Are airport VIP lounges really worth it?
A few years ago, I was on my way home from a self-designed, poorly thought-out fishing trip to Albania with a budding, chain-smoking Macedonian guide named Zafir. He was awesome. The trip, though super fun in a pickle-your-liver kind of way, wasn’t, at least on the get-skunked fishing front. But then came one of the greatest travel experiences I’ve had: I walked into the Star Alliance airport lounge during a layover in Istanbul, Turkey. And now I can say I would go back to Istanbul just to hang out in that pleasure palace.
We’re talking 60,000-plus square feet of a multi-storied, wood and glass heaven, complete with a cinema, private suites, a dozen showers, pool tables, a library, gaming consoles, work stations, meeting rooms, and what felt like endless buffets bursting with mounds of sizzling kofta sausages, tangy olives and various Turkish delights, all displayed like a sultan’s bullion on shiny silver platters. I ate. I took advantage of the free wi-fi and did some work. Then I kept eating and eating, feeling like I’d won the lottery. My three-hour layover seemed far too short.
A few years ago, I was on my way home from a self-designed, poorly thought-out fishing trip to Albania with a budding, chain-smoking Macedonian guide named Zafir. He was awesome. The trip, though super fun in a pickle-your-liver kind of way, wasn’t, at least on the get-skunked fishing front. But then came one of the greatest travel experiences I’ve had: I walked into the Star Alliance airport lounge during a layover in Istanbul, Turkey. And now I can say I would go back to Istanbul just to hang out in that pleasure palace.
More Common Options
As anyone who’s ever traveled through just about any airport knows, this isn’t your typical experience. Most of us aren’t even allowed through the frosted glass doors. Instead, we shuffle with the rest of the hoi polloi up to some dodgy fast-food joint, or jockey for a table at whatever bar is showing a sporting event of interest, and we make do, hoping it really is chicken we’re eating. Then the bill comes and it’s always a shock. I mean, $35 without the tip for a lousy salad and a beer?
There’s a whole fishbowl of reasons why airport food costs more than a first-class ticket to Farquhar Atoll, but it really doesn’t have as much to do with price gouging a captive audience as you might think. It’s actually less, “Where else you gonna get a meal, sucka?” and more “How are we going to get you that meal?”
Airport Food Costs
I’m offering no excuses here. Airports generally do have rules against price-inflating bamboozlement, but businesses are still allowed to make a profit, of course. It’s a fact that it’s more expensive for, say, McDowells to serve you a Big Mick at JFK than on the streets of Queens. A distributor has to bring all that secret sauce through security ($). Management generally must pay employees more to deal with those airport hassles, too ($$). And then the airport’s governing authority, which leases the space to businesses, can take a chunk of the sales as commission ($$$). Near my home in Oregon, the Port of Portland operates PDX airport and can siphon off anywhere from 10 percent of sales for a fast-food restaurant doing less than $600,000 in business a year to 18 percent for a coffee place turning over more than $1 million. How do you think Mr. Starbuck caulks those gaps?
Lounge Or Not?
All of this begs a question most travelers have undoubtedly pondered while hunting for a vacant electrical outlet with the handle of their carryon in one hand and a microwaved Cinnabon in the other: Just how long does a layover need to be to make it worth forking over a fee to access an airport lounge? After all, once you’re in, you’ll have “free” (if not Istanbul-level) food, presumably better wi-fi, more comfortable seats, and a quiet(er) place to work? The answer: it depends.
If you fly a lot, this all may be moot, since airlines like United, for instance, let you into their lounges when you hit “gold” status and are flying internationally. That’s how I was able to get in. Sadly, the pandemic markedly curtailed my travel and reduced my airline status to “peasant.”
By The Numbers
For United domestic flights, however, anyone could buy a $59 day pass or spend $650 for an annual membership. It’s the same with American, though the membership price drops to $550 if you are an “executive platinum” flier.
Some quick math suggests if you plan to be in the airport for at least two meals—a pretty hellacious layover—and really need to work, it may be worth your wallet to just bite the bullet and get a day pass. You’d have to do that about a dozen times a year, or once a month on average, to make that annual membership fee pen out.
The math changes if you’re traveling with friends or family, since everyone would need a pass. Delta doesn’t even sell day passes anymore, so you are left with only one option if you don’t have elite status: You have to buy an annual membership for at least $545, but you could bring in a traveling companion for $39.
Credit Card Offers
Of course, airlines and credit card companies know how badly you want into their sparkling lounges, so they dangle all sorts of incentives to get you to sign up for a card, often with heavy fees (think $250 and up). American Expresss’ Centurion Lounge, for example, requires you to have an American Express Platinum card ($695 fee) or a Delta Reserve card ($550 fee) for access. You can’t just buy a club membership. With the Delta card, you need to fly Delta that day. You can fly any airline with the Amex card, but geez, you’d have to eat a lot of Big Micks to merit such an investment. These offers seem to change daily, too. So, if you’re lounge-curious, it could be worth your time to check them out.
Your Prerogative
In the end, though, getting through the golden gates of an airport lounge isn’t really about what’s more cost effective. Whether we like it or not, they’re status symbols, but they can definitely take the edge off a long day of travel. Walking through those doors, hearing your heels click on the cool, tiled floor, and feeling the stress drain from your limbs as you settle into a comfy couch with a nearby electrical outlet (and enjoy a plate of pastry puffs and a complimentary beer) . . . well, that’s all worth something, too.
So, see you in Istanbul one day, perhaps. Maybe that time I’ll actually make it out of the lounge. Come to think of it, no, I probably won’t.
