Traveling in itself can be expensive. Of course airline tickets have been on the higher side these days and inflation isn't helping the cost of everything we do and stay while visiting somewhere away from home. But airports have gotten very good at creating experiences of their own as we wait to get to our ultimate destinations. In this episode we discuss the many ways we can fork out a lot of our hard earned cash at our worlds airports.
Traveling in itself can be expensive. Of course airline tickets have been on the higher side these days and inflation isn't helping the cost of everything we do and stay while visiting somewhere away from home. But airports have gotten very good at creating experiences of their own as we wait to get to our ultimate destinations. In this episode we discuss the many ways we can fork out a lot of our hard earned cash at our worlds airports.
Welcome to Talk Wealth to me, A Safe Space podcast where we chat about anything and everything related to personal finance. The information contained in this podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. It does not constitute as accounting, legal, tax, or other professional advice.
Chase Peckham:Hello everybody. Welcome back, Phil. I just recently got back. I was flying back east, uh, with my kids, uh, on a little like mini vacation, but it, it was five days, so I guess it wasn't super short. Uh, it just didn't feel like it was a quote on vacation. There was a lot of things that we had to do, uh, but it was really nice celebrating. Uh, my wife Kerri, uh, at her alma mater, Florida State University. Uh, the seminal contingent, uh, really just they, I can't thank them enough, uh, for how they, um, paid tribute to her, uh, her ADPi sisters, her sorority that, um, uh, immortalized her forever with a plaque in their garden. Um, it was truly special. All the people that showed up, there was some 80 people that showed up and that were all wearing the same t-shirts, uh, that we made for Kerri. They were kind of pseudo jerseys with her favorite number 13 on. It was also her birthdate. We also celebr at her birthday, celebrated her birthday on October 13th while we were out there, Um, everybody was wearing it and I wanna thank all our friends that were wearing it during the game and having parties out here on the West coast as well. But it was truly amazing. But that's not really what I, we were here to talk about.
Felipe Arevalo:It looked great. And I see you're wearing some of the swag today.
Chase Peckham:I am wearing some of the swag.
Felipe Arevalo:You brought some of it with you.
Chase Peckham:I did. Yeah. I mean, it was probably a really good recruiting trip for my kids too. They were really impressed with it. They were just super energized by it. We got to go to the game. Uh, friends of ours got us down on the field. I game they did a tribute for her on the jumbotron. Um, Avery and I got to go see a women's soccer game against Duke and they won five to one. It was really, really, it was an amazing four days, but it was just a whirlwind. I mean, we were seeing so many people, it felt like it was nonstop. Um, but I, I, you know, Katie and Jason, they were amazing hosts. Um, they did so much all the sorority sisters and everybody that, uh, and and friends alike that Kerri had had made, uh, through the years. It was, to see so many people, it was amazing. But that has nothing to do with, with personal finance, except maybe, uh,
Felipe Arevalo:It does to your personal finances.
Chase Peckham:Um, yes, it did, it, it affected mine. Um, but look, this is something that I'm doing, uh, to honor my wife and, and I wanted my kids to experience and I wanted all her friends to have, um, quote unquote closure as well, in a way to honor her. Um, didn't get so, didn't tell me About services, honestly.
Felipe Arevalo:You were telling me about what you saw in the Atlanta Airport, and I've seen it before. Pictures of it. I've seen it at other airports. I didn't realize we, we had it here in Atlanta as well. Uh, I thought they were just overseas, but you saw these little pod rentals?
Chase Peckham:Yeah, so that's ex it's amazing to me some of these airports and there, and there's, and Atlanta is a very busy airport. I mean, it's probably one of the busiest, if not the busiest airport, uh, in, in, in the United States. Um, I would imagine it's up there with O'Hare in Chicago, uh, and a few others. But it is busy. Uh, and it just so happens that it's an airport that we've traveled to a lot. So when my kids and I, and, and when Kerri was with us, we would go visit her family and that was it. It was just a hub. Um, Delta is a, is a airline that we fly a bit, but it's just easy cuz it's not direct. But, you know, Greensboro, there's no direct flight for us in North Carolina where her family lives. Um, there's no real direct flights from San Diego to Florida where we go a lot to visit other friends of hers. Um, so we spent a lot of time in the Atlanta airport and spent a lot of money in food while we're there. Cuz we tend to spend time there. We have layovers.
