Hello from Vancouver! I’m on the outbound portion of my review trip to South Korea and Japan, and had a quick musing about a lounge I just visited, prior to my Korean Air flight. There were signs all over the lounge asking guests to scan a QR code to provide feedback, but I’ll do so a bit more publicly.
In this post:
The SkyTeam Lounge Vancouver is a mess
Vancouver International Airport (YVR) has fairly few lounge options in its international (non-transborder) terminal. For Star Alliance flyers, there’s the Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge and (excellent) Air Canada Signature Suite, and for many others, there’s the SkyTeam Lounge Vancouver. The lounge is not only the primary lounge for SkyTeam airlines departing from the airport, but it’s also open to Priority Pass members.
I’d like to think that I have reasonable expectations of lounges in North America, and even more reasonable expectations of lounges that accept Priority Pass. But I’ve never in my life seen a lounge that’s in as bad shape as this one.
The “bones” of the lounge are fine, and the entrance even looks modern and sleek. The lounge only opened in 2017, so it’s not even that old.
But goodness, the seating in this lounge is in shambles. The leather in a majority of the seats is coming apart. I’m not just cherry picking, as it wasn’t just one or two seats in the lounge that are this way, but rather below is a small sampling of how the seating in the lounge looks.
Do we get the point, or should I keep going? 😉 A larger percentage of the seating in the lounge are these plastic chairs that don’t have any sort of padding, so I guess the silver lining there is at least that they can’t deteriorate in the same way.
Funny enough, I briefly visited this lounge back in May, prior to flying Lufthansa Allegris from Vancouver to Munich. I noticed the same thing at the time, and figured that there must be an imminent fix, and I just caught the lounge at the worst possible time. But nope, five months later, nothing has changed, and the condition has just gotten worse.
To the lounge’s credit, the staff here are super friendly, and the food and drinks aren’t terrible, and there’s a noodle bar. So if you can get over the condition of the seats, it’s not a bad place to spend some time.
How can the lounge’s condition get so bad?
I understand there’s a lot of bureaucracy and budgeting at big companies, but I can’t help but wonder how the various parties involved let the condition of the lounge get so bad.
I suspect that the lounge has a manager, and I have to imagine the manager noticed the condition of the lounge (if they haven’t noticed it, then maybe that person is in the wrong line of work). So hopefully the manager let the person that they report to know about what’s going on.
But what happened from there? I understand that companies have budgets, and that lead time is often required for big projects. I’m not sure what the exact financial arrangement is for how SkyTeam operates its lounges.
But the thing is, this isn’t a new issue. The condition was just as bad five months ago, and I imagine it was probably similar months before that. This kind of wear and tear doesn’t happen overnight. You’d think that this could’ve been addressed with preventive maintenance, rather than needing to do a full replacement of furniture. There’s a reason lounge furniture doesn’t usually look like this…
I also can’t imagine that SkyTeam’s member airlines would be thrilled to see the condition of the lounge. Like, Air France puts quite a bit of effort into its passenger experience, and I doubt this is what the airline would want its passengers to experience.
A lounge in this condition simply reflects poorly on the alliance, and that’s not good for any of the member airlines. Like, I don’t expect much from the Swissport Lounge Chicago, but you’d hope for a bit more from a global airline alliance.
I have to say, I’m not surprised that if an alliance lounge were to be in this condition, it would be one belonging to SkyTeam. While SkyTeam has great individual member airlines, the alliance just isn’t nearly as consistent or quality focused as Star Alliance or oneworld.
Bottom line
While I’ll have a full review soon, the SkyTeam Lounge Vancouver wins my award for the world’s most poorly maintained lounge. I’ve never seen a lounge with so much seating that’s just destroyed. I don’t know how it got to this point, but it’s time for some investments ASAP…
Have any OMAAT readers been to the SkyTeam Lounge Vancouver? If so, did you notice the furniture situation?
I was just in this lounge the other morning and can say they've sorted out the seating. I THINK they resurfaced/re-covered the seats cuz of the top of my head the shapes and sizes were the same as in these pics, but I specifically remembered this post and went looking for tattered seats, didn't find any.
