Are Delta's new 'basic' premium fares worth it?

Speaking of Delta, this week it officially launched something new. You might've heard about this. It's lower priced basic versions of its premium cabin. So travelers are going to get the same premium seats, the same onboard experience, but a big, but here you're going to give up seat selection upgrades, same day changes, and also earn fewer sky miles. So for years now, Delta's had its main cabin basic, but this is the first expansion into the more expensive cabins like Delta one Delta premium select and Delta first. The new fares are rolling out now with some flights starting this week and others are beginning in September. So this certainly is some big new news from Delta and it got us thinking, it got us talking, is this a good thing for travelers? Or is this one of those things that, you know, only benefits the airline? So we went seeking some answers for you and travel experts. Zach Griff founder of from the tray table is joining us now to get into it. So Zach, happy Friday to you. Thanks for being on Fox five news. Live. Thanks for having me. Happy Friday as well. Hey, Hey. Okay. So let's just get into it. I mean, is this a win for customers in any way? I mean, when you got this news, what was your initial takeaways? I mean, that wasn't surprised because this is something Delta has been teasing for a really long time. Now they've said we're trying to bring more different fare options to all of our different cabins. And interestingly enough, United actually beat them to the punch. United was the first to roll out basic fares to premium cabins earlier this year. And Delta's iteration of it is pretty similar to what United did. And really at the, at the end of the day, what they're trying to do is make more money. Right. Of course, of course. And we know that, but they're framing this up as, as a way to, to give travelers more choices is, is kind of what they're saying here. So do you see it that way or do you see this as just, just kind of confusing? I gotta tell you, I'm still trying to wrap my head around what it all means. But, but what do you think? Does it really give us more choices? So, so I took a look and wrote in my travel newsletter that's coming out today. I took a look at every single route that Delta flies and I manually searched through it. I used obviously some help with AI and I found two routes right now, long haul that Delta's currently testing out this new basic business, the basic premium select. And what I found is that the buyup from the, from the cheapest basic business into the classic Delta one fare is $400. Now that obviously doesn't include seats. They're charging a hundred dollars each way for a seat assignment. And the kind of crazy part, the one that's probably most shocking to me is that it also includes a $500 change or cancellation fee. So if you were to need to potentially move your flight by an hour or a day or decide, Hey, I'm not going to take this flight. Not only is the buyup $400, but you know, if you were to kind of pay for the more expensive ticket, but you're going to be on the hook for a $500 change or cancellation fee. And so for most people, what Delta is doing, what airlines are really doing when they introduce these basic fares is they're getting, they're telling you, Hey, here's a set of restrictions, but you should buy up because of all the restrictions that we've put in place. And so what I expect will happen is many people will end up buying the more expensive ticket. And of course, you know, Interesting. So you're saying there's some pretty big, fine print. You need to make sure that you're reading some pretty big details in the differences between these fares. So what do you think? I mean, could this be the new normal across all airlines? You mentioned United is doing this and now Delta's on board. So is this, is this going to be the new thing, Zach? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we actually, it's, we saw it in Europe first where they introduced these basic fares and car across permitting cabins. It's worked to make airlines billions of dollars in the domestic economy segment, right? So there's no surprise. All of us have used base or I've seen basic economy tickets. There's been around forever. It's as I said, made them so much money that they're now trying this in a post pandemic era. When, you know, corporate travel isn't filling off the front of the plane as much as it used to. This is a really great way to kind of have that difference between what they used to make on those corporate fares into this new premium leisure segment that's filling up the front cabins with the introduction of basic. And so I'm expecting this to roll out more broadly. I assume we'll see it from American as soon as they can build the tech to deploy this. And we'll probably see it from a bunch of other airlines too. You know, while we have you here, you being the travel expert, I want to, I want to go back to a story we had right before you joined us here. We were talking about, you know, Delta, uh, releasing their, their, their earnings and things going really well for them this quarter, even better than I think that they, that they expected. So are you surprised by that? I mean, the, the, the bottom line is jet fuels costing more, but, but ticket prices are higher and folks are still flying in record numbers. So this probably isn't news to you. No, it really isn't. I mean, I'm in the airport at least once a week. I'm seeing, you know, record numbers, flights are super full. People are still traveling. You know, there are still deals out there to be found. There are still, you know, obviously it's unfortunate that we've lost spirit because they placed a lot of competitive pressure in many key markets to lower fares without them. What I've seen and experienced is definitely higher fares in a lot of the markets that they used to fly. But that said, people are out there. They're traveling, not surprised to see Delta pull off such a great quarter. And you know, it's only going into now to summer kind of peak summer season. And we're just, you know, there's no sign of it stopping anytime soon. Okay. Before I let you go, tell me quickly about, uh, from the trade table and how we can find you, Zach. Yeah. So from the trade tables, my free travel newsletter, I read it three times a week, type into Google from the trade table newsletter. I'm on the road, take 120 flights last year, talking about all things, airlines, hotels, credit cards, loyalty, looking forward to having all of you guys subscribe. Very nice. Zach hanging with us today, helping us navigate these big changes that have come from Delta. So Zach Griff in the house, Zach, thank you so much. We appreciate it. Yeah. Have a good weekend and safe travels.