airlinetrends.com ( a website we warmly recommend ) reports that Delta Air Lines has just opened a new café concept at four Delta Sky Club lounges at New York JFK Airport. The new full-service cafés offer made-to-order breakfast, sandwiches, salads, small plates and desserts for purchase, as well as premium beverages. Meals are USD10-15 and premium drinks [...]

Michael Hiltzik’s tells us in his column in the Los Angeles Times what he is thinking about airline fees. I would guess that most airline customers would agree … American’s bright new idea is to charge coach passengers extra for a seat in the first few rows of the cabin, the idea being that these are [...]

The Birmingham Star reports that Japan Airlines is considering the establishment of a low-cost carrier while it goes through its state-supervised restructure. JAL may submit plans for a budget arm on Tuesday, when it fronts the Supreme Court in Tokyo. Management at JAL have already expressed interest in a business model that will intensify competition to [...]

Last September, we wrote about Planeshop, an innovative new airport retail concept developed by the pop-up retail pioneers who launched Vacant. Planeshop’s principle is simple: it lets different brands take turns running its permanent store. Now, 11 months later, Planeshop is opening in a former departure lounge at Glasgow Airport. The first brand on rotation at Planeshop is [...]

FlightNetwork.com’s first poll focussing on ‘travel pet peeves ‘ reveals that out of the 768 Canadians polled, 77.6% indentified added fees (eg. paying for additional luggage) as one of their top three air travel pet peeves. Rounding out the top three were cramped seats (63.5%) and flight delays (40.0%). Surprisingly, rude passengers scored relatively low [...]

Airlines may be global businesses in many ways, as well as exhibiting cutting edge technology in areas like mobile phone check-in at airports and offering user-friendly websites for buying air tickets (along with a host of other “ancillary” items like hotels and car rental). But, when it comes to making use of the enormously rich [...]

McCartney, The Middle Seat columnist at The Wall Street Journal askes “can the government require airlines to bake in options to ticket prices? If customers want Wi-Fi service or a sandwich and beer, they understand there will likely be an added fee. If you want to upgrade to first class and don’t have elite status that gets [...]

US-based The Consumer Travel Alliance (CTA) has found that hidden fees charged by airlines on popular routes can increase the base cost of an airline ticket by an average of 54 percent for a typical traveller with two checked bags and extra legroom, or by an average of 26 percent for a comparable one-bag traveller. [...]

TIGER Airways would consider introducing a “standing-only” option for passengers in a bid to lower airfares. The low-cost carrier said it could follow in the footsteps of UK budget airline Ryanair and introduce “vertical seating”. “We continue to look at ways of making our operation more efficient so we can offer even lower fares than we [...]

You still think that the Low Cost Business Model will never work on long haul routes ? May be you should read the latest post on airlinetrends.com : Low-cost carriers already fly many 5-hour routes across Asia, such as Jin Air and Jeju Air from Seoul to Bangkok, and Tiger Airways from Singapore to destinations [...]

Ryanair has shared that passengers can now choose a larger (20kg) checked-in bag allowance for £25 as an alternative to Ryanair’s standard (15kg) checked-in bag allowance which costs £15. Passengers who require a second checked-in bag can purchase an additional 15kg allowance for £35 (via Manage my Booking). In all, travellers can now check-in bags [...]

Departing the traditional low-cost carrier business model which emphasizes point-to-point routes instead of transfers at hubs, Vueling Airlines will start connecting passengers through its base at Barcelona El Prat Airport from July 5, 2010. Passengers will have to buy only one ticket when booking the flights, and Vueling will connect baggage at no additional charge. [...]