Felipe Arevalo:Right.
Chase Peckham:And so do a lot of people that are there. Um, they have a great tram system. It gets you from place to place from terminal to terminal, which there are a lot of them in Atlanta. But the things that, that is so creative, like there are sleeping pods and you can rent a sleeping pod for an hour. Um, and it, and it supposedly pumps in this, uh, oxygen that kind of refreshes you. And you, it's like rejuvenation. There are parlors where you can go in and you can sit in these chairs and you'll have massage therapists that will massage your back and make you feel more comfortable for the next lake of your trip. Uh, which would be amazing. I guess if you're going, uh, to Europe or you're coming, you're back from Europe, uh, Or somewhere.
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah, you have a five hour flight home
Chase Peckham:Sat for a long time, right?
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah.
Chase Peckham:But people will spend hundreds and hundreds, if not thousands of dollars just in the airport in the times that they spend waiting for their flights, whether they're waiting, uh, in between flights cause they just got off one or just showing up and, and the time that you have to spend at the airport before you go, whether it's.
Felipe Arevalo:Right.
Chase Peckham:In, in like a pseudo little, uh, gift shop that has snacks for the plane and waters because you're not allowed to bring water through tsa. Uh,
Felipe Arevalo:right.
Chase Peckham:So all the things you,
Felipe Arevalo:it's cheaper.
Chase Peckham:could buy cheap Oh yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:Cheaper than the airplane<laugh>.
Chase Peckham:Right. But you,
Felipe Arevalo:I think we've all made the purchases with the, you know, we we're on vacations. I know Barrington has from when we went to San Francisco and he was for a little die cast, uh, Southwest Airlines plane because he wanted one, like the one we had taken up there looking back at it, I don't remember the exact price, but that thing was probably way overpriced. We could have just bought one on Amazon and shipped it home for so much cheaper.
Chase Peckham:Yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:But he wanted one and it was there at the airport and he thought it was like the coolest thing. And then you end up with that. Well, we're on vacation, so.
Chase Peckham:Yeah. Well, it's, it's interesting because I was watching as I'm, as I'm sitting there, uh, and, and this was yesterday because we were home early or where we had an early flight<laugh> Getting there. We, we had, we didn't have time to purchase anything in Atlanta because we'd had app problems and we didn't know which gate we were supposed to be at. And my son misread the gates and we almost didn't make our flight because we were at one end of the airport and we were supposed to be at the other end of the airport. So we, we just spent our entire time running and sweating and on the trains back and forth.
Felipe Arevalo:On the trams?
Chase Peckham:Yeah, that's a whole story into itself. That's really, really funny. Um, now that we didn't miss our flight, but we literally made it with minutes spare. They were gonna close the door. Uh, but when we were sitting at the, the airport, we had plenty of time. And of course we're up early. Not a lot of things are open yet, but we're hungry. What do we want? Do we, you know, there's, there's a little Dunking Donuts that was open, but it's one of those makeshift, it's not a real Dunking Donuts, it's got
Felipe Arevalo:Oh, not the full,
Chase Peckham:No, it doesn't have the full things, but you know, drinks and food are marked up quite a bit compared to what you would spend in a regular, you know, where you're paying$9 for a muffin, where a lot of times are you looking for a muffin when you're just hungry? I don't think you are, but when you're in airport, you're thinking, I've gotta eat, so I'm going to just buy the muffin.
Felipe Arevalo:I'll eat, whatever there is.
Chase Peckham:Right?
Felipe Arevalo:Right.
