Mileage Run Discussion - What is considered a good cents/mile ratio?

Title says it all. If we had a bell curve, where would $.05/mi fall? It seems that $.05/mi is a threshold below which itineraries become much scarcer.

Has anyone ever gotten anything below $.04/mi?

depends...
I personally have gotton < 2 cpm :D
but these deals are hard to find....

5 cpm will probably be considered high... but if you want to do an MR in the end of the year to keep your status, 5 cpm probably will be good. In general, people try to do 3 <= cpm <= 2 My MR typically falls between 2 and 2.5 cpm

If you can achieve < 2 cpm, then good for you ^

Less than 3 cents? Wow. Granted, I haven't been savvy to the whole MR thing for long, but I have not seen anything for less than 4cpm. I guess I should search harder.

As beamMeUp38 said at the end of the year when it means making status or missing it, costs go up and 5C/EQM isn't so bad. Then it's more about how much reaching that goal is worth, what's out there from your area, and how much time and flexibility you have.

In general the earlier you're going on a MR, with the exception of making a two years of status for one year's EQM MR, the less most FTers will spend.

If RDM is your primary goal, then it depends on when you need the RDM available and how much having that RDM in time for the desired award travel will save you. Also, the higher your elite status, the more bonus miles you get, making your cost/RDM less.

Here's where you can find some more opinions on the subject:

What price/mile ratio consitutes a good MR? (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=692209&highlight=mr+3cpm)

Deciding if I should pull the trigger on this MR... (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?p=7094015#post7094015)

For real mileage runs, mine have been at 3 cents/mile or less, before bonuses. Best was around 1.5 cents/mile.

For mixed mileage/vacations, I go to 5 cents/mile or so for the air part.

However, I'm not seeing those sorts of targets as feasible next year based on several factors: price of fuel, "surcharges", and better real time control of ppm anomolies/mistakes by the larger players... ( probably through better edit checks in the data entry forms + robotic monitoring of things like farecompare's data warehouse vs current pricing. )

I'm doing a couple of runs in Dec (one starts tomorrow), where the flight portion is about $.03/bis mile. There are a ton of bonus miles, so it will be less than $.02 for all miles.

Early this year, I did a MR to complete a challenge. Since it had a limited time frame, and I wanted to get the whole thing done with at once, I was closer to $.05/bis mile....but was in F the whole trip.

3 cents per eqm used to be the well recognized good/not good line. Lots of the experts would get better than that and some of those can still be found once in a while. But I've not come across many lately (far from an expert).

I did just grab one at 3.6 but that is a mixed trip. Have 2 days off I must use before end of March and travelpartner can't go in January. So was limited and feel I got a good deal.

For trips where I want to go I pay whats available but try to keep it 5c/eqm or less. Certainly didnt do that this year on some that were greater than 10 but I try.

Shoot for 3 and then check what you find with how you're using it. Some value can be added even for getting a dinner in some restaurant or city you've not been before.

Its all about personal value.

My personal value is 3.3cpm at the very most, usually closer to 3.

It's important to distinguish between EQM CPM and RDM CPM. Of the many motivations for flying, status gain frequently looms large for most, therefore EQM costs are most important. My EQM runs typically flow at ~3.0 to ~3.5 but my RDM costs come in as low as 1.7 due to bonuses. For some, RDM is the important metric. Pretty easy to talk apples and oranges as people's status varies for bonuses.....

I am only concerned about cents per EQM. I didn't know anyone did mileage runs for regular FF miles (I'm assuming that's what "RDM" means). It's so easy to get endless miles through daily life without ever flying. But the EQM is what would justify a MR.

I am only concerned about cents per EQM. I didn't know anyone did mileage runs for regular FF miles (I'm assuming that's what "RDM" means). It's so easy to get endless miles through daily life without ever flying. But the EQM is what would justify a MR.

Meet someone who flies for RDM. I just do enough EQM each year to maintain status for the 100% bonus, shooting for lifetime Platinum.

