Bags fly free? Not for thee!
Southwest Airlines is ditching its longstanding policy of not charging for two checked bags despite having built decades of brand identity and loyalty on such affordable offerings.
The company on Tuesday announced a plan to “drive revenue growth and reward its most loyal customers” with free checked bags. Rapid Rewards A-List preferred members and those who pay for Business Select seats will still be able to check two bags free of charge, and A-List members — along with other select customers, per The Associated Press — will be allowed one checked bag.
Southwest CEO Robert Jordan cited shareholder value and revenue growth as reasons for the change. “We have tremendous opportunity to meet current and future customer needs, attract new customer segments we don’t compete for today, and return to the levels of profitability that both we and our shareholders expect," Jordan said in a statement.
It's not clear how much Southwest will charge for checking bags. Delta, United and American charge between $35 and $40 for the first checked bag.
The policy change was greeted with overwhelming disapproval on social media. One user, @shannjann on X, tweeted an uproarious laughing GIF with the caption “southwest said ‘ya’ll broke??? US TOO!’.”
Others said Southwest has dumped the biggest incentive for customers to fly with them.
“It’s so interesting to watch companies purposely destroy their customer loyalty for no real reason,” user @LoveWammie tweeted. “Southwest was known for affordable, open seating, and free checked bags. Now they getting rid of all of it and just going be another airline.”
“If Southwest Airlines had assembled a focus group and asked them ‘what's the stupidest thing that we could do to ruin our company,’ this is what they would have come up with,” Doug Gladden, a Texas-based lawyer, wrote.
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