Chase Peckham:Yeah. And you, you just, and you spend on a couple waters and the muffin, and they'll say$23 and you just go, Oh, okay. And you go, Oh my God, I just spent$23 on nothing. And then,
Felipe Arevalo:Right.
Chase Peckham:It might even be a bland dry muffin and you really don't want it, but you're like telling your kid you're gonna eat it. Because I spent$8 on a muffin. I, I, I am willing to bet of all the money that I spent while we were there. I spent a good portion of it just at the airport. And I didn't even think about all the things that people, which I've done before when buying things for kids because you forgot to buy them something. And so,
Felipe Arevalo:Oh yeah, souvenirs,
Chase Peckham:We gotta get the kid a souvenir, Right? So we'll buy that at the airport and oops.
Felipe Arevalo:I mean, I, you could have bought it at Walmart before you showed up and save for the money.
Chase Peckham:<laugh>. I didn't plan well enough ahead, but these airports can make some serious cash.
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah. You end up buying, and especially when you're buying for a group of people like you and your kids, it's not like, you know, that's three breakfast items that you have to try and find three waters or Gatorades or whatever, and or Gatorades, you might get two. And, and then it starts to add up when you get kids.
Chase Peckham:So here's question. Are there anything in your mind that you remember that you spent at an airport that you would normally never in a million years do that?
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah, one time I forgot my headphones and, and I was so angry, but I was, I was flying to DC to see my buddy when he was living out there and I passed through. I was sitting, I sat down, All right, let's get my music going. And I started digging and it was like a panic. Like, are you kidding me? I have my phone, I have my iPod. This is a long time ago. I still an iPod, uh, no headphones. Uh, so I had to go buy headphones from either the little shop or the little vending machine. And I don't remember the price for it, but I remember being so angry at me at myself for having to buy these cheap, crappy little headphones that were like 10 bucks for like 99 cent headphones.
Chase Peckham:Is that it.
Felipe Arevalo:I was probably more, uh, they had the nice ones, but those, you
Chase Peckham:Know, they give'em out to you in the, in the, in the airplane, right?
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah. But I have the<laugh>, my wife says it's a<laugh> unrealistic expectation that I should be at the airport really early. So before I get on the plane, I gotta kill two and a half hours worth of me sitting in the airport trying to read a book. And it becomes very difficult to do when you don't have headphones to kind of keep yourself distracted. And
Chase Peckham:Ah,
Felipe Arevalo:So it, it was like a couple of hours before I even got onto the plane, but it was like the cheap disposable ones that you get at the plane. And I ended up paying like 10 or 15 bucks for hem.
Chase Peckham:Oh cuz. So for instance, I, I'm amazed or I'm, I'm, I'm happy you said it was headphones because there are unreal stores in those places in the airports that, I mean, I'm like, who comes in here and buys$250 headphones?
Felipe Arevalo:Oh yeah. I've seen them. Like Dre Beats, Beats Beats by Dre
Chase Peckham:Absolutely. There are, um, um, I-vending machines like apple vending machines with different types of headphones that you can buy while you're there.
Felipe Arevalo:Yes.
Chase Peckham:Electronics,
Felipe Arevalo:Sweet looking,
Chase Peckham:But high end electronics. I'm like,
Felipe Arevalo:yeah,
Chase Peckham:I, I would imagine that there are so many people that are walking through there that they must make money or they wouldn't be there.
Felipe Arevalo:Right. So much foot traffic and just to have the machine there, they've gotta sell.
Chase Peckham:How many people forget their headphones and are gonna go, Well, I think I'll buy beats by Dre just because I've always wanted those and I'll buy it retail while I'm here.
Felipe Arevalo:I'll buy it at a premium just because I don't wanna wait until I get home to buy it at a regular price. Not many. But I, I think that sometimes people are just throwing caution to the wind. The, I've seen the vending machines with like the beats and the headphones in the iPads and the, and you're sitting there looking at'em thinking, Man, why would you buy that off of a vending machine at the airport? But they must sell at some point or another.
