David J. Danto
Travel thoughts in my
own, personal opinion
eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD on 
Welcome to 2026 on
United: Déjà Vu – January 2026
It’s the first couple of days of 2026 and my year kicks off with an old ritual. I head to CES in Las Vegas, and United
Airlines provides the transport, the comedy, and the existential questions
about why we keep doing this to ourselves.
CES is one of those trips where the moment the wheels
hit the ground the clock starts. Meetings,
briefings, dinners, hallway run-ins, and the occasional actual conference
session. Knowing this, I decided to take
the 6 AM flight from Newark. I hate taking
any 6 AM flight. It forces me to wake up
a half an hour before I go to bed, leaves at an hour most people haven’t met
yet, and lands on the West Coast around 9 AM, which is terrific for squeezing a
full workday out of the trip and terrible for everything leading up to it.
One advantage of the early flight is the upgrade game. It is usually easier to clear because no
normal person wants to be vertical at 3:30 AM to get to the airport. But nothing about CES is normal. CES flights are the Thunderdome of type-A
tech professionals who treat upgrades like emotional validation. FYI: on my return flight, I was 37th on the
list. There are high schools with
shorter waitlists.
As usual, every airline ritual now starts before the airport. United updated its app…again. I have not yet fully mapped the new “conveniences”,
but the notifications poured in. Because
of my status cocktail, which includes Million-Miler, touchless Pre-Check, and
all the other whiz-bang accreditations one acquires over decades, I was
prompted to use the special bag-drop shortcut for checked bags.
There was a time in my youth when a week in Las Vegas
required nothing more than a modest carry-on.
Those days are gone. Half my
luggage now consists of medicine, cables, adapters, and other must-have gear
for surviving both CES and middle age. So
I check a bag. This is where the comedy
begins.
United proudly told me to arrive early to use their elite
express bag-drop shortcut. I arrived
early. The shortcut they told me to go
to was, of course, closed.
United of course knows what time my flight is, and when they
suggest people get to the airport, so they intentionally sent me and dozens of
other people to a station they don’t staff at that time. Once again, United reminds its elite customers
that status is mostly theoretical. I
made my next move to the Global Services / 1K desk, a region of the airport
reserved for people slightly more important than me. I asked if I could just hand them the bag
because I was already checked in. They
declined. When I mentioned I was a Million-Miler,
they reminded me how insignificant that distinction is at United, something I
have had clarified repeatedly for years.
Next stop: Premier check-in, which theoretically should be
quick. It was not. The line snaked so far back it almost
reconnected with the closed shortcut I was told to use. United tells passengers to get to the airport
early to use a shortcut they do not intend to staff then forces them into a
line they are not supposed to be standing on and staffs it with exactly one
person. It is a performance piece. The art installation is titled Traveling on
United in America.
Welcome to business travel in 2026. It looks remarkably like business travel in
2025, 2024, 2023, and 2022. In an
industry that loves to congratulate itself for modernization, very little of
the customer-facing reality has modernized.
Digital transformation makes great slides and pretty apps. It does not seem to make great experiences –
a distinction they must not be teaching in bean-counter school.
Eventually, the bag disappeared onto the belt, I trudged
through security, and United delivered me to CES without mechanical incident. This counts as a win. In our era of post-pandemic airline
economics, an on-time departure and arrival is the new luxury. The rest of the experience is graded on
curves that would make an engineer blush.
The 6 AM flight never stops being a punishment, but it does
offer one unique perk. Landing before 10
AM means CES can devour you for an entire day.
Meetings slot directly into place.
Briefings become breakfasts (typically three a day). Dinners become second shift. And by the end of the night, you remember why
you go every year. Not for the
convenience. Not for the airline perks. But for the strange alchemy of technology,
commerce, ideas, and personality that converges in Las Vegas every January. I covered the relevant tech industry details of my CES visit
here, and will talk about the status of Las Vegas in next week’s Joe Sent
Me column.
The flight home was less glamorous. It always is.
Post-CES flights feel like evacuations.
People calculate sleep debts, email backlogs, and whether they were
briefed by the right vendors. Nobody
gets the upgrade. Some pretend they do
not care. I had been in 10D but saw an
empty middle seat in 12E so I switched myself to 12D two days before departure. Of course, 12E was eventually filled with a 7-foot-tall
person that encroached for the whole flight, 10E had a petite woman in it, and
11D in front of me was filled with a serial recliner, who slammed the seat back
on me so hard and quickly as soon as we took off that I’m sure he knocked the
last row of the plane into the lav. I
honestly expected no less. Mr. Murphy bends
his laws for no one.
The new year begins, and already nothing has changed. Traveling for business remains a ritual of
hope intersecting with operational reality.
Airlines tell us they are improving.
Airports tell us they are modernizing.
Apps tell us they understand us. Status
tells us we matter. CES tells us the
future is imminent. The lived experience,
however, tells us to shut the hell up and get in line to wait with all the
other elite flyers cattle.
After decades of candid travel commentary – from loyalty
program “magic tricks” to hotel check-in roulette – I’ve decided to turn some
of that honesty into apparel. These
aren’t novelty shirts; they’re the exact truths every road warrior wishes they
could say out loud. Whether you’re
quietly muttering “My loyalty points devalued while you read this shirt”
or admitting “If delays build character then I’m the whole movie’s cast”
you’ll find plenty of familiar sentiments… and more. Everything is produced by a
reputable outfit, with black tees that work under a sport jacket plus hoodies
and wicking travel gear for life on the road. The site also has my honest and
snarky takes on technology trade shows.
Take a look at Tinyurl.com/TechAndTravelWear.
Even if you’re not buying they’re fun to read and commiserate – and if
you do buy something, maybe I’ll break even.
If you want a style you don’t see, just email me and I’ll add it.
This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal
opinions.
All image and links provided above as reference under
prevailing fair use statutes.
Copyright 2026 David Danto
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As always, feel free to write and comment, question or
disagree. Hearing from the traveling
community is always a highlight for me.
Thanks!