Last year Hyatt announced the acquisition of Mrs. and Mrs. Smith, a booking platform of nearly 2,000 premium hotels that previously partnered with IHG One Rewards.
While Mr. and Mrs. Smith isn’t yet integrated into World of Hyatt, through March 31 they’re offering 1 elite night credit for every $300 spent on Mr & Mrs Smith gift cards that do not expire, up to 60 elite nights, plus points-earning of 5 World of Hyatt base points per dollar spent.
Mr. and Mrs. Smith includes some absolutely insane hotels for instance several Virgin Limited Edition hotels like Moskito Island are part of the platform, including places like the Hamptons and Martha’s Vineyard where it’s tough to use points and there’s even overlap with Aman Resorts though I don’t expect all hotels to eventually participate with Hyatt.
Branson Estate on Moskito Island
With Hyatt expected to onboard some Mr. and Mrs. Smith properties in the coming months, their Small Luxury Hotels of the World partnership has been in doubt. SLH is a booking platform for independent high end properties, I’ve taken advantage of redemptions at places like Point Grace Resort in Turks and Caicos and Wentworth Mansion in Charleston.
Grace Bay Beach, Turks and Caicos
Wentworth Mansion
Further suggesting that the Hyatt partnership with SLH is on the way out, Hilton has launched a new partnership with SLH.
Like the Hyatt-SLH partnership, this will mean earning and redemption for Honors members at participating (not all) Small Luxury Hotels of the World properties.
We don’t yet know any more details about the Hilton partnership, such as redemption pricing. However pricing-dependent this could be a huge boost to the luxury opportunities for Honors points, as it has been for Hyatt (and as Hyatt may no longer need given the Mr. and Mrs. Smith acquisition).
Let’s just hope that Hilton’s SLH partnership doesn’t involve having to pay a premium on regular paid nights in order to get Hilton points and/or other Hilton related benefits on rate plans that connect SLH with Hilton. And also let’s hope that Hilton doesn’t use this as an opportune excuse to devalue Hilton points following this tie-in.
It will be interesting to see what happens to existing Hyatt SLH points reservations when the partnership eventually dissolves. Will it be a hard or soft break?
Cheers.
I am not happy about this change as I used SLH properties for the vast majority of my Hyatt redemptions. With Hilton, I will probably need some exorbitant number of points and still be hit up for resort fees, breakfast, parking, etc.
Well, then again you will be earning gazillion more points with Hilton than you do with Hyatt and might even be better off 😉
The only item of import to me as a Hilton Honors LT Diamond is whether Hilton elite status will be fully recognized on SLR stays, and won’t be like stays at Mr. & Mrs Smith during their partnership with IHG when IHG points could be earned or redeemed but IHG One elite status was not recognized.
@DCS,
For the SLH partnership with Hyatt they honored a reduced level of Hyatt petks, and it is common across all levels. So Globallists fo not get full perks, for example.
Cheers.