beckoa

For those with PP too, there are two dining options in T3 as well now

You can get stuff 'to go' as well. The lobster roll isn't bad.

worldwidedreamer

If you are an SFO-based Alaska Airlines customer, you will probably be happier with an AA Admirals Club membership. The closest lounge to the AS gates at SFO is also the only AA lounge not to allow in Alaska Club memberships. The best value way to get an AC membership, imho, is to sign up for the AA Exec credit card.

safari ari

Exactly, the AA Executive credit card as you can also authorize up to 10 users who also get lounge access, and will be less of an annual fee come Nov when the AC membership cost goes up. Overall though, unless you really value lounges, you could easily spend up to $450 and get more out of T2.

Flying for Fun

Only the primary cardholder gets access to AS lounges. I use the Admirals Club in SFO as an arrivals lounge too. AS is moving to T3 in PHX next year. I will go to T4 and use the AC clubs there. TSA Pre is pretty quick at both T3 & T4 and the SkyTrain between them is a less complicated way to get between them.

James

safari ari

Wanted to post some pictures of the CX lounge in Intl A of what typical AS Lounge members will get when visiting when there is no CX flight within ~3 hours.


Fruit and Chips


Assorted Pastries, chicken soup in the background

Beer and non-alcoholic beverages (perrier, CD tonic water, coke products, bottled water)


More beer and juices (Very good beer selection, including craft brews, tsing tao, and macros heinkein, stella)


Liquor and cakes (background has a white and red wine and a cheap rose champagne)

Salad ingredients and sandwiches(turkey, tuna, salmon crostini, and veggie sometimes)

Chicken soup is also available in a pot.

When a CX flight is departing there is more food options.
These include, Cumin Lamb, Kung Pao Chicken, Cod, pork and vegetables. Rice, self service noodles and the usual noodle bar (Dan Dan noodles, dumplings etc). Another champagne and wine offerings, as well as Milano cookies are also available.

VegasGambler

This looks 100x better then what you get in domestic airline lounges

At this point, when flying domestically, I just look for a restaurant that accepts priority pass, so I can get some real food.

tom911

I drove down before morning commute today, a few hours before my Alaska departure, and popped into T3/UA terminal for breakfast at Yankee Pier. Had a meat lover's omelette which came with sausage and bacon (they were out of ham or that would have been included) With tea and a large orange juice, just over $26 and covered by Priority Pass. I'll try the Giant's Clubhouse next visit.

Visconti

I've always wondered what's the rationale for this? Singling out SFO for potential overcrowding? I can't ever recall the SFO in AC ever being overcrowded or have anything more than standardized AC offerings, which would set them apart from, say, the rest of the domestic ACs.

Agreed with the sentiments that using PP at a restaurant is preferable to domestic airline lounges.

aCavalierInCoach

I suspect the number of paid combined AS/VS F seats plus club members would overwhelm the club. I've been in their by virtue of being on an SFO-JFK F ticket and found it to be reasonably busy as is.

rustykettel

aCavalierInCoach

good point

worldwidedreamer

AFAIK Alaska at SFO is the only domestic hub in the United States without a lounge from the operator of the hub. For what it is worth, they don't fly to SFO from Alaska either. Both facts remain mysteries to me.

Overall it seems like Alaska underspends on lounges compared to its peers with no lounge at the SJC and SAN focus cities either. This might be because they spend far more on paying for members to access third party lounges. The only comparison is United which allows club members to access all *A member-owned lounges while on *A, although my instinct is that the venn diagram of "United Club Member," "frequent international traveler on *A," "No *Gold Status," but "knows about this obscure access rule" might be rather limited.

safari ari

This is primarily because before the merger AS was <8% of SFO traffic (I have to double check the stats) (it is now ~11%) and they were also not flying out of T2. Now after the merger, VX having a landside for pay lounge, and no space in T2 to build a lounge with T1 construction also ongoing, there isn't much they can do and we are also talking about <1 year since the acquisition. Before buying VX AS was mainly focused on LAX, PDX, SEA and ANC as you can see by their lounge situations in these airport. Not to mention AS is always behind on their lounge updates, just look how long it took them to build a second lounge in their hub of SEA and now they are slowly updating the other ones.

Eurynom0s

To be fair with regard to SJC, there's literally one lounge at SJC. I'm guessing there isn't space for more lounges and/or that no single airline has enough volume at SJC to want to pay for their own lounge.


https://onemileatatime.com/san-jose-...lounge-review/

sfozrhfco

Just keep in mind that advice is only good for 2019 as AA will be moving to Terminal 1 early next year and the T2 lounge will be closed and turned into retail space.