Glad to see other comments said it's renewed. Can anyone visited recently also kindly let us know if they are now keeping the shower and washroom clean? I've seen comments saying they are rather filthy :(
Visited 25 october, everything is new.
You can update your post
Just visited today, most chair are renewed. Did not see any pad broken
I sent this article to the Global Lounge Network which manages the lounge and got the following response: “Good afternoon. We did receive your email this morning and thank you for your observations which were shared with out top Management. We are in the process of upgrading the furniture and apologize for any inconvenience.”
I also sent this article directly to Skyteam and received the following response: “Thank you for your message. I'm pleased to let you know that SkyTeam's Vancouver lounge is about to undergo a full renovation in the coming weeks.”
Reminds me of the dire Skyteam lounge at LAX. After 2 visits several years ago, I said never again.
When I flew ITA from LAX last June, they tried to send me there and I laughed. I just said “never again” and proceeded to enjoy a martini at the Chaya bar near the entrance to the far away West gates at Tom Bradley. Sometimes free isn’t worth the ick and depressing factor.
When both...
Reminds me of the dire Skyteam lounge at LAX. After 2 visits several years ago, I said never again.
When I flew ITA from LAX last June, they tried to send me there and I laughed. I just said “never again” and proceeded to enjoy a martini at the Chaya bar near the entrance to the far away West gates at Tom Bradley. Sometimes free isn’t worth the ick and depressing factor.
When both Star Alliance and OneWorld manage to maintain pretty decent lounges at LAX, it makes me suspect about the focus on cleanliness that some of the lesser Skyteam airlines have.
There was a no SkyTeam lounge at LAX. You mean the Korean Air lounge
No idea why KE doesn’t have it refurbished/ redesigned considering LA is one of their most important routes
Even AF used to send customers to the Qantas lounge.
Now AF has its own dedicated lounge with is a huge improvement.
A liitle speed tape (like they put on the outside of the plane) and "all good"!
I generally like this lounge, but I haven't used it in a while. Normally I don't sit in those chairs so I guess I didn't notice, I usually sit with my laptop at the high table/bar area.
It's a nice lounge, with nice staff, decent food options and good showers. But it's weird to see it age this badly being only 7 years old. Priority pass lounges get a lot of use, and it seems...
I generally like this lounge, but I haven't used it in a while. Normally I don't sit in those chairs so I guess I didn't notice, I usually sit with my laptop at the high table/bar area.
It's a nice lounge, with nice staff, decent food options and good showers. But it's weird to see it age this badly being only 7 years old. Priority pass lounges get a lot of use, and it seems to me you (the owners/managers) should know that and either choose furniture that won't wear as badly, or is easy to restore/replace. Even if they just flipped the cushions on those seats I bet they'd get a little more mileage out of them, but maybe they've already done that.
Either way, hopefully they rectify this because the lounge is a nice space and it's sorely needed as YVR has plenty of people flying internationally that aren't on a star alliance carrier. As it is we've got the CX lounge and BA lounge but both have rather limited hours.
I imagine this is what happens when an airline doesn't control the lounge. Sky Team doesn't even have many Sky Team-branded lounges. Do we know if Sky Team even operates the lounge? I could see some other operator licensing the Sky Team brand.
SkyTeam doesn't operate the lounges.
I don't believe any of their lounges are operated by the same lowest bidder.
So, that seems to be the issue. Kind of like Marriott or IHG franchising owners to anyone and everyone. You have Sky Team branding on it, but it's not really a Sky Team lounge. It's a [insert name of licensee] lounge for Sky Team member airline customers.
And, if every Sky Team lounge has a different operator, I imagine it's a nightmare to manage.
Lounges should be using vinyl seating - not real leather - which doesn't hold up.
Those seats aren't leather, they're naugahyde. That flakes off and shows the white cloth backing, unlike leather.
Someone might have used the wrong cleaning fluid for all chairs…
Then it would flake off suddenly.
But no excuse to not fix it over months
Yes it's " bonded leather ". Frankly you will see better quality furniture at a city dump.
