Since the early months of the pandemic, United Airlines has offered its passengers an “all-in-one” snack bag on flights in which no other meal is served. These bags will finally be retired this month, marking the end of one visible reminder of the pandemic.
United Airlines Eliminates “All-In-One Snack” Bag, A Visible Sign Of Pandemic
For two years, passengers have received a drawstring plastic bag on United Airlines that contains a sweet and salty snack as well as a small bottle of water.
These bags were the extent of service in economy and first class in the early days of the pandemic and over time became a staple of first class service on flights between 300 and 800 miles. But effective this month, these bags are finally being retired.
In a memo to flight attendants shared with Live and Let’s Fly, United notes “catering will board a choice of Stroopwafel or pretzels as the primary meal service offering for this mileage band. The all-in-one bag will be removed.”
This isn’t a loss for passengers, since pretzels or Stroopwafels are exactly what are inside the bags already and water is available in glasses. The upside is less plastic waste (and of course, it saves United money as well).
Prior to the pandemic, United offered a snack basket on these shorter routes with choices that usually included several types of sweet and savory snacks as well as whole fruit. In the morning, a hot muffin or scone was offered.
There is no indication that such snack baskets will return.
These all-in-one bags were a reminder of the pandemic and I am happy to see them go. Those mini bottles of water were convenient, but wasteful, as was the plastic bags the snacks were delivered in. I do hope United follows the lead of Alaska Airlines and Delta Air Lines and again offers more substantive snacks on shorter flights.
CONCLUSION
The “all-in-one” snack bag was one of the last visible reminders of the pandemic. United Airlines is abandoning those bags this month, which these days only appear on shorter flights in premium cabins. Passengers will still be offered a sweet or savory snack on flights between 300 and 800 miles. Let’s hope United will bring back a more comprehensive snack basket in the month to come.
DL retired these a while back. I thought they would be the last airline to do so; they were the most overreactive on covid measures. Good riddance!
Why not get rid of even more waste? Just pass around a big bag of chips and everyone can grab a handful.
I hope they are going to continue with the wipes. I like to wipe down my tray table to clean off the poop from the baby that was changed on my tray table on the previous flight, or the nose picker that wiped his snot on it
The wipes are very handy. I hope they stick around too.
I ended up saving them, then giving a big pile of them to my mother, who’s now in the habit of wiping any surface she’s not familiar with. She loves the United ones. She’s not so crazy about the ones that National Rental Car gives out, though.
National gives out actual clorox wipes that you would would get at the store. Those have a very strong odor
I keep looking at that wipe thinking, “Why would anyone need something to clean flies?”
So the end of junk processed food. At least this version. In business class, they give you a plastic case which usually goes to waste.
Weird that the snack baskets are only in CRJ-550 flights in F. Either way it’s a totally non-competitive FC offering and United needs to do better.
Well, at least this cost-cutting move cuts down on waste. I’m supportive.
The “Fly Cleaner” could lead to some misunderstandings.
I haven’t seen these for over a year now, hard to believe they are still in play.
I got one on my PHL – ORD flight yesterday, despite full beverage service in Y. Can’t wait to see the end of them.
Please don’t sell this as an improvement. United is replacing the baggie of despair with . . . the same pathetic offerings, just without the bag. Meanwhile, AA, AS, and DL have all brought back the snack basket long ago. The cheapness of this airline and its management seemingly knows no bounds.
Agreed. In fact, a Stroopwafel and pretzels will now be replaced by “a choice of Stroopwafel OR pretzels”, which is far from an improvement.
I have about a dozen mini-bottles of water from these things in my refrigerator. The pretzels (eternally stale) and the Stroopwafels have long since entered landfill. Good riddance.
It’s true – the pretzels are stale. They are probably two years old!
Had snack basket las week on flight from DCA to EWR.
For some odd reason, only the CRJ-550 has the snack basket.
I don’t know why anyone would assume that whatever replaces it would be better. It’s United.
We’re not assuming that anything that will replace it will be better, even though the snack basket added a bit of variety to the mix. We just want to never see one of those little United-branded plastic bags ever again.
On an EU-UK business class BA flight two days ago, I was served a very good beef carpaccio and potato salad cold plate, with small green salad and chocolate dessert from Do&Co. On a 1 hour flight. I wish US carriers would do that kind of thing.
Apparently instead of eliminating the bag, they eliminated complimentary snacks entirely on under 800 mile flights.
There have been reports of this, but I blame FAs, not policy. Policy is to provide bis offs or pretzels.