Iberia to increase its hand luggage capacity by 60% thanks to the new Airbus´L bins

• Iberia will retrofit its A320neo fleet with the newly L bins launched by Airbus this year 

• Iberia Maintenance will lead the retrofit project in these aircraft from the beginning of 2025 

• Today, Alberto García, Fleet Planning Director at Iberia and Charbel Youzkatli, Head of Commercial Services Europe at Airbus, have signed the contract at the MRO Europe celebrated in Amsterdam 

Iberia and Airbus have signed a contract by which the Spanish airline will outfit its A320neo fleet with newly launched L bins. Thanks to the new bins, which allow vertical loading of carry-on roller bags, Iberia will further improve its passengers’ flight experience increasing by 60% the hand baggage capacity. The signing ceremony took place at the MRO Europe in Amsterdam. 

Iberia is the second airline to choose these bins which are a more compact model of the XL bins, introduced in June this year at Aircraft Interior eXpo (AIX) in Hamburg, Germany.

“We are proud to announce this contract with Airbus, one of our key partners, because with the new Airbus´L bins, we will be able to improve our customers' experience. The new luggage compartments increase the hand luggage capacity on our A320neo fleet by 60%. In addition, this improvement also translates into faster boarding and deplaning, which also makes it easier for us to continue to meet our strict punctuality targets and provide excellent service to our customers”, stated Alberto Garcia, Fleet Planning Director at Iberia.  

"The L-Bins are a game changer, enhancing passengers' experience and streamlining cabin crew workflow. We are very happy to see the L-Bin being part of Iberia's unwavering quest of excellence and punctuality" said Charbel Youzkatli, Head of Commercial Services Europe at Airbus. 

The new Airspace L bins

The new Airspace L bins share common parts with Airspace XL Bins lowering spares holding costs in mixed fleets while perfectly matching the Airspace design language. In addition, a simplified mechanism will increase reliability and reduce maintenance costs. Retrofittable in 3 to 5 days, the optimised plug & play replacement of the in-service bins will allow Iberia to minimize the out-of-service time of the aircraft.

The bins, which are made of ultra-lightweight and highly stable composite products, will be manufactured by EFW (Elbe Flugzeugwerke GmbH), an Airbus First Tier supplier for composite components since 1993. Production will take place in a new state-of-the-art manufacturing site employing measures such as photovoltaics and bioenergy.

Iberia Maintenance selected for the retrofit 

Iberia Maintenance has been selected by the airline to retrofit these aircraft at its heavy maintenance hangar in Madrid, with a capacity to work on 10 aircraft at the same time. The company carries out heavy checks for the Iberia Group (Iberia and Iberia Express) and all the members of the International Airlines Group (Vueling, British Airways and Aer Lingus). 

“Iberia Maintenance has the required expertise and knowledge to carry out this retrofit, and we are honored that Iberia has trusted us for this job. At La Muñoza, where Iberia Maintenance headquarters are located, we have retrofitted passenger aircraft to cargo ones, changed the seats of many planes, and, even, we were the first company in Spain to install sharklets to an aircraft already in service. The works will be carried out at the beginning of 2025 and the new bins will be installed during the scheduled heavy maintenance checks of these aircraft to reduce to out-of-service time of the aircraft.”, explained Natalia Martínez del Río, Airframe Services Director at Iberia Maintenance.