Emirates/Alaska codeshare. Another option for YYC-Dubai and beyond

Emirates, the (in)famous airline from Dubai will be starting service between Seattle and Dubai in March and while that news does not directly impact Calgary, their recent announcement of becoming a codeshare partner with Alaska Airlines does. Why does it? Well Emirates will be codesharing on Alaska Airlines flights between Calgary and Seattle for the connecting flight to Dubai. This means more competition for the all the Oil & Gas Travel to the Middle East. While British Airways and KLM attempt to take some of this business away from the stranglehold Air Canada/Lufthansa have for this traffic, this new option is extremely viable and with the right amount of marketing could change some YYCer's habit for flying to the Middle East. Emirates is aware of this and is making sure to price the flights competitively and here is a comparison of total all in pricing between YYC and DXB for a March 13th departure with a return on March 20th

Air Canada
Lowest price is $1611.37 in Tango (not Tango Plus) with connections in Toronto and Frankfurt; on the way back stops are in Frankfurt and Montreal. One stop flights via Frankfurt price out at $1810.85
Business Class: $8852.85 with stops in Frankfurt each way

KLM
Lowest price is $1620.87 with a stop in Amsterdam on the way out and Amsterdam/Vancouver on the way back.
Business Class: $8975.87 with stops in Amsterdam each way

British Airways
Lowest price is $1500.29 with a stop in London both ways.
Business Class: $8740.86 with a stop in London on the way out but a painful London and Dallas routing on the way back

and finally Emirates
Lowest price is $1257.30 with the stop in Seattle both ways.
Business Class: $9209.99 with the stop in Seattle both ways.

As you can see, EK is offering great pricing in Economy class however not as great business class pricing although some flyers would argue their business class trumps the other three airlines business classes and is worth the extra money whereas some other wouldn't. Also one thing to note is that I checked pricing for the first month of service where EK is trying to stimulate demand and will go up if the route proves popular. I will definitely check the pricing now and again to see if this holds true. One other thing that may make people avoid EK is that you have to clear U.S. customs to connect via Seattle and some may not want this extra hassle.

Emirates is also offering a Skywards Miles Accelerator bonus for the month of March between SEA and DXB, so for Economy you would earn a total of 21,000 Skywards miles between YYC and DXB or 73,500 Miles for Business Class.

They also offer a first class cabin (Private Suites) for the SEA-DXB route. Unfortunately there is no First or Business Class cabin on the Alaska Airlines portion between YYC-SEA. For more information on Emirates flights or to book visit them at Emirates.com