Chase Peckham:Yeah,
Felipe Arevalo:I've never seen anyone actually buy'em. Um,
Chase Peckham:No. Well, But I mean, there's people in there, uh, books sell like crazy. People buy, buy those.
Felipe Arevalo:I've bought books before.
Chase Peckham:I don't know how many times. I mean, normally now, I mean, if I bought, like for instance, I was listening to a book, uh, I did an audio book for the first time in my life and I purchased that for the plane ride. I didn't look, I didn't, uh, pay, I did pay for the internet on the way home cuz I worked. Um, but on the way there, I just literally listened to the book the whole time and that was kind of fun. Uh, I, I had never experienced that before. Uh, but there are things that you will pay for. I have to admit, I there<laugh>, I think I was going to my son's baseball game, baseball tournament last year and, uh, he, he went out early with some teammates. I stayed back for a friend's 50th birthday party and flew out the next morning to meet him out in Arizona and meet all our friends. And, uh, I had my sunglasses. I must have lost them in TSA as I was, I probably put'em in a thing, little
Felipe Arevalo:In a bucket and never pick them back up?,
Chase Peckham:I never picked it back up and I didn't know where they were. I didn't have any sunglasses. And I'm in Phoenix and I'm like, I need sunglasses. I'm really ticked off. And I made a it very impulse buy and bought a brand new pair of Oakley's at one of the gift shops, one of the sunglass huts,
Felipe Arevalo:Sun Glass Hut at the airport?
Chase Peckham:In the Phoenix Airport. On my way out. My wife none too happy with me after that. She was really,
Felipe Arevalo:That's like a double sunglass hut. And at the airport.
Chase Peckham:And at the airport, yeah. There's no sales in there.
Felipe Arevalo:No,
Chase Peckham:None. Um, so there are things that I, I have done that I would not, not normally think I would do. Um, buying a beer at the airport.
Felipe Arevalo:I was going to say.
Chase Peckham:While you're sitting there, it's like going to ball park.
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah.
Chase Peckham:I mean, I don't know if it's that expensive, but it's close.
Felipe Arevalo:It could be<laugh>, it could be you sit at a little place and then you, you have a beer and then your flight gets delayed and then you might have another beer and you might get some nachos and you might get some.
Chase Peckham:Yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:And then before you knows you're paying a huge tab cuz you sat there and watched
Chase Peckham:Next thing you had four beers,
Felipe Arevalo:You know whatever baseball game,
Chase Peckham:You're having such a good time that you didn't hear that you're boarding your plane and all of a Sudden.
Felipe Arevalo:Missed your flight.
Chase Peckham:You're not making the flight.<laugh>. I saw two guys that walked up just, uh, the other night when we were running between ours. They looked like they had a few too many and they didn't make their flight. They spent too much time at the bar.
Felipe Arevalo:Oh man. That would be very angry.
Chase Peckham:Oh, terrible. It was, it was so late. It was.
Felipe Arevalo:So mad.
Chase Peckham:Last flight out. And that's, that's a dangerous thing. You can't, you can't sit there a party at the airport.
Felipe Arevalo:Now they got to spend the nights at the airport.
Chase Peckham:Yep. Or try to, or you had to go spend more money on a, on a hotel makeup and try to find a flight out the next day. Oh, what a terrible.
Felipe Arevalo:But I remember when I was going, when I'd go out to visit my buddy and he was living out in DC it, I mean I was driving out, I was flying out and you fly from San Diego to the East coast, you end up showing up in the afternoon, even if you leave first thing in the morning our time.
Chase Peckham:Absolutely, it's a lost day.
Felipe Arevalo:It's a, Yeah. So I would, I'm not trying to lose a day. I was going out vacations. I knew he was picking me up at the airport after work and I knew we were gonna go find some food and find some beverages when we got there. So I'd just get a head start<laugh>. But then you get a head start<laugh> and you get a layover and you know, Austin or Dallas Fort Worth or something like.
Chase Peckham:Dallas is a great airport for fun.
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah.
Chase Peckham:They've got some great restaurants and foods and beers in there and all these Airports.
