Lufthansa lounges open to priority pass (in the U.S.)

"Franza or Spain, as long as you eat." This ancient proverb coined by a Florentine poet perfectly sums up Lufthansa's decision to open its lounges on American soil to all Priority Pass card holders.

The German company is not the first at this pandemic stage to have made this decision: in recent days we had talked about All Nippon Airlines and, as far as North America is concerned, Air Canada has also gone in the same direction.

Why companies open their lounges

Right now there are fewer flights and fewer passengers to satisfy, but carriers still have lounge rents and employee salaries to pay. So it seems logical to attract potential paying customers during periods of lower utilization. Recall that in this case the holder of a prestige card, such as the free included in the annual fee for American Express Platinum, does not pay for admission, which will instead be paid by Priority Pass to Lufthansa.

But not only that, in this way, the company also does marketing by allowing new (and potential) customers to visit the lounges.

Last but not least, many companies have always used this strategy, Korean examples of this are for its KAL lounges. or Air France. In the hole hours between flights, in fact, they reduce their offerings and open to everyone, only to close again on the schedule of a "proprietary" flight. To see this, one only has to read the opening times of LH lounges and compare them with flight operations.

Which lounges are accessible

The German carrier has decided to allow all Priority Pass holders to enter four lounges at times when there are no flights of group airlines. In detail, the affected lounges are at:

• New York (JFK) from 11:45 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. daily, except Wednesday and Sunday
• Newark (EWR) from 2:30 to 5:30 p.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays and from 2:30 to 9 p.m. on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays
• Detroit (DTW) from 6:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Mondays and Thursdays, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Tuesdays, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Wednesdays, and 6:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. on Fridays
• Washington Dulles (IAD) from 2 to 5:30 p.m. daily

In addition, the Boston lounge (BOS) that has been accessible to cardholders for several months already.

How long will they remain open

It's hard to say, but with forecasts of traffic recovery to pre-crisis levels, I wouldn't be surprised if the Lufthansa lounge American will remain open to many for the next 18 to 24 months. It should not be forgotten that United, Lufthansa's Star Alliance partner, also has its own lounges, so for the German carrier's elite passengers, finding a free seat will not be a problem.

All that remains now is to wait to see if, in addition to closing some of them in Europe, the lounges that will remain open will follow the same policy. Although I very much doubt that will happen.

• Priority Pass