Ben, did you not notice the Plaza Premium lounge? It closed for renovations over a year ago so they roped off an alcove in between two departure gates, put up stanchions, wheeled in a portable bar, and call it a lounge. Makes the Skyteam loc look ultra luxe. You probably walked by and didn't even recognize it was a "lounge" at all.
I flew from YVR in January and both plaza premium lounges were fully operational: the real one (upper floor) and the makeshift one.
Closed as of last Thursday when I flew from YVR and is exactly as Hear Hare describes.
I noticed the same thing recently at the United Club near gate B6 at ORD
I didn't, and I was in it just last week.
if you read some other sites, such as Gary's, he includes regular pictures of seats like this on United aircraft.
some people, of course, never manage to see them
The EWR Polaris Lounge inherited some UC furnishings - there are about 10 of the chairs at the south end by the window which look similar. It was an awful UC with no subsequent views. I mean… you can’t see the NYC skyline! The new UC at C120ish gave us those. The refurbished EWR C95 club…finally opened up a small view of the NYC skyline… meanwhile the LAX UC has an outdoor area, and the...
The EWR Polaris Lounge inherited some UC furnishings - there are about 10 of the chairs at the south end by the window which look similar. It was an awful UC with no subsequent views. I mean… you can’t see the NYC skyline! The new UC at C120ish gave us those. The refurbished EWR C95 club…finally opened up a small view of the NYC skyline… meanwhile the LAX UC has an outdoor area, and the entire club has stunning views. Biggest gripe about DEN UC is you get N/S views and no Rockies!
I’d love to see the new UC in terminal B - supposedly it will be the largest - with an outdoor viewing area!
It's funny, the loung probably spends hundreds of thousands a year on rent and staffing, but cannot afford to purchase a dozen or so new chairs.
On the plus side I have quite enjoyed the lounge and feel it is one of the best priority pass lounges - especially in North America. Food is hot and tasty, and drinks are great.
It's on the manager of the lounge. If they don't care, it'll look like that. ♂️
lol, was trying to include a shrugging emoji, but Ben's weird Wordpress template didn't like that apparently. Don't know how it came up with a Mars symbol. Oh well.
Ooh this reminds me of the SkyTeam lounge in Havana, Cuba. Even lacked a toilet seat. Should make for a fabulous review Ben. Would recommend 1/10. Happy to share the pics.
Since when is there a Sky Team lounge at Havana?
There’s no ST lounge at Jose Marti airport. It’s a common lounge used by all.
British Airways on a hugely expensive business class return gave me the Plaza Premium “Lounge”. I had difficulty finding it because it isn’t a lounge it’s a roped off area on the ground floor. Definitely the worst wine (undrinkable) and horrible food. The service food and wine in the restaurant nearby- Elevate - was the best I have had at an airport so I went there.
The Plaza Premium lounge in YVR is a temporary small setup on the terminal floor while the large interior lounge is being renovated. It's not gonna be very exciting.
Delta F lounge in MSP isn’t much better. Chairs ripped there as well
SkyTeam is more consistent than the others in offering frequent flyers priority security (Skypriority is a thing even in small outstations whereas *A Gold Track is restricted to a handful of airports), priority baggage handling, and additional luggage allowance (only SAS exclude it from light fares, and that's probably only because they just joined).
While I appreciate that, unlike first class lounges etc, people rarely get very excited about this sort of stuff, it...
SkyTeam is more consistent than the others in offering frequent flyers priority security (Skypriority is a thing even in small outstations whereas *A Gold Track is restricted to a handful of airports), priority baggage handling, and additional luggage allowance (only SAS exclude it from light fares, and that's probably only because they just joined).
While I appreciate that, unlike first class lounges etc, people rarely get very excited about this sort of stuff, it does come in handy, particularly for those who travel frequently in short haul Y.
Those chairs are Halloween props I'm thinking! IF not that ridiculous!
Yep, hit the nail on the head - the saddest airline alliance, along several dimensions...
Delta, Air France, KLM, SAS, Korean Air, China and Virgin are all I consider to be the decent members.
However the rest - Kenya, Aerolineas Argentinas, Tarom, Czech with its one plane and leaving shortly, ITA which has always been on the periphery even when it was Alitalia, Saudia. Aeroflot - goodbye
Garuda are significantly better than "decent', VN are trying ever harder, and I've not seen furniture in such a poor condition in lounges operated by either.
