She Paid $795 To Live ‘Upper Class’ In Airport Lounges—Until The Food Arrived

This piece struck me: ‘Play Pretend As Upper Class’: Woman Pays $795 Annually To Get Into Chase Sapphire Lounge At Philadelphia Airport. Then She Sees The Food They Serve. One commenter on this video of food in what’s clearly one of the two best Sapphire lounges (alongside LaGuardia) offers,

Lounges are for middle class to larp and play pretend as upper class.

@cookinwithcarl $795 annually and this is the food in the Chase Sapphire lounge. our burger literally had a hole through it, and that’s after our first order was “never received” and waited forever #travel #chasesapphire #chaselounge #sapphirelounge #philadelphia ♬ original sound – Salixtree ✨

What makes the Philadelphia Sapphire lounge great is the space. It’s large, with a variety of seating options. People like the arcade, spa pods and beer garden.

Chase Sapphire Lounge Philadelphia

The food is similar to the other lounges, and is… fine. It’s not a destination for food you’ll crave.

Chase Sapphire Lounge Philadelphia

But ultimately airport lounges aren’t ‘upper class’ if anything they’re ‘upper middle class’ (although people of all sorts spend time there, it just takes a credit card, membership or in some cases day pass).

It strikes me as such an odd trope that lounges are for ‘the upper class’. Maybe it’s because I remember being in a lounge circa 1981, waiting for my grandfather to arrive back from a business trip. I had a ginger ale and crackers. We weren’t upper class. But lounges nowadays are far more accessible, and far more accessed, than they were when I was young.

This isn’t an FBO, or the ‘Private Terminals’ at some airports where you’re driven to the plane. It’s a mass market product. Air travel itself skews better off than average, and lounge access better off still, but the lines alone tell you it’s not exclusive.

The Philadelphia Sapphire lounge food is fine! I generally have preferred Chase lounge food over Amex lounge food (Amex lounge food used to be quite good years ago), Capital One lounge food has both beat. Even so!

Only the food at Capital One Landing is something I’d have at a restaurant outside the airport, and the bagels with pastrami or lox or smoked whitewish at the Capital One lounge JFK worth eating in its own right (versus just being food because you’re hungry). I’m not going to crave the food at the Capital One lounges in Denver, Dallas, Las Vegas or Washington Dulles.

Capital One Landing DCA

Capital One Lounge JFK

Capital One Lounge JFK

So why isn’t the food better across the board? Chase revealed that they projected to spend $8.40 per passenger on food and beverages at their LAX lounge which should open soon. And delivering quality food in an airport is very difficult.

• Everything has to come through security, you often can’t work with the best vendors, space is limited.
  
• Some airports won’t permit gas ovens, plus knives must often be tethered to the wall and regularly inventories.
  
• Good employees can be tough to get because of security checks and commutes, and they’re cooking for people who are there because of their travels rather than choosing an airport (or lounge!) for the food – hence a lowest common denominator approach.

Mostly, though, a great lounge is a refuge from the chaos of the terminal. Mass market lounges offering great food and open to anyone with a credit card are going to have a hard time staying that way. People sign up for the card! They come earlier and stay longer eating more than you’d expect, even knowing that they will do this.

The best lounges are almost effortless. They’re beautifully-designed. There’s good food and drink and plenty of space, with no waits. And there’s even someone who worries about when it’s time to head to your gate for you (and escorts you there, perhaps with a buggy or tarmac transfer).

Qatar Airways al Safwa Lounge, Doha

Lufthansa First Class Terminal, Bangkok

If you’re accessing a lounge with a credit card that’s $395 or $795 or $895 then that does not signal ‘upper class’ because the threshold for entry is accessible well below that!

There’s a certain mystique to them, perhaps, if you haven’t been. It’s a door you couldn’t enter! And it’s not always clear exactly who can. I remmeber sneaking into the United Airlines Red Carpet Club at LAX in the 90s, fresh off a United business class flight from Sydney (I’d redeemed miles). I knew I had lounge access in Sydney, but hadn’t realized my international ticket would confer access on arrival. I snuck in and didn’t have to!