Amenity Kit Faceoff: First Class vs. Business Class on Lufthansa

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Today, TPG Editor-in-Chief Zach Honig digs into two amenity kits he picked up on a recent Lufthansa flight from Munich to New York.

On a recent Lufthansa first-class flight, I was able to spend some time in the (fairly empty) business-class cabin. I'll cover the seats and cabins in an upcoming post, but for now I want to dig into the amenity kits, since there's always a lot of interest in premium-cabin schwag.

Of course, the highlight here is the hard-shell Rimowa amenity kit Lufthansa issues to all first-class passengers. The airline tends to flip between these high-end kits and a soft-shell design, but for now you can expect to receive a Rimowa kit when you travel in long-haul first class on LH. The cases are exceptionally high quality (you could hand them over as checked luggage and the contents would arrive just fine) — they're made from the same material as Rimowa's excellent (but expensive) roller bags.

Meanwhile, in business class, you can expect to receive a small canvas bag manufactured by Samsonite. It's not nearly as luxurious as the Rimowa, but it's a decent pouch as well. Lufthansa only issues amenity kits on intercontinental flights, so don't expect to receive one if you're fly from London to Frankfurt, for example.

Digging into the contents, the goodies you'll receive inside are fairly consistent between both cabins. Looking at the first-class kit, you'll find socks, a shoe horn, eye mask, earplugs, headphone covers, a toothbrush, toothpaste, a folding brush, a single breath mint and three tubes of La Prairie amenities, including moisturizing Moisturizing Lip Balm, Cellular Swiss Ice Crystal Cream and Cellular Hand Cream.

The business-class kit, meanwhile, offers disposable socks, an eye mask, earplugs, headphone covers, a toothbrush, toothpaste and a single breath mint, along with Korres Moisturizing Cream and Shea Butter Lip Balm.

Lufthansa's first class is definitely the most luxurious product you can redeem miles to fly between the US and Europe (besides Singapore Suites, of course, which is only available between JFK and Frankfurt). You'll get caviar shortly after takeoff and very comfortable bedding on nighttime flights. The seats are large and very comfortable, and they're even fairly private once you raise the aisle partition. While you can book Lufthansa business-class awards at any time, the airline only opens up first-class award seats to partners at most 15 days before departure.

You can fly Lufthansa first class between the US and Europe for 110,000 United MileagePlus miles each way. Business-class awards, meanwhile, will run you 70,000 miles each way. I spent 30 minutes in the business-class seat during my flight and found it to be quite comfortable — while you'll probably find it worth redeeming the extra 40,000 miles for first on a flight departing Frankfurt, I'd probably opt for business on flights departing the US — especially short red-eye flights from the East Coast.