Felipe Arevalo:Plus they play country music.
Chase Peckham:Yeah. And it's not like just this crappy food that airports used to have.
Felipe Arevalo:No.
Chase Peckham:There are all like these big retailers, these big name, uh, restaurants and that are,
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah.
Chase Peckham:I mean, Bobby Flay's burgers, uh, were in the Atlanta airport, uh, and my clay and I had gone there when we were in Vegas for a baseball tournament and it was awesome. I'm like, Oh my god, Bobby Ffl is in the airport. It was even open for breakfast, full bar and everything.<laugh>. I couldn't do it. It was six o'clock in the morning. I'm not right. Not doing it.
Felipe Arevalo:But you can<laugh> get a really heavy breakfast sandwich I'm sure.
Chase Peckham:Not worth it. But
Felipe Arevalo:You know, in those cases, I, and I, I was in my twenties, I didn't have any, I was going out to hang out with my buddy and Yeah, I'm sure I purchased a lot of food and beverage expenses along the way. Especially if you end up with a layover,
Chase Peckham:Right.
Felipe Arevalo:And, and you have like an hour or two to kill and you're on your way to go hang out, eat and eat unhealthy and, you know, consume some beverages.
Chase Peckham:Well, and you're in the spirit of things,
Felipe Arevalo:A head start, Exactly.
Chase Peckham:You're super excited. You're going on vacation, you don't, I'll spare no expense right now.
Felipe Arevalo:Right.
Chase Peckham:And that's just kind of the freewheeling thought. So if you, you, I guess if you throw that into your budget and know I'm gonna spend a couple hundred dollars at the airports while I'm on vacation,<laugh><laugh>, then
Felipe Arevalo:If you plan it ahead that way.
Chase Peckham:Yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:It doesn't sound quite as exciting,
Chase Peckham:but I I mean.
Felipe Arevalo:More a spur of the moment unfortunately,
Chase Peckham:I think. Yeah. And there was one time where we, we knew we, we, our flight was delayed. We weren't gonna make our connection and we, we knew that we weren't gonna have clothes for that night, so we were even gonna have to fly standby. And we ended up buying some shirts,
Felipe Arevalo:Outfits?
Chase Peckham:Clean shirts and underwear and stuff at the Yeah, we, and we, so you're spending, all of a sudden you're spending 80 bucks on, you know, and we didn't go super expensive. It's not like we were going shopping at the top end, uh, store in there. We're just doing the gift shop type stores and then you end up having a Atlanta sweatshirt or t-shirt that you would never ever buy. Like. I'm a banner for Atlanta, Georgia.
Felipe Arevalo:Barrington had a potty accident when we went to San Francisco, so he had like a San, only thing they had were pajamas,<laugh>,
Chase Peckham:It said San Francisco it.
Felipe Arevalo:On his size. So he's got like little crabs, little San Francisco, some, like, something you would get at a gift shop and it, that's all they had his size and like, there you go buddy. He was running around the airport and crab San Francisco seafood pajamas.<laugh>.
Chase Peckham:Yeah. I mean it's amazing how many things there are. There's cigar lounges, there's all kind. I mean there's even where somebody told me that they were at a speakeasy in, in a, in an airport, uh, that's pretty phenomenal. I mean,
Felipe Arevalo:that's kind of cool. You get it
Chase Peckham:Is kind of cool, but how did they advertise a speakeasy? I mean, you don't really have to take your time to get there, right? I mean,
Felipe Arevalo:To go find it. Yeah.
Chase Peckham:Yeah. It's, it's incredible what people will do. Um, but I, the airport is part of the travel, part of the, the airport experience.
Felipe Arevalo:It is.
Chase Peckham:So I, I get, you know, when you're, when you're there and you know, when you're on home, you're a different frame of mind. You're not nearly gonna spend the money that you would on your way out. Um, at least that's my case. I mean, I I, when you're coming home, it's like, Oh, just get me home. Uh, when you're out there, you're like, Hey, the airport's fun
Felipe Arevalo:<laugh>. It's that first. It's that on the way out part, I think that you're more willing to, Plus you haven't spent money yet when you're coming back,
Chase Peckham:Right?
