There's no way around it: reaching the Tri-City on Poland's Baltic coast from Orange County demands at least one connection, and no single carrier owns this routing outright. Booking business class from Orange County to Gdansk realistically means routing through Amsterdam, Munich, Frankfurt, or Chicago on a combination of Delta, United, or LOT Polish Airlines, with total journey time (including connection) stretching well past the 12-hour air time once you factor in the transfer. Delta typically routes SNA travelers through Detroit or Atlanta before a transatlantic hop, often on a Delta One suite-equipped A330 or A350, while United funnels through Chicago or Newark using their Polaris business seats on 767 or 787 aircraft. LOT, Poland's flag carrier, is the only airline offering a genuinely direct-feeling final leg into GDN from a European hub like Chicago via Warsaw, using their Boeing 787 Dreamliner business cabin for the long-haul segment.
My strong preference on this itinerary is routing through Chicago O'Hare on United, then connecting onto LOT's nonstop O'Hare-to-Warsaw service before a short domestic hop to Gdansk — this avoids the congestion of a European mega-hub connection during peak summer tourist season and gets you into Poland on a single carrier group's baggage handling. If you're using Amsterdam or Frankfurt as your transatlantic gateway instead, build in at least 90 minutes for the connection, as both airports' passport control lines can be brutal for non-EU passport holders arriving from the US in high season.
Deal-wise, January through March and again in October and November are consistently the softest months for this corridor, since Gdansk's tourist season peaks hard in summer and airlines discount business fares aggressively in the shoulder and deep winter windows. Given the multi-airline routing complexity and the fare volatility that comes with connecting itineraries, setting up automated fare alerts for this specific city pair is the smartest way to catch a business class fare drop before it disappears.