Amtrak Diner and Food Service Discussion

[SouthernRailway]

I’m not up for a $600+ round trip ticket on the Crescent with boxed food.

[ryanov]

I’m flying to Chicago for the first time later this month. Have always previously taken Amtrak. They no longer want my money.

[Arlington]

I wonder if the Meteor's sleeping car prices will go down or, if contemporary dining is added to the Star, the Star's sleeper prices will go up.

I would expect that Meteor fares would fall (and ridership increase) like they did on the Star, and in general to see a shift to shorter trips (away from end to end cruising).

Does Contemporary Dining necessarily require that fares be food-inclusive? Could the Star be PAYGo and the Meteor still prepaid?

If the Auto Train goes contemporary, I would expect ticket prices to fall, and marketing to emphasize sleep and car hauling.

[mtuandrew]

I don’t expect prices will fall appreciably, though you might be able to snag lower-fare compartments closer to departure than now. Amtrak hasn’t had problems filling sleepers and I doubt they will now; not all the riders are as tuned in as we are, and as long as their food is hot and better than the cafe, they will complain but not stop riding.

[SouthernRailway]

I don’t understand why Amtrak hasn’t worked to provide a higher-class experience for LD sleeping car passengers. Sleeper prices on the Crescent are already high, and much more expensive than flying. Why not just raise them more if needed and have an even fancier experience? I regularly fly first class and by comparison I find the Amtrak on-board experience fine but not luxurious and the experiences at Amtrak stations are dreadful.

[gokeefe]

They've done this over and over and over again, nice China, tablecloths, flowers, complimentary this, complimentary that. And for all their efforts over the years (up to and including Viewliner I sleeper cars) to sell to the upper end they got mediocre load factors, dissatisfied passengers, mounting losses and cancelled routes.

Rather than continuing to do the same thing and expecting a different result Amtrak is trying something new. The food may not be the greatest but if the trains fill up I'm all for it. The best food choices are often at the stations anyways. In general it's way better than it used to be for the average traveler.

[ryanov]

No one has said a thing about why they don’t repeat the already known to be successful 24 hour diner experiment.

[Matt Johnson]

There are two ways to look at it. The optimistic viewpoint is that they're trying new approaches to improve the financials and ultimately provide a decent, sustainable product with better market responsiveness. The cynical viewpoint of course is that they're trying to make service worse and drive ridership down, so they can then say look, here's a justification for killing the long-distance routes. If they were actually trying to make "contemporary dining" a presentable, decent quality product I'd be more inclined to believe the former. But to me it looks like they're not even trying to do that, which makes me think it's more the latter.

This just doesn't really seem like an honest attempt at fielding a decent product to me:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BqLbT4Xhr4V/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BqLPEGJh_lb/

[gokeefe]

The cynical viewpoint of course is that they're trying to make service worse and drive ridership down, so they can then say look, here's a justification for killing the long-distance routes.

They left the Western routes alone (for now). In my opinion that's the best indication that this is a sincere effort to cut costs, increase sales and to grow market share.

People have to sit back and realize that the CEO has an aviation mindset. He's has a lot of industry experience and knows from many years of experience that consumers care about the bottom line more than amenities. The Silver Star reduction and subsequent increase in sleeper sales is the best possible proof that this principle applies to Amtrak as well.

[SouthernRailway]

But airlines, including Delta under Anderson, have made big strides in enhancing amenities for premium-class customers over the past few years.

I’ve been flying first class for almost 20 years (formerly due to frequent-flier upgrades and now often just by paying for it) and the planes, lounges, food, etc. are all much nicer in first class than they were particularly at rock-bottom level about 15 years ago (when I did get a boxed lunch on US Airways in first class and was not thrilled).

So have other railroads. Brightline’s Select is outstanding, with super lounges and on-board service. I see that even dinky Via has a new super-premium service.

Amtrak’s the exception. At least the Crescent is much more expensive than flying and at some point overcharging for an inferior product will give way to revenue loss. My point is that Amtrak has already jacked up prices on the Crescent, showing that riders on it are not price-sensitive; might as well charge a bit more and keep a semblance of first class.

[dgvrengineer]

Mr. Anderson, having worked many years in the airline industry, must surely now how and where to find decent first class meals like most airline provide. I don't understand why Amtrak is providing it's high paying passengers with such sub-premium food.

[gokeefe]

Fundamentally the issue is that the only true "super-premium" service left on Amtrak is Acela FirstClass. That entire service is getting a huge upgrade in the billions of dollars. I think there is real reason to doubt whether or not there is a viable "super premium" market remaining for travel on long distance trains.

The recent failure of Pullman Rail Journeys really calls into question the existence of an upper tier of rail travelers beyond the NEC market that can support service offerrings beyond BusinessClass.

This runs largely contrary to discussion here which usually holds fast to the idea that there is unmet travel demand for "super premium" passenger rail service. This is only true to the extent that such service can also be time competitive with air travel. Acela comes very close and in several markets (WAS-PHL) beats it hands down.

Until speeds increase there's virtually no hope for higher end services on long distance routes.

[SouthernRailway]

I’m not aware of any proposals for Pullman-type service on any Amtrak LD train now.

Fares for sleeping car travel on the Crescent are sky-high. For example, this Wednesday the cheapest room that I found for my 14-hour commute is $630 one-way.

Amtrak can’t charge $650 each way and keep hot meals? It’s going to charge $630 each way and have meals in a box, and people will be happy?

My point is that since demand continues at sky-high prices, increase prices just a bit and provide decent service.

[gokeefe]

My point is that since demand continues at sky-high prices, increase prices just a bit and provide decent service.

They would still be losing a lot of money doing it. Cutting food service options is the only way to reduce losses. If they raised fares high enough to cover those losses the Pullman Rail Journeys scenario seems to show there aren't enough customers at those rates.

[SouthernRailway]

Increasing revenue is another way to reduce losses. And reducing revenue, which will happen when people pay $630 for a one-way trip with dinner in a box and don't pay it again, will increase losses.

I don't think that the failure of Pullman Rail Journeys should be taken as proof that there is no market for improvements in the experience of overnight rail service at a higher price:

1. Iowa Pacific seems to botch one thing after another and its finances are in tatters. Some of its tourist railroads have failed as well but that isn't proof that there is no market for tourist railroads. Perhaps Iowa Pacific is just not competent to run anything, and another operator could have had more success.

2. When PRJ's cars were added to Amtrak trains, that resulted in a large increase in the available supply of sleeping car rooms. Perhaps Amtrak already provided enough supply of sleeping car rooms to satisfy the market.

3. Perhaps marketing was poor and didn't result in all prospective buyers being aware of the PRJ service.

So all the PRJ failure shows is that having Iowa Pacific add a few cars to Amtrak trains didn't work.

That doesn't mean that an improvement in some or all of Amtrak's own sleeping car experience, at a higher price, should be rejected. Perhaps, for example, Amtrak could have a 2-class sleeping car service per train, with one being "budget sleeper", with dinner in a box, and one being "premium sleeper", with, for example, a private lounge with hot meals.