Felipe Arevalo:You just spent all the money on everything else during your trip, but you're kind of going, trying to get excited. You got that initial burst of excitement.
Chase Peckham:Right. We were so lucky that we got to stay with friends while we were there. So I didn't have any hotels I had to pay for. Um, they shoot, they wouldn't let us pay for dinner a couple times. Um, I had to, I had to literally get at one, one day for lunch. I had to go meet. I pretended I was going to the bathroom and I met our server,
Felipe Arevalo:You met the server.
Chase Peckham:Because I was tired of people kept paying for me and the kids. So, um, I didn't, the overhead for me was not a ton, uh, outside of the flights. Um, so it was worth spending the couple hundred dollars we did on Florida State gear and, and the experiences that we got. But, um, you know, it, it was a great tribute to my wife, uh, my late wife. And, um, it was, it was very emotional. Um, and, and we're turning around and we've got another thing for her. Uh, and my friend coming up here, uh, in the next, uh, couple weeks where we're getting on a plane again and I get to experience those planes again. Right now I'm not so much looking forward to it, but I'm sure by then I will be, I'll be great. Um, but, uh, I'll, I'll let you know, Phil, how many, I know that you're more the road trip guy.
Felipe Arevalo:I am.
Chase Peckham:You don't do the airport near as much.
Felipe Arevalo:Not, not so much, but, but I like a good airport here and there. That open road. I lo I love it.
Chase Peckham:Yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:Um, but I've done a few, a few airports here and there and you get to see, I, I think you and I been to the Atlanta airport a couple times on the way to Orlando.
Chase Peckham:Yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:Uh, for conferences.
Chase Peckham:Well that's why it's such a busy airport. I mean there's so many flights in and out of there. Um, and depending on, you know, if you're Delta or you're American, you end up going through Dallas a lot. Um, if you're united, you end up going through Denver or Chicago a ton. Uh, at least for US West Coast people. Right. Those are the main times you flight. I was looking at flights for Alaska and to get to Kansas City, they were gonna take me to Seattle first. I'm like.
Felipe Arevalo:One time on the way back from Orlando, we ended up in SeaTac.
Chase Peckham:Yes.
Felipe Arevalo:And<laugh> having a layover in SeaTac.
Chase Peckham:And it was down Pour. Do you remember that? How much rain there Was<laugh>.
Felipe Arevalo:Yeah.
Chase Peckham:And We, we, by the way, what did we do? We bought, uh, Seattle Mariners. I think I bought a Seattle Mariner hat for my son or
Felipe Arevalo:Something like that. Yeah. Like little gift thingss that I needed a new book.
Chase Peckham:I think you and I did. And we only spent a good an hour there,
Felipe Arevalo:Right.<laugh>.
Chase Peckham:But that was a long trip.
Felipe Arevalo:You wanna try the local, you always wanna try the local things. If they have it. Like here in San Diego, you could score some Phil's barbecue.
Chase Peckham:Yeah.
Felipe Arevalo:At the airport,
Chase Peckham:By the way, did spend some money on some Phil's barbecue on the way outta here.
Felipe Arevalo:There you go.
Chase Peckham:At the San Diego Airport. Terminal two. And now Terminal one is under construction. That's gonna be super nice, uh, with all those different retailers as well. Um, but man, I'll tell ya, you can spend some cash in those airports, so.
Felipe Arevalo:Absolutely.
Chase Peckham:With that, if you have done that, please let us know. Go to our, uh, wherever you find us on Facebook and Instagram, uh, or on Twitter, on the, uh, Talk Wealth to Me app, uh, or talk wealth to me, uh, social media pages. Uh, let us know where, where have you, what have you spent money on in airports, Uh, that is a little bit nuts. Uh, like us. Give us those five star reviews and we'll talk to you soon.