🚢 So there's this Australian billionaire Clive Palmer. And he has been behind the plans for Titanic II for over a decade, relaunching the project again during a press briefing at Sydney Opera House. I mean… no thank you. But regardless, the story is pretty interesting. Read more here.
Good morning from beautiful Jogja, the most underrated city in Asia…
But before I ruin it and get you too excited about it, let’s change the subject and talk travel hacking:
When you think of premium airlines, there are some that immediately come to mind.
Frontier is not one of those.
And yet, they’re attempting to change that by introducing a more premium seating option on all of their flights.
It’s called “UpFront Plus,” and it’s actually pretty sweet.
And if you don’t believe me, just look at how happy these two kids are while sitting in UpFront Plus.
Photo courtesy of Frontier Airlines
Here’s the deal…
For flights departing after April 10th, 2024, Frontier will start blocking the middle seats in the first two rows of the plane, with the aisle and window seats being sold at a premium as “UpFront Plus.”
And if you’re thinking, “Wait… so it’s the same exact seat but with nobody sitting next to you,” then you’d be exactly right.
But I’m going to let you in on a little secret…
In Europe (and other parts of the world), when you buy a “business class” seat on their smaller planes, this is exactly what you get - an economy seat with nobody next to you.
All of this is to say that Frontier is not far off from “premium” standards of other airlines around the world with this move.
In fact, it’s probably a LOT cheaper than European business class…
Let’s look at this flight from Atlanta to Denver, which Frontier sells for as little as $29.
Once we get through the obnoxious Frontier checkout process, we get to the seat selection page.
Since the flight in question departs after April 10th, we can already see the new “UpFront Plus” seats available to reserve for $49 in this case.
At first glance, you might see this as a situation where the seat costs more than the flight itself.
That’s true, but I’d prefer to look at it as a 3.5-hour flight with extra space and no seat neighbor for just $78, which feels pretty solid to me.
Now, earlier, I compared this new seat to European business class - and it’s important to note that this is purely a hard product comparison…
Because while the seat might be the same, Frontier won’t give you priority airport services, world-class lounge access, in-flight meals, or any of the other perks that come with a traditional business-class ticket.
Still, I think that in many cases, people (myself included) are happy to pay a little extra on top of an already cheap flight to get some extra space.
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🍪 Tasty Travel Tidbits
😭 UK airline taxes are increasing…
🤦♂️ Oh god… United has another major safety incident
✈️ Oooooo… Qatar announces a new first-class seat
✈️ Alaska Airlines launches new subscription service
Alaska just announced that they’re launching a subscription service called Alaska Access for the “savvy, price-conscious” traveler.
This service starts at just $5 a month, but is it worth it??
To reiterate, here are the three main perks that come with Alaska Access:
Free monthly WiFi voucher
Early sale access
Personalized fare page
I think there are definitely some cool talking points here.
For starters, the free WiFi isn’t a bad move, especially since getting access to WiFi on Alaska flights can cost you up to 25 FREAKING DOLLARS PER FLIGHT (😮).
That’s if you want the WiFi that will actually allow you to load a webpage, of course.
According to their FAQs, it looks like you’ll receive one single-use voucher a month that will expire at the end of each month, and therefore will not roll over to the next month.
So essentially, if you don’t have a flight booked for the month and don’t use your voucher, it’s gone for good…
Not to worry though, because you’ll get another one sent to your email for the upcoming month 🤗
The early sale access involves getting alerted via the Alaska Airlines app of any and all sale details the night before it’s published to the general public.
This means you’ll be ahead of the game and can book preferred flights and seats (at the sale price) before anyone else.
And this personalized fare page thing?
You’ll apparently get access to a unique, personalized webpage where you can view the lowest fare by money and miles to any of Alaska’s 500+ global destinations.
Alaska says this page will take out the guesswork and time needed to find the best deals—it’ll be presented in a way that requires no searching on your end, which is kinda neat.
As a side note, do people even say neat anymore? What about neat-o? 🤔
Anyway, for only $5 a month… this is intriguing. I could see this having a lot of value for some travelers, but also less for others.
It’s also important to note that you’ll need to make a 12-month commitment, so it’s not like you can test the waters for a month or two and then cancel.
You can find all additional details, FAQs, and the sign-up button on the Alaska Access page here!
Bilt and Alaska rocked our worlds last week with the announcement of their new partnership.
The ability to transfer Bilt points to Alaska is BIG news, and in this week’s podcast, we’re doing all the talkin’ about it 🤗
And if you feel like watching Mike talk about Bilt and Alaska, don’t forget that we also post it on the YouTube.
That’s all for today, folks! I’m actually pretty stoked about Frontier’s new UpFront Plus…
Sometimes, it’s nice to get that joy of an empty middle seat, so I wouldn’t mind paying some cash money to have it guaranteed.
Anyway, thanks as always for tuning in today. Have a great Thursday, and I’ll see you tomorrow morning to finish off the week strong. ❤️
