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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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As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

In February 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

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There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

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You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points. These points convert at 1:1 into Avios.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

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There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

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There are also generous bonuses on the two American Express Business cards, with the points converting at 1:1 into Avios. These cards are open to sole traders as well as limited companies.

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Comments (438)

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

  • Simon says:

    My crockery arrived yesterday badly packed with 2 soup bowls and 2 large plates smashed
    I would like them replaced as the set is pretty useless without them
    I had ordered 6 large , medium , small plates , soup bowls and bowls

  • Steve O'Connor says:

    Anyone had any luck on the trolleys? Ordered a double meal trolley on the 25th and not had any responses to my emails. Time to give up and let the credit card company know?

  • Paul says:

    I have to admit that I have had no issues whatsoever in obtaining my BA branded crockery!
    How did I do this?
    Well much in the same way as I don’t have problems with BA flights. I didn’t buy any!!

    • AJA says:

      Haha!

      Do you want to be in show business? No? Well take your feet off the £@@&!!! stage.

    • Andrew says:

      Then how did it become “my BA branded crockery” if you didn’t order any? “the BA branded crockery” you mean.

      I did order over 60 individual items over 4 orders over the week – all of which arrived within a few days. I had one item which was incomplete, a quick email exchange with them and the correct item delivered the next day. Very satisfied customer, looking forward to hopefully future sales.

  • Chef says:

    My order of the 25th is due for delivery at lunchtime today 🤞🤞

  • Steve O'Connor says:

    The plot thickens, I’ve now had a delivery confirmation email but the courier they’ve said they’re using is City Link…city link went into administration in 2015! What on earth is going on??

  • christopher C says:

    I’m very happy with my purchases, my husband was thrilled with the package he got this morning.

  • Hannah says:

    Just received my order and it’s a complete shambles. Only one item out of 7 is correct, one of the champagne glasses is missing, and I’ve been sent 3 items I didn’t order instead of the 5 others I did. Clearly nobody has checked the dispatch note. Will be interested to see whether the site gets back to me before I start chasing it up through the credit card company.

  • Graeme says:

    I ordered an insulated box on the evening of Thursday the 26th and aside from the order confirmation I heard nothing until it arrived at 8am yesterday. It’s exactly as described – with the bonus of a tray in the top, so now I have the perfect shelf for my new desk pedestal (castors arriving today). I’m really pleased with it.

    I appreciate that the wait is annoying people, but we know they’re genuine and we know they’re not going to reply to e-mails, so try to let it go and be patient.

    • Stuart says:

      When they don’t respond to any emails then patience is not going to sort my incorrect and incomplete order, or get me a refund. I am entitled to my money back if they can’t fulfil this. I ordered at 0800 on Monday 23rd and I have given them over 10 days to contact me hence the chargeback through my credit card.

      • Andrew says:

        Whatever happened to “Allow 28 days for delivery”?

        • Stuart says:

          It is not the delivery time that is an issue for me – it is the fact that there is no response whilst I am trying to speak to someone about returning the incorrect items and, at some point receiving the correct order.
          There is no way of communicating – how long am I supposed to let them keep my money without anything being sorted? If they say there is a wait time I am not bothered, but to not respond when I have emailed on numerous occasions is not acceptable to me.
          Why not put a message on their website to assure people that they are aware there have been mistakes but they are working though them?

      • Graeme says:

        Oh no, of course you don’t need to be patient then! I’d be incredibly unhappy. I really just meant us grumbling because of no news or delivery.

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

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