TL;DR
I didn’t know this existed and I’m pretty damn satisfied with them. 5 stars. Dope.
Quick Intro
In my last post, I mentioned my trip to Japan and Korea. A part of knowing me is knowing about the intense anxiety I have about flying. However, I love to travel so I don’t let that stop me from getting on a plane when I need to. Because I’m already on edge by the time I get to the airport, anything that makes my life easier from then until the time I’ve exited my destination’s airport is a huge help to me.
So far, my flights to and from Asia have been some of the best that I’ve experienced in my adult life and yes, it might have something to do with the food that’s served. I love to eat and not being woken up for the in-flight meal/snacks is definitely high on the list of my travel pet peeves. Fortunately, my mom (a.k.a. my travel companion on this flight) knows this about me and I didn’t miss one meal.
Picture of the lowered tray table with a tray of food on top and a small bottle of water in the cupholder.
My meal experience is impacted by the quality of my tray table. Is it dirty? (Gross). Is it too small? (Annoying). Is it difficult to release and/or stow? (Frustrating). This tray table was none of these things. Allow me to share how this has raised my standards forever, and (important note) I fly coach so I’m sure they’re not even that high. Surely, business class has far surpassed this.
GIF of a boy sipping tea very fancily. (credit: giphy.com)
My Goal
My sole mission on airplanes is to remain cool, calm, and collected, so I strive to encounter the least amount of external stressors as I possibly can. Mealtime came...so I literally just wanted to enjoy my meal with no issues.
GIF of therapist saying “relax, relate, release.” (credit: giphy.com)
My Experience
Stowed tray table with embedded cupholder folded up.
Stowed tray table with embedded cupholder folded down, ready for use.
After boarding and getting situated in my seat, I noticed that the tray table in front of me had what appeared to be a cupholder. “Oh, that’s nice,” I thought. I played with it a little bit and thought about how convenient that would be for my drink...and it was. I also thought about how unfortunate it was that I wouldn’t be able to use it while eating since it was located on the underside of my tray table.
Then, it was mealtime. Until this point, I hadn’t lowered my tray table. Then, boom, I brought it down and guess what I saw…
Picture of the lowered tray table with the stowed cup holder embedded in the seat in front of me.
...another cupholder! 🎉 It was embedded in the seat in front of me, slightly above my tray table on the right. There was enough room for me to fit my whole meal on the tray with ease without having to struggle to make room for my drink (which I’ve found myself doing way too often with tray tables that have that little indent for “holding” cups). It was just an all-around good time for me. 😂
Dope or Dead?
Obviously, this is dope to me. I don’t know how so many planes don’t have this feature...or maybe they do, and I’m just getting booked on the planes that don’t. I haven’t done additional research on this, so I’m not sure if it’s specific to different airlines or plane models; regardless, I’d like to see more of them. I did notice that the cupholders do not do as well with bottles…something they may want to explore in the future.
Picture of lowered tray table with the cupholder embedded in the seat in use. Seen above the cupholder are electrical outlets.
Another adjustment that I would make to this design has to do with the placement of the electrical outlets (the USB, etc.) above the cupholder. The cupholders were sturdy but I’m fairly accident-prone and I can easily see myself spilling a drink on whatever device is nearby. My thinking is that if my device is plugged into the seat on the left side, then I’d most likely keep it on the left side — that is, away from liquids in the cupholder on the right. That, of course, is something that would need to be tested (if it hasn’t been already).
Also…I wonder how left-handed people about drinks always being placed on the right-hand side... 🤔
UX Corner
The cups provided during this flight were different from cups I’ve normally seen in the past, so I can’t help but wonder if the cupholders were actually designed for these cups specifically or if the cups themselves were designed to fit the cupholders. The cups fit so well — much better than I initially expected. The chances of this being purely coincidental are low...I would be very surprised if this was one big accident. Thinking about this reminds me of a recent design problem many of us have seen in the news recently.
In this incident, a man seated in the very back of a plane repeatedly punched the back of the woman’s reclined chair in front of him because it was invading his space. There was a huge back and forth all over social media about who was right and who was wrong in this situation. From my perspective, it’s all about the design and what it allows people to do — not whether anyone was right or wrong. The woman used her seat in the way it was designed to be used; as most of the other seats on the plane were designed to be used. The man’s seat was designed differently; thus, his reasonable frustration, as another chair’s design became inconvenient for him and he had no way of escaping the inconvenience.
GIF of a man trapped in middle seat of an airplane between two visibly sick people. (credit: giphy.com)
It raises a few questions: did the designers of these seats/this plane intend for this to be possible? Were the seat designs tested with humans? Was the airline company aware of the seats’ designs? Should all seats be capable of reclining? Do the rear seats of this plane need to be redesigned or is it the other seats that require adjustment? Should users be more responsible than the seats’ design/designers themselves? (I have plenty more, but we can cap it here).
I believe all responsible designers must realize that people themselves are both predictable and irrational (therefore, unpredictable in many cases); there’s always an additional layer of human emotion to take into account. The man in this situation could have simply remained seated without punching the seat in front of him and still been unsatisfied with his experience. The woman filming in response to being disturbed can be seen as a more mild result of this design flaw. What do we do when the response is taken to the extreme? Should we be planning for emotional extremes?
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
GIF with a man asking “What do you think?” (credit: gifimage.net)