{"id":526726,"date":"2026-07-15T04:33:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T04:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/526726\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T04:33:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T04:33:08","slug":"airport-lounge-access-firm-loungepair-working-on-ways-to-help-flyers-pick-better-options-dodge-crowds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/526726\/","title":{"rendered":"Airport lounge access firm LoungePair working on ways to help flyers pick better options, dodge crowds"},"content":{"rendered":"

That Auckland Airport-owned lounge might be dubbed the non-denominational one among the city\u2019s offerings, the others being those of Air New Zealand, Emirates, and Qantas<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of airlines, particularly Air New Zealand, are quite protective of their products around being supplied to their customers only,\u201d Kinnoch said.<\/p>\n

But he said LoungePair had partners overseas, including Thailand\u2019s Bangkok Airways and Vietnam Airlines.<\/p>\n

LoungePair recently launched a co-branded website with Etihad and made a deal with membership publisher Entertainment Publications of Australia (EPA).<\/p>\n

Kinnoch said the Etihad arrangement was nicely timed with the reopening of Middle East travel, notwithstanding the conflict flaring up again<\/a> this week.<\/p>\n

Some travellers were now flying through the United States instead of the Middle East to reach Europe and had longer layovers they wanted catered for. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got several other airline relationships that are in the pipeline at the moment … a couple in Asia, one in Central Asia, and another in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n

The EPA partnership was bringing lounge access digital e-gift cards to travellers and businesses across New Zealand and Australia.<\/p>\n

The new relationships built on deals LoungePair made last year with travel insurance app Freely, Australian Frequent Flyer (AFF) and the Dragonpass travel platform<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re working with a couple of insurance companies and a few banks, and there\u2019s been a lot of growth in the space around how to make airport time, time well spent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kinnoch said demand was growing, and some traveller tastes were changing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got lounge partners that are focused on everything from creating dedicated sleep zones for longer layovers to offering enhanced dining packages for people who want to actually have a menu.\u201d<\/p>\n

As more people learned about innovative ways to access lounges, the competition heated up.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re finding globally that a lot of lounges have quite ambitious plans around renovation and improving floor space.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he said making airport time more enjoyable didn\u2019t always involve lounges.<\/p>\n

For that reason, the company was working on lounge-adjacent experiences such as spas and massages.<\/p>\n

He said better food and beverage options were hot topics and some people now wanted menus instead of lounge buffets. <\/p>\n

Dodging crowds<\/p>\n

Kinnoch said LoungePair was aware people didn\u2019t want to end up in crowded lounges. <\/p>\n

He said when lounges were approaching capacity, LoungePair usually highlighted that online for customers.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the occasion they have bought a pass for a lounge where they can\u2019t be let in for some reason because there is a capacity issue, our partners will usually redirect them to another option in the airport, or a 24\/7 support team can present them with another option.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be fair, if someone\u2019s bought a pass for a crowded lounge, it\u2019d actually be a worse experience for them to be let in. It\u2019d be better that they spend their money elsewhere anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said lounge rush hour varied from airport to airport.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve never had a problem here in New Zealand for outbound customers. Most of the capacity issues are usually at airports that have grown a lot, but the lounge capacity hasn\u2019t grown with it. <\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes places like Singapore and Hong Kong can get quite busy. But then there\u2019s also plenty of other lounge options in those airports.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kinnoch said a key focus for LoungePair was using technology to better plan lounge visits in airports where multiple lounges were available.<\/p>\n

That involved building a model to help people discover the lounge closest to where they\u2019d most likely fly out of. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you know that there\u2019s an 85% chance you\u2019re going to fly out of Concourse F, then we can tell you that one of the lounges there is probably the one that you should buy.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said Bangkok had about 25 different lounges and customers might not know in advance which one was best for them.<\/p>\n

There was little point booking a lounge for three hours if you had to spend 45 minutes getting to the gate, he said.<\/p>\n

The LoungePair system is web-based, so people get a QR code and go to the lounge, show the code, have it scanned, and get access.<\/p>\n

John Weekes<\/a> is a business journalist covering aviation. He previously covered consumer affairs, crime, politics and courts.<\/p>\n

Stay ahead with the latest market moves, corporate updates, and economic insights by subscribing to our Business newsletter<\/a> \u2013 your essential weekly round-up of all the business news you need.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"That Auckland Airport-owned lounge might be dubbed the non-denominational one among the city\u2019s offerings, the others being those…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":526727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[542,115849,2681,260427,9442,138,26636,129428,23966,1138,9479,23856,5838,84025,90623,68225,44191,111,139,69,13692,90,14725,15407,213,3405,8229,61,274,4524,1955,19135],"class_list":["post-526726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-access","tag-accessible","tag-airport","tag-antidotes","tag-better","tag-business","tag-crowds","tag-dodge","tag-enough","tag-firm","tag-flexibility","tag-flyers","tag-help","tag-lounge","tag-loungepair","tag-lounges","tag-lucrative","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-offer","tag-on","tag-options","tag-pick","tag-sports","tag-stress","tag-they","tag-to","tag-travel","tag-want","tag-ways","tag-working"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=526726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/526727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=526726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=526726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=526726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}