Aeroflot aren't a member anymore, Czech Airlines are closing down because their government didn't want to spend taxpayer money to bail them out during COVID. Tarom and AZ are also caught in between business and politics, the latter won't be around for long anyway.
Kenya Airways clearly is the second best airline in the whole of Africa (just behind ET and far ahead of anyone else), if you don't like it you can fly around...
Aeroflot aren't a member anymore, Czech Airlines are closing down because their government didn't want to spend taxpayer money to bail them out during COVID. Tarom and AZ are also caught in between business and politics, the latter won't be around for long anyway.
Kenya Airways clearly is the second best airline in the whole of Africa (just behind ET and far ahead of anyone else), if you don't like it you can fly around the continent on all the local oneworld members (hint: there aren't any apart from AT which might as well be in Spain). Garuda probably have the best Y product of any airline in the world, China Airlines are up there with the best in both cabins, Saudia offer by far the best value business class deals between Europe and Asia etc.
The likes of AM, UX, and VN may be rather unexciting, but still quite solid and reliable in my experience. The soft product on Aeroméxico's transatlantic business class blows the likes of UA out of the water.
The issue isn't that the airlines, on an individual level, are poor. It's that the level of co-operation on the alliance level is poor.
The public face of DieTeam when its mask slips. Just like its leading member, the crop dusters, with its worthless frequent flyer program, its prison guard FAs, its useless gate agents, its homophobic CEO, and its tax deduction Tim Dunn.
Homophobic CEO ? Ben Smith is definitely not homophobic lol. Nor are Marjan Rintel or Anne Rigail. Who the f.. are you referring to in your nonsensical rant.
The butt-licker of Guillaume Faury, Ed Rat-bastian. And it's perfectly sensible if you haven't been blue-pilled by Delta.
You're a really weird dude, ORD
Plenty of reasons to fly Delta or not to fly them... but homophobia isn't really one I'd put at the top of the list
No reason to become like Tim Dunn using blatant fake information and lies to attempt to make a point
Honestly, Max, what do you call a person who goes out of his way to hook up with the Saudis, not once, but twice? And tries to minimize the impact of those deals on the social conscience of his airline, like he's disguising it as something evil? The UAE may not be the freest place for people of my tribe, but at least my preferred airline has a hands-off deal with the least worst of...
Honestly, Max, what do you call a person who goes out of his way to hook up with the Saudis, not once, but twice? And tries to minimize the impact of those deals on the social conscience of his airline, like he's disguising it as something evil? The UAE may not be the freest place for people of my tribe, but at least my preferred airline has a hands-off deal with the least worst of the Emirates. I could definitely survive a trip to Dubai. I have my doubts about Saudi.
Ed Bastian is a homophobe and a hypocrite who loves his deal with Disney too much to condemn Gay Days.
I think the question to ask = and you should be able to explain - is how alliance owned and operated lounges - which I presume this is - are operated and maintained.
You do have a knack for excessive fixation (and I mean the space devoted to an issue relative to others) on appearance issues.
That was an unnecessarily rude comment. If you dislike Ben, why are you on his site?
@Super
The reason to that is, some troll loves to live rent free on other people's blog.
It's because my Daddy knows when ANYONE dares to demean the universe's #1 PREMIUM airline (and alliance), the SkyPeso redemption rates between ATL and MCO jump another 100K miles!
why do you nameless trolls always manage to come out of the woodwork when you have something negative to say?
You didn't bother to notice my recent responses which praised Ben's family.
YOU are the one that is rude.
If Ben wants to respond, he certainly can. He has mentioned me in the body of his articles - can't say so that about nameless you
@Super
Trolls have to troll somehow.
I think the question to ask = and you should be able to explain - is how self owned and operated blog - which I presume this is - are operated and written.
You do have a knack for excessive fixation (and I mean the space devoted to an issue relative to others) on Delta issues.
An issue relative to others ? Absolutely no one should believe the condition of those seats is acceptable. Apart from it appears, yourself.
