salsa

Here's the CLT B Concourse Club on March 31, 2021. If people don't like it, don't buy it.

It is nice to ACs provide food to go in spite of rules to the contrary.

joeyE

So coach pax get a free coke on the plane, but Admirals members need to pay for it in the club?

enviroian

No.

Sky Dreamer

This makes no sense to me, why are they making you pay for membership and charging you to take outside food? I understand it's against their official rules but if someone is paying $59 for a day pass, you should be allowed to take a piece of fruit, chips or a can of soda on to the plane. If not I just rather take the $59 and get a real meal at a terminal restaurant- and have leftovers to eat on the plane if I want.

IADCAflyer

Here's the thing. They don't have cans of soda in the Clubs. They have a soda dispenser at the bar (typical barman's dispenser) and they have a self serve soda fountain (standard or "Coke Freestyle") in certain clubs. You won't see individual 12 / 16 / 20 ounce cans or bottles anywhere. In fact, the only places I've seen individual cans or bottles is in the Flagship lounge at JFK or LAX or the now shuttered (temporarily or otherwise) terminal "E" club at MIA.

Antarius

Agree. But given that they've cut down on in flight service completely, it makes sense to add some grab-and-go for your high margin/regular customers.

As we saw under Arpey and since the merger with Parker, you can't cut yourself to sustainable profitability.

FlyDeltaMD88

That's wrong considering the United Club had a section where you could package trail mix/gummy bears/cereal to go and the Sky Club had lids for the coffee/tea that I regularly walked out with.

FlyDeltaMD88

So you swipe your card and open the fridge? So just go ahead and pay for a sandwich and grab a drink or two while you're at it, problem solved.
Edit: Nevermind, I see they all have "tags" on them, I guess you could try ripping it off and leaving it in.

Antarius

At that point, why bother buying a membership? Just run past the check in desk and hide.

Often1

No, AC members do not.

Soda and certain booze is included in membership for consumption in the AC. You get that at the bar or a dispenser. If you want a soda, to take with you, you purchase it from a machine. AC rules have been clear for years that F&B is to be consumed on premises. No different than UC, SC or AL.

Hopefully the food service will come back to pre-pandemic, especially if this summer sees a return to normal flying. But, that is a separate issue from the machines.

FlyDeltaMD88

Not the same. At all.

smartytravel

So maybe they should start offering those to passengers to go? Passengers already pay hefty fees, and they are clearly being cheap with on-board service.

that should already be included in the fees.

IADCAflyer

Let's be honest: I will bet that 90% of club members (be it United or Delta or American) have taken food or drinks out of the club. An apple, a banana, some Carrs water crackers, a cup full of Skittles or Starburst, their latte that they just got from the self-service barista machine. I grabbed a bagel and two little packs of grapes from the AC on Wednesday because I knew that I wasn't going to be offered a lick of food for the six-hour flight to LAX. Call it benign ignorance on the part of the housekeeping staff, the club manager and the front desk agents.

What you're not going to see the clubs do is make it easy peasy to take the items out of the club. You can take out your cup of Skittles, but the lid may come off and you have a trail of Skittles leading from the Club to gate C11. You can find a way to take a coffee cup full of Coke with lime flavoring out of the club, but it's a 10-ounce cup and it comes from a soda dispenser which costs about $0.20 for 10 ounces to dispense. That is Infinitely cheaper than a 20-ounce bottle of Cherry Coke which costs $0.50 a bottle. If you provided bottles, people are going to take bottles. Guaranteed. If you provide it through a dispenser, only a few will take the time to grab a 10-ounce cup to go.

LovePrunes

I have a hunch the manufacturer or service provider is putting it in free to AA with a revenue sharing agreement for access to AC members, rather than AA spending a nickel this way to improve AC "service."
And if AA doesn't make some decent $ off it, they'll disappear.

econ

Don’t forget the cookies. Even more convenient now that they’re individually wrapped.