of balance, you’ll see from my quote on the previous page that I personally, can’t see why you would buy any of this, however it doesn’t make it less interesting to read about those who do, and if it does then don’t read it!

    • Lady London says:

      Nice work by Rhys. The channel clearly got the point too and had prepared lots of ‘luxury cabin’ clips to whet aspirational appetites alongside Rhys’s comments.

      Lot of unspent money around, lots of aspirational people locked up around the world … British Airways must be delighted.

  • chef says:

    does anybody know how big the pasta bowls are please?

    • Andrew says:

      From the PR shots inflight, pretty decent size. I’ve ordered some too, but not arrived yet, so can’t confirm the measurements.

    • Margaret says:

      The ones on their website are 24cm, so I’d guess the same.

  • Ron says:

    Anyone else ordered Monday morning but still not arrived?? Their contact numbers and email are useless.

    • Rhys says:

      Yes, many, you’re not the only one. I just received 1 of 2 orders so it looks like they are (slowly) being processed. I would give it a couple of days.

    • Stuart says:

      I did and not had a despatch note yet. I assume they had a lot more sales than they anticipated!

    • Andrew says:

      I did an order at 7:45 on Monday morning, that was finally dispatched at 6pm last night and passed to DPD, but I think now DPD are being a bit slow and despite saying it would be delivered today it won’t be until tomorrow. I made 2 further orders which I anticipate being dispatched today.

    • Nigel W says:

      Nope nothing here and I order virtually all the crockery for my new flat!

  • MKB says:

    whatabuy.co.uk has all the hallmarks of a very dodgy outfit. Their Instagram, Facebook and Twitter don’t appear to have been updated in months, and their Contact Us is via an email address that rejects messages sent to it.

    If you use the online webform instead, it merely automates an email to be sent from your default email client to the same address.

    The telephone number (01933 235736) at the bottom of the order acknowledgement is permanently engaged.

  • Njbdevon says:

    My order arrived today – very happy. Includes the 6 plates for £5

  • Alison says:

    Despatch confirmation email arrived this afternoon, with DPD tracking number.

  • Graeme says:

    Just picked up my order of 6 plates purchased at the bargain misprice £5, so pleased with them I’ve ordered the side plates and bowls to match. I must admit I wasn’t expecting to receive them…. They are clearly brand new.

    • Andrew says:

      Excellent! I thought the saucers were misprised too at 6 for £5 but they have remained at that price so clearly not.

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