Category Archives for Lounges.
U.S. forces left Afghanistan, with their last position held at the Kabul airport. There was much reporting on the airport being effectively abandoned based on a ‘notice to airmen’ that the airport was uncontrolled. That’s not an entirely uncommon situation. And there are already plans in place for a Turkish-Qatari consortium to manage the airport. Turkish control means o good chance of a Priority Pass lounge in Kabul.
The Club at MSY airport lounge in the New Orleans airport is the Priority Pass option there. Many haven’t seen it since the airport opened a brand new terminal, abandoning the existing one, shortly before the pandemic.
Two birds walk into the Philadelphia airport Admirals Club bar. They sit down and the first bird asks the bartender, “you got any bread?” The Admirals Club bartender replies, “No, sorry.”
The second bird then asks, “Have you got any bread?” And the bartender starts getting angry: “we haven’t got any bread, what do you think this is a Delta Sky Club?”
The Philadelphia Airport Admirals Club between the B and C concourses has two birds that have been flying through it. Staff there say they first attracted one of the birds three months ago, and the other bird showed up in early August.
An executive was talking a little too loudly in a Delta Air Lines Sky Club in Detroit. It sounds like Delta has terminated Sodexho contracts for running some clubs, and that Los Angeles is getting its differentiated business class lounge soon along with improvements to the Delta One check-in experience.
Two months ago Chase announced its own airport lounge network just as Capital One begins opening its own airport lounges, following in the footsteps of American Express with its Centurion lounge network.
We now know their first three locations, along with access policy.
Geoffrey Palcher made a brilliant move as his fiancé was headed off on her bachelorette trip. He booked the conference room at the American Airlines Admirals Club for a pre-trip party. He went in early and got it decorated, too. Most people don’t realize it’s possible to customize a celebration at the airport, but Palcher was all over this.
Escape lounges in the U.S. are being rebranded as “Escape Lounges – The Centurion® Studio Partner”. Escape has a new partnership, though, outside of the American Express relationship. They’ll be delivering phone booths in airports you can pay to access for privacy and to charge devices in conjunction with Jabbrrbox which has had these in airports since 2018.
With a big aircraft order and a new commitment to seat back video screens, including retrofitting existing aircraft, United Airlines is trying to capture the mantle of a premium carrier that customers will choose to fly.
However they’ve been slow to re-open their club lounges. Fortunately the airline is feeling the pressure, has started to re-open more of its clubs outside of hubs, and has a plan to re-open more over the summer.
Cathay Pacific carried an average of just 774 passengers per day in May. Only around 2000 passengers per day used the Hong Kong airport. That’s only 1% of pre-pandemic volume. As a result, Cathay Pacific has just one lounge open – The Wing First Class lounge.
The Wing first class lounge joins Priority Pass effective Monday, June 21.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
