Cliché time.
When it comes to airlines and ancillary revenue, that ship has sailed. You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube. The horse is already out of the barn.
Airlines aren't going to go backward when it comes to baggage fees, reservation fees, change fees, et al. Not when they see that, since 2008 - generally considered the year when ancillary fees took off - that it's been a reliable, ever-increasing source of income.
This doesn't cross into EpiPen territory. The airlines certainly aren't doing anything unethical or disingenuous in charging extra for fees.
It only feels that way.
But what's staggering are the cold, hard numbers, and not even the ones from the Department of Transportation report that came out last week. Those numbers alone are unreal. According to the DOT, airlines in the U.S. made a total of $4.6 billion in ancillary fees in the second quarter, which is up from the $3.1 billion earned in the first quarter of the year. Baggage fees alone represent $1.1 billion of that figure, with reservation change fees pulling in $755 million. The numbers dropped compared to the second quarter of 2015, though, falling from $5.5 billion to $4.6 billion
Since 2008, the Department of Transportation revealed airlines have made more than $26.8 billion in baggage fees and more than $21.5 billion in ticket change and cancellation fees. These numbers do not take into consideration pet transportation fees, sale of frequent flyer award miles to airline business partners and standby passenger fees.
Yet what seems more staggering, at least to me, was a separate report from airline consulting firm IdeaWorksCompany that revealed this little nugget:
Ten of the world's biggest airlines make $1 billion a year just from ancillary fees alone.
$1 billion.
Just. From. Ancillary. Fees. Alone.
That's a lot of $25 bag fees, don't you think?
Seriously, that number just floored me. The top 67 airlines in the world generated a total of $40.5 billion from passenger fees and other ancillary revenue last year, and 10 made $1 billion or more - American, Delta, United, Southwest, Alaska, Air France, Ryanair, Lufthansa, Easyjet and Qantas.
And some of these members of the Billion-Dollar Club have more than earned their entry into the exclusive enclave. According to IdeaWorks, some club members earned $1 billion and scraped their way in; at least one made $6.2 billion. Comfortably.
At our expense.
It's never going to change. You do realize that, right? If it ever consistently starts going in the wrong direction, you can be those $25 bag fees will become $30. Those $100 change fees become $150. And so on.
The airlines found a way. They survived the aftermath of 9/11, of bankruptcies and buyouts, and did what every business model dreams of - they found a way to generate a new revenue stream.
The toothpaste, indeed, is out of the tube.
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