As revealed on Milepoint, word is that Hyatt has selected KenetMD which is made by Gilchrist & Soames. I haven’t ever heard of KenetMD but apparently their narrative is a product produced by a dermatologist, scientific approach to skincare or some such. I look forward to trying it out. Back in May there was discussion of Hyatt’s plans to dump Portico, and goodness knows it won’t come soon enough. I like ginger but their ‘white ginger’ smell doesn’t cut it for me, and my wife tells me that many other hotel products work better for her. I rather hoped for L’Occitane, with Hilton rather going upmarket and all with Peter Thomas Roth, but perhaps these new bath amentiies will prove to be worth the search that went into them. I don’t know the timeframe for…
Starwood and Hyatt Announce Their Fall Promotions
I previously wrote about Marriott’s and Priority Club’s fall promotions, and have been impatiently waiting to see what the other major chains had in store. Starwood’s fall promotion is triple points on stays which include a Thursday or Sunday night (double points on all other stays). The promo runs September 6 through December 18, and registration will become available by the 6th of September. The fact that there’s a long list of properties where you won’t be eligible to earn the bonus suggests that hotels aren’t looking to incentivize additional heads in beds, they’re pretty full with high rates and don’t feel like they need to spend broadly to fill up. Which also likely explains why Hyatt’s new promotion isn’t nearly as valuable as some were expecting or hoping (including me). Hyatt has announced their…
New DOT Consumer Protection Rules Are Virtually Meaningless
New Department of Transportation ‘consumer protection’ rules went into effect on Tuesday, and they don’t amount to much — mostly codifying practices that are already in place, and imposing penalties for things airlines rarely do. A very small number of people will be better off, others will be worse off. Kathleen Pender of the San Francisco Chronicle quotes my bottom line: the rules “won’t change the travel experience for the vast majority of passengers,” says Gary Leff, co-founder of Milepoint.com Major components of the new rules are: Airlines will be required to disclose more of their fees clearly on their websites. I struggle to find many examples of airlines that don’t already do this. Besides, while transparency is appealing it’s not clear that greater information influences consumer behavior, travel is complicated already and it’s not…
Hitler Expresses His Frustrations with the Star Mega DO
The Star Mega DO is approaching in a couple of weeks, it really is likely to be a truly special, amazing, once (or three times?) in a lifetime experience. But it’s quite a lot of effort to put together a charter flight, get everyone on the trip Hyatt Diamond status, coordinate flight simulator time with United, work with Hyatt on a series of receptions, get tours of aircraft facilities, set up buses, etc. And communicate all of the relevant details to folks coming on the trip. So there are always going to be folks who are a bit concerned about some of the details, lots of questions get posted over at Milepoint in the discussion thread for the event. And though it’s incredibly inside baseball, I thought it worth passing along a video mashup that…
My Million Mile Secrets Interview
Million Mile Secrets interviews me. An excerpt: It’s cliché to say that we shouldn’t take this all too seriously, but I disagree: I’m passionate about miles and points. I practice full contact loyalty. I love these programs. I think they offer a tremendous value proposition, and for all of their success I think they’re still widely misunderstood (perhaps because they’re so complicated, though therein lies the true opportunity). I do my best to honor those programs that work well – for the travel providers and for the consumer, and to criticize those that I think are missing the boat. Properly understood, the relationship is win-win and for my part my entire worldview has been changed by these programs, I see the world as much smaller and more accessible and I experience the world in a…
American Finally Announces Changes to their Million Miler Status Program
Though speculation has been rampant over the past couple of years, it became clear by April that American was on the verge of changing its uber-generous million mile status qualification program. At the Randy Petersen Travel Executive Summit in April, the President of AAdvantage confirmed that they were looking at changes and promised that there would be advance notice. And indeed they’re giving us 3+ months of notice. For years, American has offered lifetime elite status based on all of the miles you earn in their program. In contrast, every other airline offering million mile recognition only counts those miles earned by actually flying. As a result, and though I am not a frequent American Airlines flight customer, I’m a 2-million miler and have lifetime Platinum status. Historically, American has offered: Lifetime Gold at 1…
The Value Proposition of the US Airways Grand Slam Promotion
Several days ago I shared some details of the upcoming US Airways Grand Slam promotion which offers bonus miles for qualifying activities with their partners. Deals We Like has an excellent summary of what the promotion actually looks like. I had been afraid that only elites would be able to qualify for the traditional highest bonus of 100,000 miles, and also that that highest bonus would require more partner activity than in the past (40 rather than 36 ‘hits’). Instead it’s more or less the standard Grand Slam offer of 100,000 miles for 36 partner activities plus an extra opportunity for an additional 10,000 miles when hitting 40 activities, if you’re a US Airways elite member. Now, since various bonus point thresholds actually offer miles towards elite status, and the 10,000 miles towards elite status…
Improvements Coming to United’s (Mostly Continental’s) Inflight Product
Wandering Aramean outlines planned actual improvements to United’s inflight product. I previously reported that United would keep economy plus after its integration with Continental, and that the Continental fleet would be getting economy plus starting in 2012. Seth reports that the timetable is being moved up: The company expects to see the E+seats on 38 Continental aircraft before the end of the year. Based on some information received from other sources it is quite possible that these first Economy Plus aircraft will be 757-300s or 737-800s. …By the end of Q1 2012 the company expects to have 100 Continental aircraft equipped with Economy Plus seats. That number will include 29 Bombardier Q400 commuter turbo-prop aircraft which will be equipped with both a first class and economy plus section. Back in May I noted that United…
Details Begin to Emerge on US Airways Grand Slam Promotion
Mommy Points details the upcoming US Airways ‘Grand Slam’ promotion. You can’t register for it yet, but the offer’s FAQ page is up. The offer will run from September 14 through November 14, and will eventually be detailed (with registration available) at usairways.com/grandslam. This annual promo stretches a baseball analogy where various partner activities are considered ‘hits’ and the more hits you accumulate, the more bonus miles you earn. For instance, 4 ‘hits’ earns 3000 bonus miles while 8 hits earns an additional 7,000 bonus miles (on top of the 3000 that were earned after 4 hits had been completed). So 8 partner activities is 10,000 bonus miles. Lots of folks will start to figure out the cheapest ways to get eligible partner activities, and I’ll certainly report on several of those here. If you…
National Car Rental Status Match Offer
Earlier in the week I detailed National Car Rental’s new “One, Two, Free” promo — rent twice (mid-size or larger, two day minimum) and get a free rental day which is running through January 31. Several other bloggers have subsequently noted that National is also offering to status match you if you have elite status in another car rental program. That’s a unique departure from past practice in the car rental industry — airline and hotel status matching has been a long-standing practice but car rental companies haven’t routinely done it. As I observed in my earlier post, at the base signup level I like National better than the other car rental firms because of their ‘Emerald Aisle’ (choose your own car) concept. But I don’t make National my own rental company of choice because…
