I wonder if the current economy has anything to do with decisions to comp status on a limited promotions. Generally speaking (for my industry, at least) the fastest buck is made from one's own customer base. Elites make up the hotel industry's customer base - based on past performance, they can project that elites will occupy "X" number of rooms per quarter. If room occupancy is not "on projection", one way to make up for it is to recruit someone else's customer base (elites).
If the Hilton Fast Track to Gold promotion did indeed go out to a targeted audience - elites from other loyalty programs - (and then happily make it's way to FT )that may be what is happening - a reaction to the economy and needing to beef-up room occupancy.

Here in Dallas, commercial For Lease signs are popping up. There have been layoffs (XO, Lucent, etc.), Office Depot has discontinued 1200 SKU's.....there are many signs that business is not wonderful.

Just trying to "look at the problem from 24,000 feet" and see if there is a bigger picture.

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