The History of In-Flight Peanuts
It's not clear when the first peanuts were served on a flight, but Southwest Airlines made them famous.
Southwest began flying in 1971 as the world's first low-cost airline. It offered "peanut fares" – flights so cheap they "cost peanuts." So to help make their point and save money, Southwest didn't serve meals: it only served peanuts.
Until 1978, US airline ticket prices were controlled by the government. But once that changed, airlines wanted to reduce costs so they could lower prices. Some chose to serve simpler food, and peanuts – which are cheap and last a long time – were a popular choice.
After the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001, many airlines lost money and meals became even smaller. Some airlines even started making people pay for their peanuts.
Around the same time, deadly peanut allergies were becoming more common in the US. People with severe peanut allergies can die from just breathing in the dust from peanuts, so airlines created special policies for people with peanut allergies. Some airlines let them board early to clean their seats, or created areas where nobody was allowed to eat peanuts. Other airlines stopped serving peanuts altogether.
Southwest still served more than 106 million packages of peanuts in 2017. But in 2018, a nine-year-old boy had a severe reaction to them on a Southwest flight. The boy survived, but Southwest decided to stop serving peanuts on August 1.
A few US airlines, such as Delta, continue to serve peanuts. Others, like United and American Airlines, have stopped. However, since other passengers may still bring peanuts on board, and some meals may include nuts, no airline can say for sure that its flights will be completely peanut-free.
