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Review: the new Clubrooms lounge at Birmingham Airport

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This is our review of the Clubrooms lounge at Birmingham Airport.

This article is part of our series of reviews of airport lounges across the UK.  You see all of the reviews here.

Reader Stephen kindly offered to check this lounge out on his flight from Birmingham.  The Clubrooms lounge is owned by No1 Lounges and is their most premium offering.  Clubrooms only opened in late 2018 but No1 Lounges has had a ‘standard’ No1 Lounge in the airport for many years which we reviewed here.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

Add in the two Aspire lounges in the terminal, reviewed here and here, and you have a lot of choices now when flying out of Birmingham.

You can learn about the Clubrooms lounge in Birmingham on the No 1 website here.

Over to Stephen:

“The new Clubrooms lounge at Birmingham Airport is located close to gate 54.  It is a 5-minute walk from security.  Access to Express Lane Security is also included for all bookings made in advance via the No1 website.

Opening hours are 05:30 until 20:30 during the summer schedule and 05:30 until 20:00 in winter.

If booked online directly, entry is £34 per person, saving you £6 from the on-the-door price of £40.  Via this Virgin Atlantic offer, it costs £35.00 but comes with 400 Flying Club miles.  There is an additional £10 charge for the champagne package.

Entrance with Priority Pass (which comes free with American Express Platinum, or you can buy one separately), Dragon Pass, Lounge Club (two free entry vouchers with American Express Preferred Rewards Gold), Lounge Key and Lounge Pass comes with an additional £10 charge.

Whilst you could access the Aspire lounges or the main No 1 Lounge in Birmingham with these cards without paying an extra £10, I think it is worth the money if you are looking for a quality experience and are not in a rush.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

Regulations state that you can only remain in the lounge for three hours prior to your flight time, but this doesn’t seem to be strictly imposed.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

Upon entry, I was given a very warm welcome by the staff and asked if I would like to eat at the dining table or more casual coffee tables. There were only two other people in the lounge when I arrived (09:30), but by midday it had filled up, with only a few empty tables.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

There is also a larger table suitable for small groups (up to 8) on the left side of the lounge.  Unlike No1 Lounges, the Birmingham Clubrooms offers table service.

You can order one item from the breakfast menu. There were a range of egg-based options including eggs florentine and eggs benedict, as well as more substantial full English breakfasts. There is also a selection of cereals although there wasn’t a list of stocked products on the menu.

I decided to go for the full English, which was well presented and really nice. The latte was also very good.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

There was a limited selection of soft drinks in the fridge to which you could help yourself, although the staff were more than happy to bring over other soft or alcoholic drinks from the bar. The alcoholic selection was good and included a range of cocktails.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

There were also a small selection of pastries and fruit for self service.  Unfortunately, the pastries were not fresh and were quite hard. Around 10:30, they removed them and changed them a selection of small deserts, which were really tasty.

For lunch, they offer a choice of English breakfast / beef burger / pumpkin tortellini / soup / salad / eggs benedict / club sandwich.  If you have already had breakfast, however, you are not allowed to have a free lunch item as well.  They police this by giving you a menu on entry and making you hand it in when you place your order.  No menu = no free main course!

This lounge has a really relaxing atmosphere, with music playing softly in the background with a good amount of natural light.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

The lounge was very clean, and had lots of staff, who were very attentive offering drink top ups when needed.

They have a selection of newspapers which are complimentary.

There is one toilet located inside the lounge which is a positive compared with some of the other lounges in Birmingham.

Unfortunately, the lower panes of the floor-to-ceiling windows are frosted, obscuring the view of the runway when seated.

Review Clubrooms lounge Birmingham Airport

The Clubrooms wi-fi was good (download speed of 20 Mbps), although there were very few plug sockets, mostly in the corners of each room. Most tables did not have access to a plug.

On the whole, the Birmingham Clubrooms lounge is a very relaxing place to spend a few hours before a flight, assuming you do not need access to power sockets since the few seats which offer them may already be taken.  The service was friendly, and food and drinks were delivered to the table promptly.”

Thanks Stephen.  Looking at the photos, this looks like a beautifully designed and furnished lounge. You can read more about it on the Birmingham Clubrooms page here.


Getting airport lounge access for free from a credit card

How to get FREE airport lounge access via UK credit cards (October 2024)

Here are the four options to get FREE airport lounge access via a UK credit card.

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with two free Priority Pass cards, one for you and one for a supplementary cardholder. Each card admits two so a family of four gets in free. You get access to all 1,500 lounges in the Priority Pass network – search it here.

You also get access to Eurostar, Lufthansa and Delta Air Lines lounges.  Our American Express Platinum review is here.

You can apply here.

The Platinum Card from American Express

50,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

If you have a small business, consider American Express Business Platinum instead.

American Express Business Platinum

Up to 80,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for the first year. It comes with a Priority Pass card loaded with four free visits to any Priority Pass lounge – see the list here.

Additional lounge visits are charged at £24.  You get four more free visits for every year you keep the card.  