2006 I achieved the enviable $0.0100/RDM average for the year.
2007 I will achieve the still admirable $0.0150/RDM average for the year.

And I enjoyed a 33-day vacation to NRT, HKG, MEL, SYD, ZQN and AKL in business class for just 150k, so I think I'm doing pretty okay at this.

Steve

This thread is getting me depressed.
Over here, it's virtually impossible to find anything below 5c per EQM. And that's €0.05 not $0.05. :(

This thread is getting me depressed.
Over here, it's virtually impossible to find anything below 5c per EQM. And that's €0.05 not $0.05. :(
Sounds like you need to buy your tickets for MRs on the SkyTeam partners over here and fly here, do your MRs, and fly home.

Sounds like you need to buy your tickets for MRs on the SkyTeam partners over here and fly here, do your MRs, and fly home.

That idea would almost be good if I didn't have to make a special trip to London, go through a personal interview at the US embassy, and pay a stupid amount of money for a visa.

That idea would almost be good if I didn't have to make a special trip to London, go through a personal interview at the US embassy, and pay a stupid amount of money for a visa.I guess we don't have a strong enough international lobby here at FT. We need MR exemptions to C&I laws, so long as we don't leave the airport(s)!

Ah...
My above post regarding < 2 cpm was for RDM CPM.
Like lucky my EQM CPM has been around 3-ish; sometimes 4, depending on the purpose of the trip. While it is accomplishing to achieve low cpm per trip, you also need to factor in time you need to spend traveling and comfort. If my trip has multiple purposes, such as stopping at a city to visit a friend, I would not mind going up to 5 cpm.
For MR purposes, my goal is usually low cpm with low traveling time preferred if two different itineraries has approximately the same cpm. I, from time to time, got greedy and picked some routing that was just ridiculous, and ended up kicking myself. Remember, it is good to bounce around and get those 500 minimum, but more bouncing also means more things could go wrong (or more bumping ;)), it is always good to plan for an escape routing when you do your MR planning.

It's important to distinguish between EQM CPM and RDM CPM. Of the many motivations for flying, status gain frequently looms large for most, therefore EQM costs are most important. My EQM runs typically flow at ~3.0 to ~3.5 but my RDM costs come in as low as 1.7 due to bonuses. For some, RDM is the important metric. Pretty easy to talk apples and oranges as people's status varies for bonuses.....

I am only concerned about cents per EQM. I didn't know anyone did mileage runs for regular FF miles (I'm assuming that's what "RDM" means). It's so easy to get endless miles through daily life without ever flying. But the EQM is what would justify a MR.

Try adding on extra legs to your trip or choose an unusual routing.

Example: instead of flying SFO-LAS non-stop for $65, try SFO-LAX-LAS for $75. An extra $10 yields and extra 500 miles (2 cpm). The overall trip is a whopping 7.5 cpm, so it's not a mileage run. But it's a good way to pad your mileage account.

Two things that have not been mentioned are the carrier and the starting location. Certain airlines are a whole lot cheaper to fly than others and some lacations are a whole lot cheaper to start from than others.

Another consideration is time. For those of us that work for a living the number of days and the days of the week available for MRing are critical. In my case I could almost always save a few bucks by including redeyes in a MR but if I do I have to take the next day off work because I cannot sleep on a plane.

I'm doing a couple of runs in Dec (one starts tomorrow), where the flight portion is about $.03/bis mile. There are a ton of bonus miles, so it will be less than $.02 for all miles.

Early this year, I did a MR to complete a challenge. Since it had a limited time frame, and I wanted to get the whole thing done with at once, I was closer to $.05/bis mile....but was in F the whole trip.

I find this incredulous. Teach us your tricks

I'm happy with anything less than 4c per EQM. I could probably do better, but the added stress of multiple connections is usually not worth the additional miles to me.

(Although there are exceptions. I'm considering a LAS-LAX-SEA-PDX-EUG-RDM run. After a couple of those I should be eligible for a Horizon Air pension. :) )