I’m often struck by hotels that market their room decor, especially their beds, and I wonder whether it can really be a good business for them. The items are generally overpriced, and often not of as good quality as I’d want to buy for myself. And yet there’s still something that would appeal to me in owning a Westin Heavenly Bed ensemble. Turns out that selling hotel furnishings is a large and growing business. Westin expects to sell $8 million worth of bedding this year. It’s easy to buy a bed that you’ve already slept in and are comfortable with. You spend more time getting comfortable with hotel furniture than you would in a store. And hotel furnishings help bring back memories of a trip. Since introducing its Heavenly Bed five years ago, the Westin…
Thoughts and prayers
My thoughts are with the families of the two pilots who died in the crash of a Pinnacle Airlines regional jet Thursday night while repositioning the aircraft to Minneapolis.
Hyatt’s Promotion and Program Changes
Last week I reported that Hyatt would be bringing back its “Faster Free Nights” promotion — stay twice and pay with Mastercard and earn a free night. Details and registration are now available on the Gold Passport website. Hyatt has also posted upcoming changes to its program. They have eliminated the requirement of booking a three-night minimum for mid-week standard awards, have added flexibility in transferring points and awards between members, and changed the points-to-miles conversion ratio. These changes went into effect yesterday. In addition, beginning March 1, Hyatt will eliminate their 300 point bonus for flying a partner airline and limit the rates that are eligible for stay credit. An “Eligible Rate” is any hotel published room rate, including, but not limited to the hyatt.com rate, prevailing rack rate, AAA and senior citizen rates,…
Double Miles on Delta Amex
As I mentioned last month, the Delta American Express card is offering double miles on retail purchases (up to 10,000 bonus miles) from October 15 to November 15, 2004. Registration is required. Here’s yesterday’s press release.
Kayak.com
Samir passes along a new travel metasearch site, Kayak.com which is similar in many ways to SideStep and Mobissimo with a clean, user-friendly interface. You enter travel search criteria, it scours multiple travel providers, and collates the results. It isn’t a silver bullet tool but it’s definitely one to add to the arsenal (and to add to my How to Get the Best Airfare Deals FAQ when I get around to updating it). Like other similar sites, Kayak.com makes money on referral commissions for your purchases. Doesn’t bother me a whit, it’s a useful tool so well they should make something. Their partner list isn’t as extensive as Mobissimo’s, they don’t seem to include consolidators like OneTravel for instance in their searches, but they include more search parameters like including multiple airports so Kayak.com’s added…
Cheap Flights to New Zealand
Air New Zealand is offering November flights from Los Angeles to Sydney with a free stopover in Auckland for $699.
Another Reason Why TED is Inferior, Even When It Tries to Improve
United’s TED flights will be experimenting by offering DVD player and movie rentals. Passengers will rent the devices for $12 at the gate and return them at their destination. JetBlue offers free live satellite TV — meaning a whole lot more channels and choices compared to a single movie. Denver-based Frontier, a primary competitor of United, offers TV for $5. $12 makes United uncompetitive, especially when most business travelers won’t be able to seek reimbursement for the rental from their company.
$10/night Hotel Discount at Hotwire
Hotwire is offering $10 off per hotel night, up to 5 nights for new customers.
Startup Launched to Predict Airfare Prices
Hamlet, which asks: “To Buy Or Not To Buy” attempts to uncover algorithms that predict whether airline prices will go up or down and help consumers decide the right time to purchase their tickets. The early-stage company, which recently raised $1.5 million from Madrona Venture Group and WRF Capital, is trying to crack into the multibillion-dollar travel market with a technology that predicts the ever-fluctuating prices of airline tickets. The value of the service should be clear for any airline traveler who has paid $400 for a round-trip ticket, only to discover that the price dropped $100 the following day. If they had only waited, they could have saved some serious money on that trip to Honolulu or Houston. That’s where Hamlet comes in, informing travelers of the best time to buy. I don’t worry…
Redeeming Points for Medical Procedures
Some time ago I offered advice on what to do with a million American Express Membership Rewards points. At the time I didn’t realize that you could redeem points for an MRI!
