Headphones on Virgin America no longer free! They want $2 now

OK so a few things on this - First of all Virgin America never gave out headphones to everyone, they just had them in a little basket and if you needed them you could take them with you. This wasn't the old style where there was a pair of headphones sitting in every seat and they asked you to leave them. These were sealed in plastic bags and they were complementary if you needed them so I'm not sure that the waste/reuse issues are valid here.

Obviously charging for something that was previously free cuts down on expense thou ;). But that's kind of point -personally I have my own headphones that I bring with me and I wasn't really complaining about this as much as just pointing it out as I noticed it. The free headphones were never billed as "free for a limited time" they were just "free" and so that brings us to the idea that it's a bad customer experience to start charging for something that was previously free. I makes you wonder what else that they are offering for free will soon have a price tag on it?

Sure the RED entertainment system is great, but should we expect it to cost a few bucks to turn on sometime in the future? How about the free soft drinks and water, are those nearing the end too? Again, not complaining, just pointing out that making a big deal about the free stuff you have then quietly changing it to not so free brings up other issues. I love Virgin and even with $2 headphones it's a much better flying experience than any other airline for short trips like LA/SF/SD/Vegas etc but can we expect it to stay that way or will it be just like the others soon too?

Hey Sean! (are you in SF at the moment, btw? I'd love to meet up)

I do agree with your wider point. Yes, I can see a day when the entertainment system suddenly becomes $$ (doesn't JetBlue charge to watch live TV, which is currently free on VA?).

And it goes without saying that most of the old skool airlines now charge you to check baggage, unless you have status. (I rarely check baggage and I have status on United so I don't know when this started).

What I would say is that it's important that the airlines make a profit - and I'm not normally the type of person to go around making sure companies are doing ok out of my hard earned money.

But airlines are an exception because there are only a limited number of them that can exist and we need competition. Scarcity is factored into the industry because there are only so many take off and landing spots, number of passengers per route, etc. If one dies out that doesn't mean another will take it's place - it might mean the ecosystem just got scarcer.

In a nut shell, I don't want VA to go out of business because it's what's keeping the other carriers honest. They can only put their prices up so much - esp as Southwest controls the market for pricing because they locked in their fuel price a few years ago. 40% of your ticket is fuel costs, and so SW are able to control the market in terms of costs based on better operating conditions than the other carriers.

Hmmm, maybe I've not made my point as clearly as I should here - I'm pressed to go out but wanted to respond. As you may know, I travel most weeks on planes and so I follow this area closely and VA is actually an important player in keeping these routes out of SFO competitive - I would rather see things like baggage check and entertainment becomes for-pay than to see ticket prices rise or them go out of business.

There's prob a blog post in here in airline micro-economics, because its fascinating to watch the different airlines change their prices each day to match each other.

Ben! Yep, in SF for the next few days, staying in the Mission so we should get together for sure. Drop me a line or something!

Anyway, I think we pretty much agree on all of the airline stuff, and I fully support them making a profit for filling our needs and all that. Like I said, wasn't really complaining as much as noticing a change. That said, no matter what it stings to see something that was free get a price tag added to it and in generally I'd prefer to see companies either add new options and perks that are worth paying for, or be more clear upfront that not all things that are being offered free will stay that way.