Which hotel loyalty program?
 

I'm going to be traveling more this year and want to figure out which hotel loyalty programs it would make sense for me to maximize on. My budget is generally targeted to midrange hotels with a splurge here and there and I mostly stay at hotels when I travel abroad. I have Hilton Gold status and A|Club Platinum status based on those instant promos that were active recently, but I haven't stayed at those hotels in a while. Also, I don't have any hotel credit cards yet. Lots of chains are running promos in Q1, so which ones are good for 1 night stays, 2-3 night stays, etc so as to maximize the reward points? Which ones are good for redeeming points for hotels abroad?

Starwood is best

I also prefer SPG for the balance of quality hotels and reward program.

Are you interested in mainly the most comfortable stay while traveling, the rewards to used later, or a balance of both?

I would say a balance. How hard/easy it is to achieve elite status is another consideration, but not a major one.

You should be able to status match HHonors Gold to Priority Club and Club Carlson.

Starpoint flexibility make Starwood by far the best program. However, their geographic footprint is limited so make sure they are well represented in your highest frequency business or leisure destinations.

I have found that the best loyalty program for hotels is different for everyone. I think the most important part fo the loyalty program is where do you really want to go on your trips that are not work related and who has the best hotel for you vacation, not necessary who has the best value, but who give you what you want. Then you work on maximizing the points in that program.
For us wh have choosen hilton for three reasons we love staying at the Hilton Waikoloa village, the La Qunita resort and Spa, and the Torrey pines hilton (san diego). All three of these properties are great places my wife, 4yo son and I enjoy. so there cound be better deals out there but we are extreamly happy with these little retreats so we stick with hilton.
plus the amex surpass card give 9 points per dollar at hilton resorts so the points add up fast.

Can't comment on pros and cons of every program, but if you have Gold with Hilton but no hotel cards, then you should consider getting both no fee Hilton cards from Amex and Citi (no fee for the 1st year) for 110,000 points total. If you consider Starwood, then Amex Plat will give you Gold status which I personally have found very useful for getting an occasional upgrade (although I know many others on SPG forum would disagree).

How often are you traveling abroad and do you want the same mid-range level of hotels there as in the USA? If you are overseas with any regularity (~10+ days annually, I'd say) then I would skip the chains and stay independent. Way better value, particularly overseas, and no need to be loyal to anyone but yourself (and your wallet) when in the USA.

Also see here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...y-program.html.

Gosh, it so depends where.

For example, if you want to get see the fjords in western Norway, out among the fjords themselves, if you don't have Choice points (easy to earn tons of them during some promos, though not the current one) or Best Western points (slow to earn most of the time), you'll have to pay through the nose for indie hotels (not much competition). But even if you just want to cruises form back in Bergen, you won't find most of the "biggies" there. You'll find more Choice, you'll find SAS Radisson (is that part of Carlson or separate?), you'll find Scandic (which years ago was linked to Hilton HHonors but now is its own Scandinavia-specific chain), etc. I'm not sure which, if any, of the other "biggies" will do you any good even in Bergen.

But go to Madrid, and now there's no Choice. There's tons of Marriott, now that they've hooked up with AC Hotels. There's only one Hilton out at the airport. There's a couple Priority Club hotels in the city itself, but most are in random suburbs.

But go to Budapest, and Hilton has two great hotels, including the fabulous "Castle" (upon on a hill on the Buda side). And no Choice. Priority Club only has one IC in the city itself, and a Holiday Inn out in the suburbs (good if you are renting a car and doing side trips to the south and west of Hungary, no good if what you actually are visiting is Budapest proper on public transit).

But perhaps in Paris and London and Tokyo just about all the chains are there with several locations each.

Oh, then in South America: If you want to go Iguazu Falls, the only chain on the Brazilian side is a Best Western (but it's so inexpensive, you want to earn, not burn). On the Argentian side, insde the national park there's a fabulously-located Sheraton, but it's super expensive and also requires a lot of SPG points. In Patagonia, the only chain I've found is WyndhamRewards!

So there's no one or two or even three programs you can necessarily collect in and be sure they'll work everywhere in the world where hotels are expensive on cash and there's some chain hotel there you could get on points. (Obviously, if the hotels are cheap on cash, don't worry about points.)

Which is why you need to figure where overseas, and not just overseas, to figure out what program(s) you want to collect in.

I think it is relatively easy to achieve gold with Priority Club and as others have mentioned SPG will give you gold if you have Platinum AMEX.

Hitting the top tier for each program varies greatly, but I may still weigh in on Priority club being the easiest as they look at points or stays versus some of the other hotels. Priority club also always seems to be running a promotion of some type.

I personally like SPG as the room quality is good while I travel and the hotel locations are adequate for vacation. If your goal is to go anywhere in the world and have your loyalty hotel of choice, I would not pick starwood as the best program.

I sometimes base my vacation around where SPG has properties or I decide not to even bother staying at one.

I echo many of the posters sentiments that Starwood is among the best.

Thanks for the great answers.

In the past I did usually go for independent hotels when traveling abroad, just because of the cost part. But I figure I can still do that while spending some nights at chains where it makes sense.

I also agree that I should diversify and not stick with just one single program. Since I already have Hilton Gold, perhaps it makes sense to go for Hilton and one other one (Marriott, SPG, Hyatt, or PC).

Starting off this year, I need to go to Austin for a weekend in March. For 3/22-24 I see $277/night rate at Hyatt Regency (and they'll be running the new promo soon for 4,000 points after 4 nights + 1,000 points for Hyatt cardholders). Hilton Austin is $201 and Garden Inn is $152 (and Hilton is running a couple of promos - 7,000 points for 2-night weekend stay and 33% off Any Weekend, Anywhere). I can get a $219 rate at W Austin through FoundersCard (and Starwood is doing the double points for 2-night stay promo). Marriott's Residence Inn is $184 (and Marriott is doing the Stay twice, earn a free night MegaBonus). And finally, Intercontinental Stephen F. Austin is $234 (and PC has a couple of promos for double the points every stay and 5,000 points after 3 stays).

So hard to choose..

Wow. Stumbled on this thread and it was the same question I had! I use Marriott in the US and some locations overseas but can't use them in all locations I need overseas. I have been trying to pick a second program but my travel isn't to a particular destination so it sounds like it won't really be possible to pick a second one that works everywhere. I have low level Hyatt through presidential plus cc but I don't think that covers much. Thanks for advice!

Is this your "splurge here or splurge there"? W and Regencry and Hilton proper do sound liuke "midrange" to me.

I'm not sure which HGI you checked but the HGI Austin North is $119/night "Best Available Rate" (even less Advance Purchase or MVP or AAA if you have that), and since most of the points would be from the promo (but is 7000 points for a Thu-Sat stay or only Fri-Sun?), I don't see 'if yuo're "midrange" mostly why you'd be condiering paying almost double that for the Hilton?

(22 Mar is a Thu and 24 Mar is a Sat.)

Meanwhile, I don't know what Founders Card is or what it works for, but while it sure gives you big discount on the W (it's $400+ without it), with no such card (a no other discount) the Sheraton is $189 and the Aloft is $169. And again the promos are the same, no?

Finally, at Marriot, there's a Fairfield or two for $119 and Springhill Suites for $129. And Marriott's stay twice promo requires you to change hotels every night to max that out! So why pick only one Marriott property for both nighs, and one of the most expensive ones at that??? :confused:

(IMHO, the key to getting points is not just to choose hotels that give them, but choose hotels that give you the most points for the least spend. Then you have money left over for weekend trips on which you can find even cheaper hotels to build up your status and points at multiple chains even faster.