Slowly But Surely, The Magic is Coming Back

In the last few weeks, a couple of major players in the travel industry started what I will call, “A step in the right direction.”

JetBlue announced that they are going to provide free high speed Wi-Fi to everyone on every flight starting in 2016. This was recently followed up by Amtrak announcing that they are going to offer free Wi-Fi on their Auto Train which was the “first phase of a larger project that will provide passengers with free Wi-Fi on all single-level, long-distance train routes in 2016.” Most recently, Four Seasons announced that they will offer Complimentary Wi-Fi for Unlimited Devices across a majority of the company’s portfolio.

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I constantly talk to friends and colleagues about how technology is just supposed to work. When I stayed at the Southbridge Hotel and Conference Center, I found a hotel that gets how Wi-Fi should work. When I wanted Internet access, I got it. No passwords, usernames, splash pages, erroneous surveys or fees to access it.  It was available property-wide (including their outdoor spaces) and there was never a place where I didn’t have a strong signal.

Why does free Wi-Fi have to be such a stretch for brands to give?  Travelers nowadays don’t just want Wi-Fi, they need it; especially family or business travelers. This is a chance here for the industry to step up and bring back some of the magic.

In fact, it's only when the industry starts giving back that you start to realize how much has been slowly taken away. Bags fly free on Southwest Airlines, but aren't they supposed to? Didn't they used to fly free? Airlines have been taking things away from the passengers for years, so gradually we hardly noticed. It started with the playing cards and the meals. Then they moved away from the pillows and blankets, the free in-flight entertainment, and eventually most of the snacks went away, too.

Hotels have notoriously been known for insecure, slow-as-molasses Wi-Fi which they charged way too much for.  This should never have been an add-on to begin with. This should have been something that came with the room, like a clock radio with an iPod station.

It seems like the footing in travel has been to take away from the experience for so long. Maybe, at last, the pendulum is swinging back the other way.

We are seeing many companies finally start to bend in some regards because they are concerned with appeasing the millennial generation. But this didn't start with the millenials. We all want some of that magic brought back to travel, no matter what demographic we belong to. 

And finally, it seems, we're getting it.

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