Best advice. It's bargain week at the airport area hotels. Worth getting to the threshold. Was going to push for Titanium this year, but recently could not even get a coffee at a recent Autograph Collection hotel.

What am I missing here???

The benefits of UA Premier Silver, if you would not have otherwise had them.

The expectation that full Marriott Bonv°y Titanium Elite benefits will be restored someday, perhaps while we still have status.

The speculation on my part about the possible restoration of new qualifications for Lifetime Titanium Elite, perhaps requiring 10 years in that status and 1,000 nights.

Not all hotels offer crappy benefits. I stayed at 5 different Marriott hotels across Canada this summer and got full restaurant breakfast at all of them. There was a 6th property I was supposed to go to, but cancelled my reservation when I found out about the brown bag breakfast.

I hope youy informed the hotel why you were cancelling the booking? As a public service, you should name and shame that hotel right here

Residence Inn Gravenhurst (north of Toronto). I don’t think too many people want to go there. :)

Sounds like a pretty grave property...

- However, there is a good chance that a cheap airport hotel would have a mediocre breakfast. This Aug I did stay one night in Courtyard Dulles Airport Herndon on a rate that included breakfast. I was given a brown bag with a small (100 ml?) apple juice, small prepackaged muffin of the cheapest supermarket kind, and a banana. I was also told to prepare coffee in my room using the coffeemaker there. But Westin Hilton Head provided nice hot breakfast at the restaurant and so was Westin Cozumel.
Coming back to the initial question, I would probably do a mattress run of a few nights to get PLT but not for the 5 suite rewards. I am lifetime Titanium with 74 nights right now and 3 more nights booked with Sheraton till the year end. Rest 7 nights are with Hilton because they still run a promotion.

Autograph hotel. Keurig pods removed from the rooms. Staff couldn't locate any at front desk, all restaurant facilities were closed down. I get that there is no symmetry between hotels and lounge access, but basic food perks are so vastly different between properties and even within the same brand. Expectations between a Fairfield and an Autograph are of course slightly different - just think there should be a little consistency amongst the brands.

Which Autograph is this?

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I have 47 nights this year. I am done travelling for work and for fun. Some Marriott hotels in my are are for $75/ night tax-in. So $225 to get 5 suites or 5 elite nights.

Is it worth it mattress running 3 night/$225 for 5 suite nights? My business travel will be severely curtailed next year as well so I may take the elite-night credits instead. But I will probably take a vacation for a month so suite awards may be handy.

On the other hand, platinum perks like lounge, breakfast, upgrades with Marriott will be like 2020. There is no rationale for high end hotels to offer platinum amenities like cocktails and food and full service breakfast when their house is @ 15% and most of that is OTA bookings. And TBH the lounges in Northern North America are awful, including the ones that try to be nice. These hotels are struggling and they're pivoting to volume over high-yield stays, because that traffic is gone and not coming back for a while, if forever. So I may as well stay at a self-service hotel like most Marriotts and 4points+aloft, where SNA are of no use.

But 5 elite nights seems like way lower value to the suites. But also $225 in my pocket can get me 1-2 nights somewhere. 4-5 if I really game it.

Also, if I get 50 nights this year, that counts as another platinum year for lifetime purposes?

TBH I don't think I'll go for 50.

expedia rewards has been VERY rewarding for me this year. very very good program and a huge competitive threat (but also maybe an opportunity?) to hotel chains. this is an understated threat while airbnb is an overstated one imo. i'm a marriott plat and had a year to philander around and it has been very nice.

Be careful when choosing elite nights. IIRC they always count for the year in which the choice benefit is earned, namely 2020 in this case, which would put you at Plat with 55 nights.

50 nights achieved. Which would you choose in the current environment. 5 nights or 5 SNA's and why?
Happy Holidays. Would really like Marriott to make some progress with lounge access in whatever diluted form as an incentive towards shooting for Titanium.

I would just pick 5 SNA since 5 elite nights appears to be less valuable unless you are close to lifetime.

as for making progress on lounge access, are you saying Marriott should scrap platinum lounge access and make it for titaniums and above? If that happens, there will be pitch forks out on FT even before they make that kind of announcement :p.

I would say a good trade off is full breakfast instead of platinum lounge access but I’m in the (very) minority.