Update: It looks like MiMa isn’t an airline, or a club, any longer. We hardly knew ye. The original post remains below, for posterity.

Leave it to the Italians to find a way to make business class travel seem more exclusive…

Forget MaxJet and Eos, which offer scheduled all-business service and actually publish their fares. (the gall!) MiMa, partly owned by Alitalia, will operate an Airbus 319 6 days a week from Milan to New York. But MiMa, short for Milano-Manhattan, is not an airline, it’s a club. Yes, a club. You have to apply and be approved in order to join, which gives you the privilege of paying (reportedly) $4000 per round trip.

I say “reportedly,” because the MiMa website doesn’t say how much a flight would cost. You’re not buying a flight, after all, you’re buying a club membership. And membership is not open: Check the association bylaws! (pdf)

This is just silly. I understand that the company is trying to position itself between a private jet and a commercial business class ticket, but the pretensions of the club are downright laughable.

Plus, you don’t earn miles…

(geneology of a post: Departures, via BrandNoise, via Gridskipper)