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| Zagreb, Croatia. See Yomadic story link below |
BURN, BURN, BURN
After Marriott’s devaluation, I tweeted “Breaking News! Marriott super sucky loyalty program is becoming even suckier!”. Dear readers, I believe we are in a sea change in the loyalty rewards industry and we are seeing the beginning of the end! Of course the “end is near” is much nearer with the airlines after the latest developments. Hotels will follow most likely but in a slower pace. I hope I am wrong…I am going “free agent” mode in 2013, burn miles or pay the cheapest tickets flying domestically and burn miles internationally! See MVP post of the day below!
I also finally continued putting together my family trip to Canada (Fairmonts at Banff Springs and Lake Louise). I had 7 nights already booked. I thought about the idea on riding the Amtrak train but decided it would add too much time. We may not have two full weeks after the latest developments in our household. Therefore, I decided to at least knock out the one way tickets to Calgary YYC. For entertainment purposes, I found 4 seats at Delta at only 40k miles each! AA miles would requrire routing through Dallas, so scratch that. So, I went again with reliable United miles. Detroit to Chicago to Calgary 12.5k miles each plus $5. Connection in Chicago only 45 minutes, hope we make it! Getting into Calgary at 11 pm. Staying at the Hilton Garden Inn Airport on a free night cert I won in a contetst that expires just a week later! We are not sure if we can do the drive to Vancouver and return from there…#developing. I feel better I burned 50k miles, I suggest you all do so too!
MVP POST OF THE DAY
Everyone in this hobby should read this post at the Gate “Frequent Travel, Miles and Points: Time to Give Up“. I absolutely agree with the sentiment. We have entered a true New Normal. To all new in the hobby: You are geting in it late in the game!
Burn, burn, burn!!
THE REST OF THE POST
Okay, back to the old groove.
Macrowold of Bali. I have NEVER seen anything like these creatures shown here, WOW! Gadling
Nate at Yomadic does it again. “Stunning Communist Architecture – The Brutalism of New Zagreb, Croatia“.
The Wandering Aramean wrote “The vast awesomeness of Istanbul’s Basilica Cistern“. I had the exact same reaction about this place. Must visit!
Namimbian Nights short video. I love this and the music that goes with it.
A fun short story at Airline Biz blog of the Dallas News about the AA-US merger website. Ends with “We’ve now been talking about this possible merger for more than a year. We may register decideforgawdsake.com. Getonwithitalready.com is taken.” – Lol!
Did FTG’s churning challenge involve staying at a hotel during a month that it is closed?
why yes, yes it did
At least some disclosures were added! Why bother with the dates & dollar amounts…keeping it positive:-)
(Note: This is a sample itinerary only. We haven’t checked award availability to ensure that these dates are open.)
(Note: The airline value is based on the cheapest available seats found using ITA Matrix for the dates in the sample itinerary with a starting point of Chicago. The hotel value is based on a standard-room on Tuesday-Sunday dates in September, as the Vedema currently doesn’t show availability beyond October 1.)
I wonder if all the calling out of that on boards he stalks and can’t censor (FT, TBB) had anything to do with that?
Complete coincidence I bet 🙂
You don’t sound angry to me:-)
I’m looking forward to TPG’s next installment of Visa Signat….. er, sorry – I mean Wine Wednesdays
There has been substantial improvement in reduction of eye socket attacks…We shall see:-)
Actually none this week, but that’s only because there were no Visa Sig hotels wherever his post was about.
He still managed to slip in an inferior US Airways link among all barrage of CC’s found in his top 10 list
He changed it to the correct link to his credit.
Yeah, he does that a lot
This is no less than the 3rd time in the past few weeks I’ve seen him called out on putting the inferior link, and then apologizing for the “oversight”
It’s amazing how Gary, MMS or Frequent Miler never “accidentally” putting inferior links in
As I read “Burn! Burn! Burn!” and then through the linked post, I could not stop thinking about two comparisons – the stock market hysteria with the idea of buying when everyone is trying to sell as well as “Who Moved My Cheese?” book.
The game is changing. No questions asked. In my mind, the hotel programs were never that great of a deal with their complexities of dozens of tiers and hugely different point values. So I never jumped into that game. I finally did the Club Carlson promos last Spring and been enjoying my 150,000+ points.
This spring I am taking my parents to Europe for free using United miles/Chase UR points and we have applied for a few hotel cards to get them free rooms close to the main attractions. Now that we have the points, my head is about to explode trying to figure out how to use them (not even how to BEST use them). Screw that!
But when it comes to airline travel, I still think there is plenty of value in the programs. Sure, the Cheese is moving. It ain’t the old days folks. If some are willing to get out of the game (which I highly doubt – forum talk is cheap!) then it will open up more availability for me! I am ok with that.
It really comes down to someone’s expectations (the Cheese). I don’t get excited by F or J travels. I have flown on business jets before, so the hype reviews of first class and lounges just make me smirk. What I do care is getting enough legroom (I am 6’8″) and a bit more courtesy by flying in J. Sure it is no longer free to get those miles. I spent about $300 on oVs at OD and converting them to VRs in order to get enough miles to book in J. But it was worth it because otherwise I would of spent those same $300 on buying E+ seats across the pond.
Sure the game is harder, but we can still play. It will not longer be a free J ticket, but even if I just buy up VRs at 1pt per $1, that will come out to about $800 in fees for a J ticket. A price I would pay anyways for an economy ticket but I will fly in J instead (oh and tack on 5-6 stops onto my itinerary instead of a simple round trip).
I’ll keep following the Cheese.
The game IS getting harder and I think the pace will continue and likely accelerate! Of course there is still value as you indicate…so we will still play. But if the trend continues…just not looking good at all!
You should get into the hotel game, lots of value there still even with the (slower) devaluation pace.
Thanks for taking the time to comment!