ehallison

But people actually do leave. My husband and I were completely loyal to AA for many years. He did some (looking back on it) crazy stupid stuff to keep his status - more expensive or less convenient flights, an end-of-year mileage run if the year came up short, etc. When they gutted the program, he was done. In the last 18 months he's chosen flights based completely on the best cost/convenience combination. We've both flown United, Southwest, Jetblue, and Alaska as much as AA. It's been liberating. Perhaps Marriott's changes will also liberate us. (I hope not).

kaizen7

I would like to see that as well
Starriott now have more high end type hotels, I would say $$$ based requirements will encourage more stays at those St Regises Ritz Carltons Autograph Collections and Luxury Collections hotel

RogerD408

Yes, the Kool Aid does wear off! Experiencing more aspects of life can be refreshing. Shifting focus to what you are doing vs how you are doing it is much more rewarding. The days of the journey being more important than the destination should be coming to an end. Go, Enjoy, repeat.

hockeyinsider

Be careful what you wish for. $20,000 is entirely arbitrary, especially for a global hotelier with prices that vary significantly depending on the region of the world.

hockeyinsider

If Marriott extends, as expected, the breakfast benefit for top-level elites to include Ritz-Carlton properties and resort-designated properties then I suspect it's because of competition from Airbnb. Between resort fees and per person breakfast charges, it is often a much better value for families to stay at an Airbnb than to stay at a resort-designated hotel.

Of course, the advantage that Marriott has its the crony-capitalist industry groups and quasi-government tourism bureaus are against mostly against Airbnb (or similar services) because taxes that hotels charge aren't always collected by Airbnb.

It's frankly absurd that it has taken this long for Marriott to extend the breakfast benefit. While many hotels still offer ŕ la carte breakfast menus they really push guests toward the buffet in part because breakfast buffets are one of the most profitable food services a hotel can offer. Think about it. Guests typically pay between $15 and $40 for some eggs, bacon, pancakes, maybe an omelette cooked by someone dressed up as a chef, and both cold and hot cereal. Oh yeah, there's water, some cheap coffee, and sugary juice. Plus, buffets are mostly self-serve so labor costs are slightly reduced.

CJKatl

What is the basis for the wild claim that this number is arbitrary? Or is that a baseless - or arbitrary - statement?

Marriott has tons of data on what people spend, what profit is made at what spend level and activity and what each perks cost. They gave departments full of people doing research and making decisions, billions of dollars to spend on that research and like most corporations likely have meeting after meeting with tons of people before making a decision. From all appearances Marriott has been slow and methodical in planning this merger.

So let me get this straight, there is no proof that this is an arbitrary number but some guy without any of the pertinent information says on the Internet that the decision is arbitrary and expects to be believed? Nah.

CJKatl

OT, but it seems you don't know this...

Marriott T&Cs only allow you to get credit for one room a night. If I reserve three rooms in one reservation, I'll get the points for all but credit for one night only. Due to how we get reimbursed, though, every so often I reserve two rooms separately so that the other person will have his/her own bill to submit. In this case, credit is almost always given for each reservation, a total of two nights, even though it shouldn't. I've pointed this out to Marriott and they know it's wrong, but don't change it. I'm LTP, so it really does not matter but I know that some others in my company have had the same thing happen. So if you want to get credit for additional nights making individual reservations instead of a single multi-room reservation might work.

aaupgrade

I kind of did the same thing, but with the airlines you don't actually have to leave the airline who changed their program. In my case I just switched to BA for status, which is much easier to obtain as long as you are able to fly 4 BA or IB flights each year. I still fly AA, as a matter of fact I'm doing so to Sydney as their J is better than QF's. I really like OW RTW products much better than *A or ST as their unlimited mileage Continent based pricing works much better for me than *A and ST mileage based pricing.

