More regulation here, too!

[3WE]

Quote = Wall Street Journal

It Can Be Easier to Fly Through $100 at the Airport These Days
In Phoenix, our reporter found rising prices for some items, deals on others; happy with a Happy Meal

Unless it’s an early morning caffeine emergency or vacation mimosa, I’d sooner board last than spring for snacks and drinks at the airport.

Yet there I was on Sunday, wearing out the company credit card at shops and restaurants for a few hours at Sky Harbor Inter-national Airport. My mission: See how far $100 would go in an era of high inflation and daily social-media posts on outrageous airport prices. That’s a deceptively complicated task in a place where the same two bottles of water cost $5 in one spot and $8 down the hall.

New York Times columnist David Brooks went viral in September for lamenting his $78 meal at Newark’s airport. The restaurant got the last laugh: His burger and fries cost $17.78 and the rest of the bill was booze. It launched a $17.78 special, including liquor, in his name at its Trenton, N.J., location. (Brooks later told PBS that the tweet was “insensitive” and that he shouldn’t have written it.)

Airport sticker shock has existed as long as baggage carousels. Airport authorities across the country have tried to keep prices in check by mandating prices roughly in line with those outside the airport, a practice called street pricing.

That price gap between a bag of cool-ranch Doritos in your neighborhood and at the airport has widened at many airports. Major concessionaires have successfully argued that airport prices should be higher because it costs more to run businesses in airports, from rent to labor. Today, nearly 80% of major airports charge above street pricing, a practice called street-plus, according to a 2023 survey by trade group Airports Council International- North America.

In Los Angeles, the figure is street plus 18%. Kansas City, plus 15%. In the New York area, LaGuardia, JFK and Newark, plus 10%. Street prices are defined and monitored differently at each airport.

In 2021, a viral social-media post about a $27.85 beer at La-Guardia got management in hot water and set off a government investigation. After a series of new enforcement efforts, that outlandish price went away.

Some price controls

A small number of airports, including those in Salt Lake City and Portland, Ore., still maintain street pricing.

“Street [pricing] is better for the passenger,” says Bill Wyatt, who runs Salt Lake’s new airport and used to oversee Portland’s. “Those are residents in many cases, and those are people whose needs we need to attend to.”

Some airports have no price controls, including Phoenix, home to hubs for American and South-west airlines. City leaders voted to discontinue the street-pricing-plus 10% policy in 2018. Airport officials say competition keeps prices in check.

“If a passenger is dissatisfied with the pricing, they can go across the concourse to another food offering,” says Roxann Favors, the airport’s chief revenue officer. The varying policies explain why you’ll find different prices for the same items, even on the same trip. In my unscientific Phoenix experiment, my $100 went further than expected. In a couple of cases, the prices I found were the same as those outside the airport.

Not all bad news

The first pleasant surprise: a relative deal on bottled water. One shop in the airport’s Terminal 4, which handles about three-quar-ters of passenger traffic, offered a buy-one-get-one deal on a 20 oz. bottle

of Aquafina. The first bottle cost $3.99, the second $1. A nearby vending machine had the same price but no BOGO offer.

Yes, that’s more than what a case of water might cost outside the airport, and two bottles might be more than you need, but let’s call it a small victory. An even better strategy: Bring your own water bottle and fill it up after security.

Less impressive was the price tag on a Quest chocolate-chip protein bar: $5.99. I can buy a box of four for under $9 at Walmart or Target, which is why I usually pack my own.

My haul of treats—small bags of peanut M& M’s, Nerds gummy clusters, pistachios and white cheddar Cheez-Its—was embarrassing. And not just because it set me back $28.96. The teen boys behind me in line had been walking around the store complaining that they couldn’t afford any of the snacks.

At $5.99, the 5.3-ounce bag of M& M’s was the cheapest of the snacks, but no bargain. (Another store at the airport was selling it for $6.99!) By comparison, my local Target sells a bag three times that size for $7.29; my CVS, double- sized bags at two for $9.

At Wendy’s, large fries and a chocolate Frosty cost me $10, a couple dollars more than at a local outlet. I didn’t buy one, but was surprised to find a four-piece McDonald’s Happy Meal for $5.79, compared with $6.09 at my local McDonald’s. A kale and quinoa salad at La Grande Orange, a popular local chain’s airport branch, was $15 plus tax, a dollar more than at the original location in Phoenix.

The biggest expense of the day was money I don’t mind spending when not on the company dime: $40 including tip for a salad with chicken and a glass of rosé from Cowboy Ciao, a Scottsdale fixture. The original restaurant is gone, but its name and signature chopped salad live on at the airport.

The salad cost $17, the same price charged by the two local restaurants that offer it. A 6-ounce glass of an Arizona—yes, Arizona— rosé was $14, a few dollars more than outside the airport.

Sydney Frigerio graduated from college this year and doesn’t usually spend on airport food and drinks. On her way home to London from a family visit on Sunday, she splurged on a mushroom pan fry, guava margarita and spiked seltzer at Cowboy Ciao. The bill was $55 before tip.

She justified it by the long layover and a parting gift.

“My mom gave me 50 bucks,” she said.

There was a deal on Aquafina water, but none of the snack items proved to be a bargain.

CARRY ON

DAWN GILBERTSON