It's the end of an era.
Southwest Airlines on Saturday, June 1, became the last U.S. carrier to dispense with paper ticket jackets, scrapping the colorful pseudo-envelopes used to hold boarding passes.
The Dallas-based airline said the change stemmed from a combination of trying to be more environmentally friendly and the plethora of people who have already switched to electronic tickets and digital boarding passes.
"We are constantly studying ways to reduce waste, use less paper, and ultimately become a greener company," Southwest spokesman Dan Landson said in a statement. "Over the last few years, we've seen an increase in the number of customers using mobile boarding passes and thus not using ticket jackets as much as in years past. Through this change in behavior, we feel like we've reached a good point to transition away from paper ticket jackets."
Southwest was issuing 22 million ticket jackets each year.
The other major U.S. carriers eliminated the practice years ago. United stopped issuing ticket jackets in the early 2000s, according to USA Today. Delta Air Lines followed in 2008, American in 2014 and Spirit in 2016.
The ticket jackets were an iconic part of the travel experience-a bright, visible holder for the boarding pass printed out on thick paper and easily identified in a purse or suit jacket.
Now passengers barely wear suits on planes anymore, and boarding passes are spit out of kiosks on paper that resembles looseleaf or are downloaded on smartphones.
If it will be difficult to let go of the nostalgia, USA Today pointed out that you can still troll eBay and purchase a ticket jacket-or several.
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