<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by cigarman:
Holiday Inn today is offering to SELL gold status for $50 a year! How sad, and pathetic. Their program was terrible BEFORE, not it's just a joke. 
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I actually think it's a brilliant marketing move:
You create a gold level that doesn't give you anything other than 10% point discount and dedicated phone line, and charge money for getting to this level.
If you want to spend 50$ for nothing, you are very welcome.
Once you spent the money you'll more likely stay at the HI hotels to justify your expense!