In they hyper-branded airline universe, appearance is vitally important. Staff are expected to be well-groomed, polite, helpful, and in uniform. Aircraft are expected to be spotlessly clean and the cabins well-maintained. Lounges are expected to be the same. I have to wonder what execs from KAL, Air France, or Virgin Atlantic would make of those tatty old chairs? I'm guessing they'd be very unimpressed, because it's not the image they want for their brands.
as usual, the minute I comment, Ben's site lights up with responses.
For those that are worried, I clearly want Ben to succeed or I wouldn't bother to post.
And, yes, Ben does make a big deal about appearance relative to other things.
Appearance is the "first impression" but the fact that the staff are friendly - as he noted - and the buffet was decent - got disproportionately less coverage than multiple pictures...
as usual, the minute I comment, Ben's site lights up with responses.
For those that are worried, I clearly want Ben to succeed or I wouldn't bother to post.
And, yes, Ben does make a big deal about appearance relative to other things.
Appearance is the "first impression" but the fact that the staff are friendly - as he noted - and the buffet was decent - got disproportionately less coverage than multiple pictures of tattered furniture.
No one believes that furniture is acceptable - which is why I asked who actually maintains that lounge and other SkyTeam branded lounges.
You all can go back into your caves until I post again.
People were commenting before and after you posted, you delusional twit.
How come you aren't posting on LALF any more?
aaron,
I have never posted on LALF... which goes to show how much fake traffic there is on these websites.
we realize you aren't the smartest or most observant person on the planet but the replies to my comment are, as usual, the longest in this topic.
There is a subset of humanity that are best classified as trolls and can't stand to just read when someone else posts.
The ultimate troll reflects on how his living room furniture is owned by his wife.....
Siri doesn't count as wife.
Nor does a life-size cardboard of Ed Bastian.
If it was just a couple chairs that were torn and tattered, then sure, probably not a big deal and not worth creating a separate blog post about. But if we're talking multiple upon multiple chairs, especially when hundreds (thousands?) of other lounges don't seem to have this problem, then I think it's worth singling out.
I've seen nicer Egypt Air lounges in Cairo and they are pretty bad.
They could have gone to IKEA and bought good budget furniture!
And secondly: has anyone ever looked at the sugar content on yogurt? Easily 10 grams or over for
that flavored stuff they say is yogurt. I wish someone would pay attention and buy the low sugar kind - the way yogurt USED to be before it came commercialized.
I always wonder why smaller lounges and less fancier lounges don't just do a corporate deal with IKEA or something to just get highly usable furniture that can be replaced on a modular basis as it wears out.
I remember back when WeWork was still spending like there's no tomorrow, and a friend of mine told me that every few months, they just replace the super expensive furniture there and the staff can just...
I always wonder why smaller lounges and less fancier lounges don't just do a corporate deal with IKEA or something to just get highly usable furniture that can be replaced on a modular basis as it wears out.
I remember back when WeWork was still spending like there's no tomorrow, and a friend of mine told me that every few months, they just replace the super expensive furniture there and the staff can just take them home. I ended up renting a massive truck and took everything and sold it back online, most were in perfect condition (I am sitting and using some of the furniture now).
Corporates utilities are a pack of bs in my experience, had to replace a door hinge in my office once and the corproate maintenance person told me it was going to be 1200 to replace the hinge, I questioned why, and he got flustered and said that the contractor does provide a receipt that corporate pays without asking.
You should have testified on their Chapter 11 and Adam Neumann lawsuits.
Investors who bought the after SPAC wants to know what made their $500 went down to zero.
Ben, I hope you have a chance to visit the Cathay Pacific Lounge at YVR instead of this (not sure the hours though). It's much nicer!
He's flying Korean, so won't have access to the CX lounge.
Ben has AA/Oneworld status.
Who cares about that, Delta is profitable.
Money before everything! Rawrr!
I'd bet the devil is in the details of who pays for it - because if there's a pre-negotiated budget line for upkeep, it's almost certainly inadequate, and the influence of SkyTeam airlines that don't benefit from that lounge will inhibit any sort of resolution.
The transition from Star Alliance to Skyteam for us SAS people just keeps getting better by the day.
Not