Broadly speaking, Alaska Airlines offers the best soft product of any U.S. carrier on standard domestic flights (so, excluding premium cross-country routes). That wasn’t always true – but began with their acquisition of Virgin America which did a really nice job with food that was both delicious and attractively presented.
The airline has announced some new products starting this fall – from new drinks, to first class blankets, and toiletries for their lounges and lavatories.
- Lagunitas Hoppy Refresher, a non-alcoholic sparkling water “with a refreshing hoppy kick”
Credit: Alaska Airlines - Straightaway Nitro Espresso Martini with Stumptown Coffee Roasters
Credit: Alaska Airlines - Filson blanket for first class
Credit: Alaska Airlines - Salt & Stone amenities in lounge and in-lavatory
Credit: Alaska Airlines
I’m not sure that I especially care for ‘hoppy water’ but it’s something Alaska is doing that is different from competitors in an industry that isn’t especially distinguished or distinguishable in terms of product experience. It’s complimentary to first class and extra legroom coach starting November 20, and available for purchase further back.
And for a Seattle-based airline, coffee matters. They moved from Starbucks to Stumptown a year ago – in a move that in many ways telegraphed problems for the coffee chain that are just now being well-understood and addressed. In the airline’s home market, coffee matters. And combining it with an espresso martini is very on-trend.
This summer even American Airlines brought back blankets to non-premium cross country redeyes. American does everything in a me-too, less-than fashion for its soft product experience. These will be available on “select long-haul and coast-to-coast routes starting early December.” I look forward to trying the new Alaska blanket to see how it measures up.
Meanwhile, the bath products brought in-airport and on-board offer “bright citrus notes of Italian Bergamot, grapefruit and orange blossom awakens your senses while the earthy warmth of vetiver, hinoki and amber grounds and soothes.” I’m not myself familiar with Salt & Stone, but sold at retail these products tend to be high margin while purchased at scale they shouldn’t be expensive but still get the name out there with premium customers. I’m not convinced, though, that associating a brand with airline lavatories is a plus for them. We’ll see starting “the beginning of next year.”
Finally a “complete new beverage lineup” launches November 20th with “Waterbrook Wine Blend, Alaskan Brewing WILDNESS and our new First Class offering from Airfield Estates Winery.”
Product details matter in the airline industry in a way that some executives, who prefer just to play with route maps and airplanes, sometimes forget.
We’ll all have our favorites, of course, and these choices will delight some while others will be unimpressed. Alaska operates in a lot of competitive markets – against Delta in Seattle, against everyone in Los Angeles, and now against everyone in a ramped up way for mainland – Hawaii – as well as less competitive ones like small towns in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska.
Differentiating the experience matters, or else it’s just a game of price and schedule, and schedule is hard to win when you aren’t the largest.
I don’t care about their premium soap give me something I can eat without spitting it out
Maybe the soap would taste better?
I mean…the hoppy water is sort of refreshing. It is a bit of a gimmick (something non-drinking people buy when out with friends in the evening), but honestly, I prefer it to cola. If they could really deliver something amazing — like quality hot tea — that would move the needle for me. Not all high quality experiences need to be costly. And yes, a non-caustic lavatory hand soap/lotion option is also sort of nice.
Blankets?
They did this a few years ago for transcon flights. Nice blue blankets that were cozy.
Then came the cuts. Blankets only on longer flights, conveniently setting the distance threshold to exclude SEA-PHL, SEA-JFK, and a couple other transcon routes.
Then came not carrying blankets for all seats in F.
Then they had real problems even getting the blankets restocked between flights. Even in Alaska’s home airport of SEA they’d regularly leave on a transcon without blankets even when the plane overnighted in SEA.
Then they just stopped carrying blankets.
I don’t trust the bean counters at Alaska.
They already have had blankets in first class on transcons and Hawaii flights. They were brought back over a year ago. I just use them to see on since the new first class seats are hard or I use it for my back for extra padding. These blankets look different. Personally I’d rather have a pillow than a blanket.
At the end of the day, it’s still a tight, cramped, old design with just standard seats. No leg extension like Virgin had. No entertainment like Virgin had. Not even the more comfortable Airbuses that Virgin had. Putting more lipstick on a 737 pig doesn’t make it any better. The lav is stupidly small by design and the seats Alaska has are just average…nothing extraordinary. Without a reinvention of the standard 2×2 in a 50+ year old design won’t do much to improve the experience. Sure a catchy beverage and blanket is welcomed, but that won’t move the needle much in my opinion.