While this goes somewhat towards addressing my complaints about HH, I think they are being too greedy and unrealistic. Even if one spends $400/stay on average, you will need to do 25 stays to get Diamond. They are not getting this business traveler to do it. I don't know of any business travelers that can justify sustained expenses like that for that many stays and still have job security. I would say the number of people that do it this way are negligible.

HH is still targetted towards frequent $60/night HI customers. $1680 HI Diamond vs. $10,000 high-rollers.

The Gold level requirement is laughable given people can essentially get it for free if you have any status on most airlines even if they do not handily give it away and the compliance at the Gold level is iffy.

The only result of this is to make people who would have spent it anyway feel better.