Now if Marriott were to make changes I was unhappy with, I would probably just go with the best property and lounge (if desired) for my $. I had to change plans last minute for my upcoming trip to Sydney and the Marriott price was high for my new dates and at first Pier One Sydney Harbour, Autograph Collection was sold out. So I looked at Shangri-La and Four Seasons and surprisingly I could get both those hotels with lounge access for about the same as what Marriott was quoting at the time, so this was my fallback plan. A few days later rooms opened up at Pier One, so I'm staying there instead. No lounge, but breakfast is included and I've been meaning to try this property, so all is well. The point I'm trying to make, is there are some nice hotels out there that have competitive prices in the cities I frequent, and in the case of Shangri-La I can always credit to my Golden Circle account. I could also use Priceline for 5* hotels too, but I would want to do a bit of research on that before diving in.

FWIW, I'm not a AirBNB or VRBO type of guy but understand its appeal to others.

In all likelihood the changes that they announce on Monday will not be so draconian that it will necessitate major changes. While there may be minor tweaks in my stay paradigm, I doubt there will be drastic changes. Time will tell.

hockeyinsider

Because it seems to be entirely arbitrary.

As of 2014, Marriott's average nightly room rate in North America was $130. If you did 100 nights at $130, that's $13,000.

From everything I have ever read, Marriott's heretofore unpublished sub-status -- platinum premier -- wasn't awarded without at least 125 nights per year.

Dropping the threshold to 100 nights when 100 nights at the average nightly room rate is unlikely to meet a threshold of $20,000 would seem to be the definition of arbitrary.

pinniped

The interesting tidbit I always seem to pick up from the limited public statements these companies make is that the $130 guest is probably more profitable than the $250 guest. The $130 person is frequenting the limited-service brands, which have excellent margins. The $250 person is frequenting full-service city hotels that often struggle to post strong numbers.

Maybe the shiniest metal should go to the road warrior who is spending $100/nt at the Fairfield Inn in Smalltown USA. They're probably doing the biggest purposeful "buy up" to stay with Marriott (vs. the many much-cheaper roadside motels).

<Insert sound of Flyertalkers' heads exploding here...>

CPRich

OT - you really should reset your posts per page to avoid needless paging - this is 10 pages for me.

pinniped

read unless you have an bunch of free time on your hands to go through all 10 pages.

This one blew up fast. There are whole pages in the middle that I now haven't read.

itsallgood

That's what I'd do. Toss out a list of items, some completely correct and others that aren't planned to judge public reaction.
I'd have a small team of people combing the web for individual reactions and make any last minute changes to what's planned to be unveiled on Monday. If there was any uncertainty on some items, I'd delete giving an 'answer' on those items next Monday.

As can be seen reading through this entire thread, different posters have different hot buttons.
Take dynamic pricing. A big thumbs down for many because those people feel that more points will be required based on dynamic pricing. However, the topic ignores some situations such as the Conrad Maldives where you can get a $1050 water villa for 95,000 pts. I haven't looked at many Hilton rooms on points but I've found good deals at times where I've burned points.
For lounges, I hadn't considered the speed/efficiency of lounges in the morning for some. As far as the threshold for access, I'd expect it to be 50 nights annually, not a minimum of 75.
I've been surprised at how little/no commentary there's been about suite upgrades.

No matter what the initial program looks like, there will be tweaks made to the program after the rollout.

Some will be unhappy with the new program and leave. Some from other programs will migrate over.

I remember reading long ago that the entire purpose of these loyalty programs is to get the consumer to spend more money. The combined program will be no different, so I'm not at all surprised to see 5 levels. I'd also expect a double top secret level above the advertised levels.

hockeyinsider

Increasingly, the only difference between a limited-service Fairfield Inn hotel and a full-service Marriott flagship Marriott hotel is the quality of the bed, linen and toiletries (the latter apparently on their way out) as well as the presence of a club lounge and lobby bar/restaurant.

But outside of major destinations, it's rare in my experience to find a Marriott -- particularly those located in office parks and the suburbs -- with any service, let alone full-service. Gone are the days when a full-service hotel would have a bellman or doorman, concierge (not that an airport or suburban hotel needs one), and room service. Heck, you can't even get a newspaper delivered to your room anymore. What constitutes a full-service hotel anymore is beyond me.

MSPeconomist

IMO a bigger problem is that so many Marriotts close their lounges for the weekend, starting no later than just after breakfast Friday morning and sometimes not re-opening until Monday evening. At many properties, this means that you can't get coffee or water (let alone any sort of snack) or even you the computer and printer during these "long weekends."