There is no annual fee for Amex Gold in Year 1 and you get a 20,000 points sign-up bonus.  Full details are in our American Express Preferred Rewards Gold review here.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard gets you get a free Priority Pass card, allowing you access to the Priority Pass network.  Guests are charged at £24 although it may be cheaper to pay £60 for a supplementary credit card for your partner.

The card has a fee of £290 and there are strict financial requirements to become a HSBC Premier customer.  Full details are in my HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard review.

HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard

A good package, but only available to HSBC Premier clients Read our full review

PS. You can find all of HfP’s UK airport lounge reviews – and we’ve been to most of them – indexed here.

Comments (24)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Phil says:

    Paying £10 on top of already holding a lounge card but being restricted to a single main food item (like the other No.1 lounge) doesn’t work for me. Seems an unnecessary restriction, also a lack of power sockets would annoy me as that’s something I always look for in lounges pre flight. I think I’ll stick with aspire!

    • Shoestring says:

      single food item doesn’t really describe the extensive breakfast choice (all free) and nearly as good salad/ fruits etc choice come 11am (all free)

      I use No1 T3 a lot and you need never feel hungry just because you only get 1 free a la carte choice

      • Lady London says:

        Doesnt sound like Clubrooms BHX is offering the same as No LHR T3 though Shoestring. Plus it costs a supplement.

        • Shoestring says:

          I guess we’d have to ask Stephen – but it would surprise me if the normal No1 breakfast selection weren’t available as well (free to choose as much as you like), ie cereals, pastries, toast, juices, fruits etc

          • Stephen says:

            Unfortunately they didn’t have the normal breakfast selection to help yourself from.

  • John says:

    If the pictured full English counts as “more substantial” I’m not sure what the eggs benedict would look like… maybe I just like a big breakfast as even in LHR T3 CX F I usually order a second breakfast dish about 90 mins after having my first.

    • Phil says:

      I’d honestly rather spend £10 on a weatherspoons breakfast and pint in the main airport

      • Shoestring says:

        Clubroom is from £20.40 with the MSE code & link – just did a dummy booking. £20.40 is a lot more palatable, as is an effective £10 if you already have PP.

      • Bob says:

        And this is why so many people don’t get to eat a complimentary breakfast in T3 CX F. Penny wise;, pound foolish.

  • Shoestring says:

    I know from No1 T3 that there are always quite a few people who don’t want food & just leave their menu on their table when they leave.

    • Lady London says:

      🙂

      Hum. Is “Wombling” in lounges a thing?

      Unfortunately i always catch up on these things too late.

      • Shoestring says:

        the dropped receipts in the pub are good for subsequent credit to HR, you just email them with a scan

      • Rob says:

        I did find a big shopping receipt in Heathrow once ….

  • Dickie_H says:

    I mentioned this here a couple of days ago, but No. 1 Lounges seem to have quietly removed free fast track security from their booking fee. You can pay a supplementary £2 fee when booking to include it, but this option is NOT available to customers paying £5 to reserve their place with Priority Pass: in this case you’ll either have to pay for fast track via the airline or with the airport direct.

    • Stu_N says:

      I pre-booked No.1 lounge at Birmingham on Tuesday for a Priority Pass visit on Thursday and it still included Fast Track.

  • Grant says:

    If I am reading it correctly, there seems to be an anomoly between this artcile, which suggests PP Members can get access to Clubrooms for £10, and the Bits article covering the 40% promo, which suggests PP Members cannot access Clubrooms.

    My experience, when looking to book this morning, is that PP Members can book access, but it is £15. At a guess the £5 difference is to cover pre-booking a place, plus the £10 door fee.

  • Lady London says:

    The Lunch menu sounds very close to what used to be offered in exchange for your menu at the Gatwick No.1 before they went not-much-quality buffet (exception for breakfast which is about OK).

    Handing over your menu and having things ‘counted’ is not a feeling that makes a lounge attractive to me. So i think i would pass unless it’s truly necessary to get away from a horrible airport. Is it?

  • Andrew says:

    The other lounges at BHX (except for EK) are atrocious, so paying £10 for this I would be more than willing to do so – I wasn’t aware this was a Priority Pass top-up option. I flew QR from BHX a few weeks ago and they send you to the regular No1 lounge – which is terrible. The coffee is that horrible Nescafé machine – so basically instant coffee, and the water is from a fountain. Finding myself drinking tap water and instant coffee I really wish I had just left for the airport later as at least I have a proper coffee machine at home. I moved to the Aspire lounge after a little while, entering with my PP – this was marginally better in terms of ambiance, but still no fresh coffee.

  • Sandra says:

    Flying BA from Gatwick in a couple of months – living quite a bit north of Watford Gap Gatwick isn’t an airport I’ve used for at least 25 years – can anyone give an up to date view of the BA lounge there please?

    • Peter K says:

      Plenty of seating, it’s comfortable, there are self pour drinks, food is adequate, view from windows nice. Even when busy it’s not felt overcrowded. Overall a good experience.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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