"Chicago Seminars 2011" October 29 and 30 Registration Open
Seminar Registration is now CLOSED
Update September 29, 2011 With just 1 month until the big homecoming we have registered over 475 people for the biggest party in FF Land. The speakers are lined up and working on their presentations. Most of the volunteers are in place (see about 3 posts below for open spots to help out.) We have 8 sponsors kicking in to help with expenses and we expect another fun and educational event. Please note: As registration continues some of the seminars will be filling up and leave you with only one choice during any given time slot. If you are on the fence about joining us, sooner is probably better than later to get the seminars you want. Registration is going smoothly with some seminars getting close to full. There will not be a waiting list for this event. To all volunteers, potential volunteers, attendees and speakers: We will be onsite sometime in early September to handle final details with the hotel; RE: menu, shuttles, room setup, Halloween party, internet, display set up. Do we have a Chicago local interested in checking out an offsite dinner Saturday night? zippyonthego has expressed an interest in organizing something. PM her with your help. Halloween Decorations? Anybody got any? PM me. dlouise37, fti and all other computer geeks and pros: We will need somebody at each seminar to make sure the speakers Powerpoints load properly. Volunteers to help? Speakers get me your presentations asasp. What happened to our [B]T shirt Committee MiffSC is running that show. Pleae fill out her survey. SkiAdcock is handling the charity raffle PM her to donate or volunteer. toandfro is indeed bringing the apples? So much to do and so little time. Email me with things you have to suggest, volunteer or remind me about. [email protected] Get Ready for the Big Homecoming and volunteer or donate if you can. __________________ February 22, 2011 our first post about the Chicago Seminars 2011. This post #1 will again be our most effective way of communicating news and updates. Our dates are October 29th and 30th with two evening sessions on the 28th. You will only be able to register for the hotel through the links we will provide. All other reservations or award nights at the host or overflow hotel will be cancelled. The host hotel again is the Holiday Inn Elk Grove Village, and our one and only overflow hotel is the Holiday Inn and Suites O’Hare/ Rosemont. We have approximately 250 rooms available to start. Rates are comparable to last year and will include one or two breakfast coupons per day. The first night’s rate is NON refundable. Seminar registration this year will be $75. Why the increase? We added for online registration (hooray), money to fly in our speakers, and lunch and coffee breaks for both days are included in your registration. This event again is 100% non profit and an all volunteer effort. Any excess proceeds will be given to charity. Seminar Registration will also be NON refundable. There will be no waiting list and you will only be able to register through the online links provided. The areas of concern last year have been addressed to the best of our ability. 1. With the closer overflow hotel and the promise of more frequent and larger shuttles, transportation issues will be minimized. 2. The reception will be a cash bar and costume party (it is Halloween weekend) so there is no first occupant only issue. 3. The menu has been upgraded to include fresh fruit and oatmeal at breakfast and you all will enjoy his fresh Wisconsin apple with lunch. 4. The hotel has upgraded their entire internet system. We are still not sure if it will handle all of us, but they have promised enhanced performance. The Seminar Program has been set and posted in Post #4: See you in Chicago Ingy |
Hotel Registration Now OPEN
The Host Hotel Holiday Inn Elk Grove is already sold out but there are still plenty of rooms at the overflow hotel. When registering for your hotel room remember the first night is NON refundable and please use the same name and email address on your registration as you will be using for seminar registration. OverFlow Hotel Links Holiday Day Inn Rosemont/O'Hare Without Breakfast Enter Group Code FYN http://www.holidayinn.com/hotels/us/...&execute=basic With Breakfast Enter Group code FY1 http://www.holidayinn.com/hotels/us/...&execute=basic Thanks for all your cooperation. |
Seminar Registration is Now CLOSED
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Schedule:
