Originally Posted by
William Fikes
Welcome to Flyertalk! It really depends on the number of stays/nights, class ($$) of hotels, ans other factors. It pays to join multiple programs since the programs are free. That way you can decide which prgram you wany as your main choice, but can also take advantage of special promotions in the other programs as well.
I totally agree on this one - there is no membership fee and it gives you an opportunity to try out several if frequent travel is new to you.
I ultimately settled on Starwood both because I really like their hotels (primarily the Westin brand) and because I find their rooms to be the most comfortable of all of the big 'chains' - but some people find other amenities to be more important than comfort-while-sleeping, so do a bit of experimenting.
One thing I will recommend - purely from a points perspective - is to get whatever hotel program's credit card is offered if you're going to become a VIP-level guest. Not only do you rack up ridiculous amounts of points, but I find that I get extra accommodation upgrades and other unpublished 'perks' when I charge my stays to that card. Have been platinum with Starwood for just over a year now and have almost 90k points racked up between stays and putting the stays on their branded AMEX.