Please don’t count on it and, for sure, don’t offer it.
I’m in the Air Canada lounge at Toronto’s Pearson Airport. I’m not in the original lounge, but the other one, opposite Gate D 20, for those who are nerdy enough to know.
The original lounge was so packed that I left before entering. This second lounge, the AC Café, is reserved for only Super Elite members. It’s not as big, it’s not as stocked, but it is a welcome place of calm in the storm, and I find I come here more often than the other now.
The problem many businesses have, yours and everyone else’s, is finding ways to preserve and increase client value in an increasingly commoditized world.
How do you maintain value while avoiding the knee-jerk reaction to make things cheaper simply? When you discount something by 25%, you haven’t created 25% more value; you have made something 25% more affordable. There is a difference.
Airlines have so many credit card partners that almost anyone allowed on an airplane is invited to the lounge. This causes some problems for passengers who are frequent flyers and supporters.
It will catch up with you when you tell the whole world that they can have exclusivity.
What an opportunity for you.
For the smaller business owner, the outlier who can offer exclusivity and experience to some people rather than everyone with a pulse.