Friday October 28th Early Bird Specials 7-8PM "Maximizing Delta miles and Delta award tickets – from SkyPesos to SkyGold" with Fti and ffi or "Technology Skills You Need To Know" with Dlouise37 Saturday October 29th Breakfast 8-9AM 9AM to 9:45 "Rookie Bootcamp" with Bikeguy 9:45 AM to 10 AM Coffee Break 10AM to 11:45 "Award Bookings" with Gleff or "Hyatt and PC" with Lucky 11:45 to 1:00Pm Lunch 1PM to 2:45 Priceline Bidding, Expedia BRG and Timeshare tips with GoMike or Lucky, SPG and UA Captain Denny Flanagan 2:45PM to 3PM Coffee Break 3PM to 5PM "Mileage Runs" with Lucky9876Coins or "Credit Cards and Amex MR" with Ingy Frugal Travel Guy and Brian Kelly thePointsGuy 5PM to 6PM Breakout Session for "Mileage Runs with Hands on Workshop" or "Meet the Speakers" 8:30PM to 10PM "Costumes and Cocktails" Sunday October 30th 8AM to 9 AM Breakfast 9AM to 10:45 Sponsors Workshop 10:45 to 11AM Coffee Break 11AM to 12:45 "Pudding and Pickles or Moderated Breakout Sessions on AA, DL, CO/UA, US, SPG, Hilton, Marriott, Priority Club 12:45PM to 2PM Lunch 2PM to 4PM "Cherry Pickin' with Beaubo and the BOSS" |
Volunteers:
We need registration help, Friday afternoon,, evening and Sat Morning Friday Afternoon: gsmart, deltagoldflyer, gpapodop Friday Evening:?? natebaumgart, jefftf1, sagy Saturday Morning:??? Aktchi, Braynes, fti The infamous "gopher position" has been accepted by legalalien for the weeknd. We are ever grateful for this offer on his behalf. Friday afternoon setup: zippyonthego, gpapodop and Sunday breakdown: dodger1K HELP??? Our Charity Raffle will be handled again by the fantastic: SkiAdcock Projector donations and operators: dlouise37 and fti T-Shirt Committee:Travelsavant and MiffSC And New this Year: Moderators for the Sunday Breakout Sessions. If you consider yourself an expert in any one program and want to lead a discussion group, send me your interest by PM Break Session Moderators: SPG: Basil K 15 year member Hilton ??? Marriott SkiAdcock Hyatt??? Other Hotel Programs??? United: Lucky9876coins US Airways and others: DCPatti, toomanybooks American ?????? Delta geoffco And We Need Apples Not anymore; to and fro will be bringing Wisconsin apples for your lunchtime enjoyment. It is amazing how working together we can solve last years issues. You go: to and fro |
Speaker Topics
Cliff Straton dlouise37 Friday eve "..An overview of technology related concepts, approaches and tools you can use to increase your efficiently at obtaining the information involved in our hobby. Dave Homyak (Bikeguy): "Questions asked to help newcomers develop a miles and points philosophy. Also covered will be tools and past successes." Gary Leff Award Booking: “How to identify the best value uses of your points, find award seats, and navigate the call with your mileage program to turn a ‘no’ into a ‘yes!’” Lucky Hyatt and PC:"Forget Priceline, I'll show you how hotel loyalty programs can be just as lucrative, if not more lucrative, than airline loyalty programs." GoMike "Advanced priceline hotel bidding techniques and how to take advantage of the timeshare market." Lucky9876Coins "How to identify mileage run fares of interest, how to construct and book a mileage run, how to maximize miles earned while minimizing costs, and comfort/efficiency of mileage runs considerations." Rick Ingersoll "The latest on the highest source of free miles around and how to keep your scores from suffering. Brian Kelly, ThePointsGuy: Mastering American Express Membership Rewards: Understanding Transfer Partners, Transfer bonuses and other tips and tricks to get the most bang for your points. Pudding Guy:A "coach-class perspective on how to maximize the value of miles & points." Beaubo (Steve Belkin): "The Mileage Game Value Proposition: Is It Still Worth It To Play? * The Thresholds Of When To Purchase Ticket Or Redeem Miles/Upgrades * Mileage Outsourcing: When Over-The-Pond Programs Offer Under-The-Radar Advantages" |
Sponsors: We are so pleased to have the following sites and firms sponsor our Seminars this year
AwardWallet Electric Wombats ExpertFlyer Frugal Travel Guy Blog Milepoint ITASoftware, (Google) The PointsGuy Blog Million Mile Secrets Blog If your firm or website is interested in presenting your site or service to 500+ travel crazies, drop me a PM |
Airline and Car Rental Discounts
