The End of "Bags Fly Free": Unpacking How AHL Teams Pack for Road Trips

Image by Jeremy Snavely from Pixabay

Last week, the final nail came down in the great unbundling of air travel as the last holdout against no bag fees, Southwest Airlines, announced the end of their “Bags Fly Free” policy. The policy, which was a core part of the company’s marketing strategy around their neologism “Transfarency”, was also a big help to American Hockey League teams.

The AHL is not a charter flight league. Anytime you have to get on a plane in the A, players, coaches and staff are going through TSA and waiting in the boarding area like the rest of us*. For some teams on a geographical island, like Texas and Manitoba, every single road trip involves an airplane.

When Sean Shapiro and I wrote We Win Here just two years ago, the Texas Stars were pretty frequent users of Southwest Airlines. Many AHL teams, including Texas, loved the fact that extra bags did not cost extra. All told, it was a relatively small line item in an AHL budget, but spread out over the course of an entire season, the idea of free bags on every flight is pretty appealing.

But just how much will an AHL team pay in bag fees when they fly with Southwest in the 2025-26 season compared to today? The answer is actually more interesting in terms of what it reveals about what it takes to get a professional hockey team on the road than it is in terms of the budgetary cost of extra baggage.

Let’s start with the travellers themselves. A professional team has 18 skaters and two goalies. There will be a few scratches that travel with the team as well, so let’s just use the NHL roster limit for argument’s sake and go with 23. Texas has three coaches on the bench plus two more behind the scenes. There’s also a head and assistant equipment manager and athletic trainer. That’s nine more right there. For a round ten, don’t forget the team’s broadcaster. For Texas, this is just one role but some teams have multiple PR or media personnel that travel with the team. Ontario, for example, had four traveling in the press box last night.

That puts it at 33.

Image by Bonnie Henderson from Pixabay

Every one of those folks gets the standard 1+1 that every airline gives. You have a carryon like a backpack for things you want to have on the plane at your feet and an overhead bin carryon with your suits and other clothes for when you aren’t at the rink.

Now it gets more complicated.

Every player has their own equipment bag for skates, protective equipment, helmets, etc. But unlike your beer league kit, everything isn’t even packed into one bag. Items like workout gear, shower shoes, jerseys and socks are combined together in their own bags. And don’t forget that teams don’t just need the jerseys for the players on the plane. What if they have to sign a PTO or get a player reassigned on short notice? They’ll need all the equipment and extras to make a jersey on the fly.

Also under the plane, don’t forget that coaches have to go on the ice for practice, so you’ll need skates and gloves for them. Speaking of the coaches, you’ll also need video equipment for recording the game (coaches have their own camera angle they shoot, they don’t just take the AHL feed like the rest of us) and then there’s any equipment to project pre-game meetings and practice tuneups for special teams, etc.

Another thing that’s important for hockey players is sticks. Teams pack up to four bags of just sticks for road trips, and those also have to go under the plane. In addition to all the equipment, the EQM staff also brings an entire skate sharpener as well. The goalies get special treatment as well with an extra bag dedicated to their oversized equipment.

The athletic trainers also need bags. Items like supplements, post-workout protein shake mixes, and medical necessities fill out more under the plane inventory.

And finally, if fans want to hear the game, there’s a Pelican case full of audio equipment for the broadcast team.

Head equipment manager Charlie Kaser and head athletic trainer Mike DeGaetano are each responsible for extra bags that travel with the team to make sure every player is ready to play a full 60 on the road. (Credit: Andy Nietupski/Texas Stars)

All told, the Stars pack out with 70-75 bags for a road trip. In terms of how that actually works when they get to the airport, there is a manifest that matches travelers to bags. Arttu Hyry might be assigned his own bag and the skate sharpener. Cameron Hughes gets his bag and a stick bag. For those playing at home, that’s 66 free bags and then a few extra that carry a fee.

Another thing to note is that equipment staff is responsible for more than just their own bags when they’re the host. Despite the different teams, equipment managers help each other out to pack up and pack out for the next stop. As an example, Texas’ EQMs stayed late last night not only to dry out the Stars’ gear for their trip to Chicago tomorrow but also to help get the Reign ready for their trip to Des Moines tomorrow.

As far as the conceit for this story, how much the end of ‘bags fly free’ really affects the Texas Stars, the answer is less than in previous years. If you look at where Texas flies to play the majority of their games, it isn’t a “Southwest Airlines” division. Southwest doesn’t fly to Winnipeg or Des Moines. If the Stars are going to Milwaukee, Chicago, Rockford or Grand Rapids, they’re likely to fly into Chicago, which has both Midway, served by Southwest, and O’Hare, served by everyone, and then bus around the Midwest in true AHL throwback style.

Additionally, more recent additions to Austin’s airline footprint, including emphasis from Delta and American, have added more flight options to the inventory.

When the team list for Texas’ opponents included more of the Pacific Division, a stronghold for Southwest, the impact of a bag change would have been more. Now, the amount of the change is even more of a rounding error on the AHL budget. Over 70 bags at $40 each, if we assume American’s baggage fee as an example, is still $2800 for each flight in a trip. Let’s assume half a dozen trips with a flight out and a return for 12 total legs, giving us $33,600 for the season.

In the end, when GM Scott White sits down to sort out the travel budget, managed by video coach Josh Johnson, during the summer, all things equal the Southwest flight could be cheaper or maybe not. Bags fly free is no longer a factor. As much for a professional hockey team as for one of its fans, Southwest Airlines is now just another airline, same as the rest.

** - At the end of the season, there are some exceptions as teams are in playoff mode. For example, the Texas Stars flew charter in their 2014 Calder Cup Finals series when traveling from Cedar Park to St. John’s. Occupying the other half of the plane? The IceCaps, who had to get to the same place at the same time.