Here’s What Happened When My Diabolically Cheap Self Went Into A First-Class Airport Lounge For The First Time

This week, I’ve embarked on my first-ever trip outside of the United States. My mind has been blown more times than I can remember in the past 24 hours and I’m far from being done yet. All of it has been amplified by the fact that, for the first time ever, I flew something better than basic economy. So, what’s it like being a serial cheapass and flying first class? Let’s find out!

I’m in Nice, France to test the brand new Audi [REDACTED]. Normally, this would be the kind of trip we’d send a freelancer to go on so our full-time staff can focus on getting out the content you crave. However, the crafty Matt Hardigree and David Tracy decided to use this trip as a big push to motivate me to finally get my passport. I’ve been flying since 2016, yet I’ve never left the borders of the United States. As it turned out, getting a passport was totally painless and I wonder why I’ve waited so long.

Now, it’s time to enjoy the spoils of international travel. Well, technically, I already am. I’m writing this from a ridiculously expensive villa on the French Riviera. I have so many comments to make already, including the fact that I just heard the sounds of a loud Harley-Davidson. Even when you’re thousands of miles away from home you can’t escape loud pipes!

But you’ll have to wait for my trip report. First, I want to talk about the experience of what it’s like flying first class as a cheapass, or something along those lines.

(Full Disclosure: Audi invited us to Nice, France to test the new [Redacted]. Audi has paid for all of my travel, lodging, and food, with the interesting twist of paying for the best seats on every aircraft I’ll be flying on.)

Normally, we wouldn’t write about traveling to a press event because, really, who cares? The vast majority of the time the automaker will put you in a cattle class seat that, at best, might be Economy with a little extra legroom. You’ll usually sit in the middle of the plane, pay for your own checked luggage, and pay for anything additional that isn’t just plopping your tuchus down in an uncomfortable chair.

This is the standard procedure for most press trip travel, regardless if you’re flying to a Land Rover event or a Honda event. At the very least, I’m happy that the automakers put us on decent airlines. They could cheap out and put journalists on Spirit flights, though then you run the risk of your attendees not making it.

Audi could have done the same here, but it went beyond.

As I said in my previous entry, Audi gave me a selection of different flights to get me to France. I chose my flights entirely based on aircraft type. I picked United as it paired me with a Boeing 787 for the leg across the Atlantic and a Bombardier CRJ-900. My other choices were Boeing 777s and Airbus A320 series aircraft, which are fine, but aren’t anything new for me. I’ve never been on a 787 and it’s been a few years since I was last on a CRJ, so that seemed to be a good pick.

Eventually, Audi sent over my flight details and I did a double-take at what I saw. These weren’t just seats, but United Polaris business class. If you’re taking an international flight with United Airlines, Polaris is likely to be the top class of the aircraft you’re on.

When flying Polaris, you sit at the very front of the aircraft in a little pod that’s like a tiny bedroom complete with a seat that folds into a bed. United then gives you more stuff than you know what to do with, including two different kinds of pillows, two different kinds of blankets, all the free drinks you could ask for, and piping hot cuisine inspired by different cultures.

The price will vary wildly depending on where you’re going and when you book it, but the last time I checked, United said that flying from Chicago to Nice in Polaris business class costs $7,100 if the trip is booked a month ahead of time. The price goes even higher if you pick a more prime time. Matt Hardigree suspects that Audi paid about $10,000 for each direction for my trip.

That’s an unthinkable amount of money to my cheap brain. I’ve never flown anything better than Economy for my entire life. I paid $277 to fly to Florida to buy my Smart Fortwo Cabriolet and I think I overpaid for that. I pride myself in traveling over a thousand miles for $30 and I was excited to fly a round trip on Frontier for just $58.

I’m just so used to plain planes like the one above and cannot fathom spending $20,000 for 20 hours worth of flying. I’ve purchased brand-new cars for less than that! I’m not sure if I’m programmed to do expensive things.

According to Forbes, the Polaris program was launched in 2016 with the installation of the O’Hare Polaris Lounge. The idea here was to give international business travelers an upscale experience on the ground so that they keep coming back to the airline. In 2017, the first aircraft with United’s Polaris seats, a Boeing 777-300ER, took to the skies. Since then, the Polaris Lounge network has grown to six locations: Chicago O’Hare (ORD), Houston Intercontinental (IAH), Los Angeles (LAX), New York/Newark (EWR), San Francisco (SFO), and Washington Dulles (IAD). Here’s what the Washington lounge looks like:

But how does all of this work in real life? I decided to document the surprises of what it’s like to live life like a rich gal, at least for a handful of hours, anyway.