We appreciate your business with American Airlines. A discount agreement has been completed and is valid 25OCT11 – 03NOV11 for travel to ORD. The Promotion Code you will need to give to your meeting attendees is 62H1BG. Please allow 1 hour for the code to be loaded for use onwww.AA.com. Your attendees will receive a 5% discount off the lowest applicable published air fare. Thank you for choosing American Airlines Group and Meeting Travel along with Avis Rent-A-Car to handle your meeting needs. American Airlines and Avis have joined together to provide the Meeting and Group industry with a unique partnership. Avis has assigned a specific discount number for your meeting. The Avis Worldwide Discount (AWD) Number is H800994. Please advise your attendees to use this AWD number when calling Avis directly at 1-888-754-8878 to receive the best possible car rental rates available. And a Big Thank you to MrPickles for getting these discounts for all of us |
Handles of registered attendees as of March 22 (alpha sort courtesy of gomike):
3LeftTurns 84fiero acker Airshadow Aktchi albert ALCARLOS Angust ArizonaGuy arollins arollins + 1 AS74 baliktad Barristan Beans Morocco berrenger blankeeta Blue Skye Bonesaz BUZZ4FLY BWItraveller carolinaaaflyer CDKing challett chemist661 cjares ckpeter Cliburn cmtrepp cmTrvlr64 ColonelWes CubsGirl dan6681. Daringdoo DBoy Dcpatti Dcpatti Dcpatti Dcpatti DealsRock DealsRock dkayford dlouise37 Dodger 1K dsw66 ehud eightblack. fanch26 FirstClassQueen Flying Firefly flyingforfun fotobaron fsa_ea FT: myc2004 MP: thefitworldtraveler fti FTNewbie731 gbtrotter geoffco GETITON gogogo888 goodeats21 gpapadop Greekquent Flyer GrizShel gsmart harry0233 hogo74 holycow4 JANIEGREENTHUMB jb831 jefftf1 jhflyer jmd001 johnmont JohnnieD kjvaughn KMA26 Knecht Lauterbrunnen Lauterbrunnen leemaj33. Lev. LoneTree lv2vl lyst Mainliner marykob mhnadel Middle_Seat miffSC monnyc Mr. Bob / Happyflier mrcol mrs palefire msp2anywhere mswtravels N/A nanny-york natebaum newhousejim Ngalliance nickfromct none OnScholarship ORD-TGU palefire paranoiatx ParisHelen Pat89339 PatBateman23 PatBateman23 +1 pnoeric pnoeric Poptarts richtravels Ronf rrw66 rubesl rustyr Scubaflyer seacarl seacarl_p1 need to set her up SeanPVD spectralflyer Spiffster stravels Sweet Willie Sylvie tamminh TexasYankee TheBagman thegrailer thegrailer +1 thnarf Thor3 tivolady tivolady. tmolta travelfree TRAVRLHOLICSCUBA tsangsh2002 u2fan UNITED863 unitedmark VandyBDL webby325 Weltall900 wfb worldtraveller2 yesletsski Ziron When considering a repeat of last year's event, of course we looked at other hotels in the ORD area. To forestall numerous comments I know are coming, we know about the Rosemont hotels and others along the Blue Line (such as the ORD Marriott) and we evaluated them. I visited the suitable ones that would give me an appointment. They ALL required ingy and/or me to sign a personal guarantee on the order of 70-80% of the room block cost plus anticipated food and beverage. Since we are looking at something like $65,000+ for this weekend, and we aren't making any money on this, we decided we would not take the risk. Furthermore, these other hotels: 1. Failed to return repeated phone calls. 2. Changed terms and conditions after we had negotiated things. 3. Changed weekend dates on us unilaterally when a better offer came along, then lied about it (a real pi$$er) 4. Wanted IMMENSE amounts of money for microphones, projectors, wi-fi, etc. 5. Switched sales reps on us so we had to explain everything all over again 6. Were going to cost 50% more 7. etc. The only hotel that would not make us sign a personal guarantee was the EGV Holiday Inn, because they know for certain we will completely fill their hotel in a few hours the way we did last time. Furthermore, they were very responsive to some of the improvements we wanted and willing to work with us. I'm confident the changes ingy negotiated with them will make this event better than last year's. |
Year of the Seminar Do's I can make this one now the date has been changed. I guess i better subscribe to daily digest so i dot overflow my inbox. Time off requested
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great news. calender marked, just waiting for details to register. :)
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Cool on vaction all that week!
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My vacation has been approved. Just waiting for hotel link. Will probably be flying in Thursday and leaving Monday. I heard last year some people received a tour of UA Ops, any chance something like that can be arranged for the Friday for anyone arriving early or those planning of skipping the Friday beginner overviews?
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What's the difference between this event and the Frequent Traveler University? (Other than $26..)
Are these affiliated events ? |
Originally Posted by izzik
(Post 15913878)
What's the difference between this event and the Frequent Traveler University? (Other than $26..)
Are these affiliated events ? |
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