New Zealanders are flying more spontaneously, more often. Photo / Winston Aldworth, File
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Are you the spontaneous type?
If you never know where you're going to be from one weekend to the next, Air New Zealand is launching a discount flight club offering half-price fares on last-minute flights.
Called "Gotta Getaway", at the moment membership is for an exclusive few.
The airline emphasises it is currently a "trial" programme. It is open to just 1000 passengers, drawn at random from the existing Grabaseat sales database.
It is also only applicable to domestic flights. Although the carrier is reported to be still weighing up its options, depending on the state of international travel in a years' time and a twelve-month trial period.
The pandemic has had a number of unusual effects on travel. Not least the habit of Kiwis booking travel closer to home, and with far less lead time.
The experiences of cancelled travel and scrambled holiday plans mean that even Kiwis planning school holidays have been leaving it up to the very last minute to get travel and accommodation booked in.
"The idea sparked after we found out about the growing demand for more spontaneous leisure travel," said the carrier's chief of Customer and Sales, Leanne Geraghty.
With late seat bookings often more expensive that booking in advance, the airline says the trial conept aims to "enable more last minute holiday travel."
A more cynical appraisal would see the membership as an attempt to fill unsold seats. Selling half-price seats to a database of foot-loose travellers is clever ploy.
However, with the price of membership at under $100 you could easily cover the annual cost on a single return fare. It might become a staple for frequent flyers.
Many travel experts see the last-minute booker here to stay.
To this end, the airline is offering discounts to GGG members of up to 50 per cent off flights booked within seven days of travel.
Unlimited use for a year means that for certain travellers this will be a huge saver.
The Herald understands that all 1000 invitations have been assigned at random to members of the existing Air New Zealand Grabaseat database. However, there is an opportunity to add up to three additional passengers on each membership, at $50pp.
The club is designed specifically for leisure travellers, over business travellers on day trips.
Flights need to include at least a two-night stay and return within 14 days of original departure. Another quirk of the terms and conditions is that some fares and routes will be excluded from these offers.
"We expect the trial will encourage more travellers to explore parts of Aotearoa they otherwise may have not seen, with the discounted fares available across our 20 domestic ports," says Geraghty.
Like many of the Airline's post Covid promotions it is designed to build demand on the domestic network.
In short, the aim is: more Kiwis, booking more leisure trips to see more of the country.
At $95 a year, this discount flight club is a "no-frills" membership for spontaneous travellers.
There are currently no additional perks. Discounts apply only to flights and it sits outside of the Airpoints Loyalty programme.
Compared to the Koru and other loyalty memberships, the GGG club would appear to be far more useful in a post-Covid world.
Last year, passengers of the airline's premium and lounge access club Koru, which costs an annual $629 plus joining fees, had their memberships extended due to the downturn of international travel.
While travel bubbles and international travel arrangements are slowly being agreed up, many of the perks associated with the old airline club remain redundant.
The Gotta Getaway is quick pivot to a more spontaneous type of travel. In a post-pandemic world of snap-lockdowns and non-committal carriers, prone to grounding domestic fleets at a moment's notice – the club is perhaps a sign that both traveller and airline are becoming more relaxed about booking travel at the very last minute.
When there's nothing as far as the eye can see, you may appreciate the company.