Last year I began my mattress running addiction with the Carlson group of hotels, mainly Radisson and Country Inn & Suites here in the U.S., after having stayed at several properties and been comped Silver elite status. Not usually in any conversation in terms of preferred hotel loyalty programs, I started with Radisson since they…
Hotels
Category Archives for Hotels.
Club Carlson launches today with Stay 2 Earn 1 Free Night promotion
Replacing the GoldPoints Plus hotel loyalty program, the Carlson line of hotels (Radisson, Park Inn, Country Inn & Suites, and Park Plaza), officially launched Club Carlson today. Supporting the re-branding, and likely their entry into the quarterly promotions most other hotel loyalty programs already provide, they are offering a “Stay Twice, Earn a Free Night 
The Queen flies, debit miles, mobile check-in, Wi-Fi, bonus points & the hunt for an A330
Since I volunteered my seat on United Airlines this morning and scored another $400 in vouchers, I have a bit of time to recap additional news items from the week. Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental. The longest passenger aircraft in the world took its maiden flight this past Sunday. As I previously posted, only Lufthansa and Korean…
Review of Room 77: a new hotel search engine featuring floor plans & room views
A new and ingenious hotel search engine has entered the market of travel websites. Named Room 77, it allows you to search for a specific hotel, enter your room type preferences including bed type, floor level & distance from the elevator, and then displays a list of top-matching rooms at that hotel, as well as…
Noteworthy items from the airline & travel industry this week
Here’s a summary of some hot news items from this week covering airlines, airfares, airplanes and hotels. Delta Air Lines: Delta announced that retroactive to January 1, 2011, there is no longer an expiration policy to frequent flyer miles earned in the SkyMiles program. This makes Delta the first major carrier to offer such an…
Instant Hilton Silver status & fast-track to gold in 4 stays
The Hilton HHonors program is offering instant Silver elite status, and requires only 4 stays in 90-days to achieve Gold status just for being a United Airlines Mileage Plus elite member. They’re also being smart to further entice you with an additional 2,000 bonus award miles on United after the 5th stay. Currently I’m a…
Bonus point promotion: 10,000 bonus GoldPoints for a one-night stay at Radisson through February 28, 2011
Radisson has introduced a new promotion this morning branding it as “Experience the World of Radisson.†Unlike the current Country Inn & Suites promotion I blogged about recently, this one is eligible for a one-night stay any day of the week, so the commonly less expensive Friday and Saturday night stays qualify. You can only…
Bonus point promotion: 10,000 goldpoints for a one night stay at Country Inn & Suites
Country Inn & Suites is offering 10,000 bonus goldpoints by staying just one night (Sunday through Thursday) before February 17, 2010. I took advantage of a similar deal last year, and fully intend to make a qualifying stay once again. My goal for 2011 is to hit 100,000 points in the program, and will then…
Review: Radisson Suites Hotel Buena Park, California
I blogged recently about my decision to stick with Radisson properties for the time being as my hotel loyalty program of choice, and I’ve been on the hunt for bonus point opportunities. Last month, I came across a rate at a fairly local Radisson Suites in Buena Park, California that included 10,000 bonus points, so…
Hotel loyalty programs and why I started with Radisson
Up until this year, I haven’t paid too much attention to loyalty programs on the hotel side. I generally would just research historical winning bids over at betterbidding.com, and go on a bidding spree on Priceline. I got pretty good at it, actually, and enjoyed the challenge & frequently won lower winning bids than those…