My journey started at O’Hare, where my Polaris seat gave me access to United Premier Access. This fancy program gives you benefits like a dedicated security line, priority check-in, and your bags are also given priority during loading and unloading. It’s basically a bit of a white glove service.

I didn’t check my bag, so I went straight for the dedicated security line.

This line was a fraction of the size of the regular TSA line at the airport and the TSA agents were a lot more chill. I read warnings that you should get to the airport at least three hours before an international flight. I didn’t want to miss this flight, so I got there five hours early.

I’m not entirely sure what I expected. It’s said you should arrive two hours early for a domestic flight, so I wondered what the extra hour was supposed to be for. At least in this case, it didn’t seem to mean anything. Security screening went exactly the way it does for a domestic flight, only I showed the TSA agent my passport in addition to my driver’s license. I even got through security in a third of the usual time.

Apparently, it was supposed to be even faster than that. There were a number of folks in line who were pissed off because the TSA wasn’t using every scanner and thus wasn’t going as fast as they normally go. One guy got so mad he even yelled at a random TSA agent about it.

On one hand, I was excited by how fast and painless the dedicated United Premier Access line was. I never want to do standard security ever again! Yet, the people waiting in line were much meaner and more grumpy than the folks in the standard security line. I heard “we paid for this” quite a lot while in line.

Oh well, I was on a mission. I was super hungry, so I decided to go straight to the United Polaris Lounge at O’Hare.

Viewed from the outside, the lounge doesn’t seem impressive. It just looks like a room in the airport. But walk through the doors of the Polaris Lounge, and you’re seemingly transported into a different, far more luxurious dimension than just any room in an airport.

The O’Hare Polaris Lounge is under construction and was about half of its planned size. You could have fooled me because the lounge was absolutely dreamy.

First, I was shocked when I walked in because the lounge was such a huge departure from the rest of the airport. I love O’Hare’s design, but it’s nothing like this. I did a double-take because wait, hold on, I’m still in O’Hare? I adored all of the little details like the sparkly ceiling above the bathrooms, the elaborate chandeliers, and the stone accents.

Hot decor is a good start, but the Polaris Lounge goes way harder than that. The lounge has shower suites, day beds, and a relaxation area with a bunch of different body devices. Then you have your choice of a bar, a restaurant, or a buffet.

I didn’t even know what to do. I usually eat at a food court and then “relax” in the hard chairs at the gate. Here, I was allowed to just walk up to a station, grab as much food as I wanted, and eat it while sitting in a comfy chair. I ate off of real plates and used real silverware, and the food wasn’t the same old awful airport food.

Admittedly, I did zero actual research on the Polaris Lounge before I went into it, so I kept looking for prices on things. And where was the garbage can? Where do I put my dirty plate? Such things are not the concern of those in the Polaris Lounge. Wonderful people dressed to the nines take away your plates, your empty drink cans, and your trash. And the food I ate? It was included.

Also included were some of the best mixed drinks I’ve ever had in my life. The Polaris Lounge at O’Hare has a huge bar and the bartenders can make any drink you can conjure up in your head. Check out this really spicy Bloody Mary! They’ll then keep serving you drinks, even if you haven’t finished your current drink. Once again, it felt bizarre to be downing drinks at a bar and not paying anything, so I tossed some cash into the tip jar.

The bartender assured me that the lounge was all-inclusive. At the time I thought that was unbelievable. However, if you’re paying $10,000 for a plane ticket I would hope for perks like these.

Still, I felt like a fish out of water, a city girl in the country, or a Volkswagen that’s not in a shop. It felt so wrong. I saw women decked out head to toe in Prada, yet I was “slumming it” in my 10-year-old dress from Torrid. I felt like I didn’t belong.

Then I ordered another drink, sat in a chair, and did some plane spotting. I’ve never seen 5 hours fly by as easily as they did in that lounge. Forget sitting at a stuffy gate with crying babies, crowding, and hard chairs. You could walk into a Polaris Lounge, take a nap, and feel like a million bucks just to waltz out of the lounge and right onto your plane.

I never want to sit at a gate again. Sadly, the only way to get into a Polaris Lounge is to get a Polaris seat on a flight or a premium seat on a Star Alliance member flight. That means you’re going to be burning a lot of cash or a lot of miles. So, this might be a very rare treat for me.

This is only just part of the experience. The Polaris Lounge is followed up with the Polaris seat. I’m going to stop here, so you’ll have to tune in to the next chapter of my cheap-ass flying first class to find out if a $10,000 airplane seat is worth it or not.

(Images: Author, unless otherwise noted.)