“Bonvoy?” New Plans for SPG/Marriott Rewards Program Leaked
Jeff Edwards November 26, 2018
Marriott Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest loyalty programs have more or less operated under the umbrella of Marriott Rewards since early this summer. The combined program’s new name and elite status tiers aren’t due to be announced until next year, but the yet to be unveiled “Bonvoy” loyalty program went live briefly online, giving some members a glimpse of the future.
Starting this summer, the Starwood Preferred Guest loyalty program has been slowly folded into the Marriott Rewards program, but the hospitality giant has promised that an updated post-consolidation program with a new name would be unveiled early next year. There were some hints to the new reward program’s name and elite status levels in trademark protection filings submitted by Marriott, but now it seems the company has stepped on its own big reveal after briefly going live with the program on its websites.
A Loyalty Lobby report, complete with screen shots of the brand new loyalty scheme, indicates that the new combined rewards program will almost certainly be named “Marriott Bonvoy.” More than just rebranding, it appears that the new loyalty program will have seven newly organized status levels. Like the current Marriott Rewards system, the elite tiers are named after precious metals, but soon, top status members will be trading in their Platinum and Platinum with Ambassador Status for newly minted “Titanium Elite” and “Ambassador Elite” status.
Calls to Marriott International were not immediately returned, but so far, the company has not publicly disavowed the inadvertently leaked details of the new Bonvoy rewards program. This isn’t the first time Marriott has “accidentally” leaked plans for changes to the loyalty programs it controls. In some cases, the leaks were trial balloons for enhancements that never came to pass, but other times, the changes including the details of combining of the SPG and Marriott Rewards programs unfolded exactly as forecast. In this case, it appears travelers will have to wait until after the holidays to see for certain what is in this particular gift-wrapped package.
[Photo: Shutterstock]
Whatever it is called, the program will be inferior to SPG.
There is no way Bonvoy can be the name. This is the problem with legalizing Marijuana in the US. All these executives smoking weed together at loyalty program naming meetings.
Stupidest name ever. Pretty obvious that a bunch of clueless millennials are making decisions there.
That name is atrocious.
Gag me with a spoon its bad enough to be called a "Globalist" at Hyatt