Posted by Seth on April 17, 2009 under News | 
It is very rare that a corporate espionage story makes the news and even less likely that I’d care at all. But a lawsuit filed yesterday did catch my attention. Starwood has filed suit against Hilton alleging corporate espionage and theft of trade secrets, all over Hilton’s plans to launch their new Denizen brand. The guy responsible for the new brand, Ross Klein, used to work at Starwood and now he works at Hilton. And when he left his old job he walked out the door with 8 boxes of papers, apparently contracts and market research, among other things.
I would be pretty pissed, too, if I were Starwood. After all, they’ve enjoyed a relative monopoly on the luxury/style segment with their W brand over the past many years. But does that mean it is corporate espionage that resulted in a competitor starting up a similar brand? Continental has made a huge name for itself by offering tons of transatlantic air service on 757s, planes often considered too small to serve the market. But they now offer service to twenty-something cities in Europe from their hub in Newark, mostly on 757s. And they get a LOT of business on those flights. And then the guy responsible for that plan went to work for Delta. The following summer Delta added a ton of flights to similar destinations in Europe. Corporate espionage? Or just a guy who knows what he is doing moving to a new company?
Ultimately this is likely going to come down to a boring trial with lots of testimony about the files that were taken and very little about the actual details of the brand. But that doesn’t mean it won’t be fun to watch.
Hudson Crossing Travel Industry Insight: Starwood sues Hilton over Denizen – "Zengate
Posted by Seth on February 20, 2009 under Uncategorized |
After a pretty strong run of loyalty program devaluations during the past year or so (I’m looking at you, Delta) there have finally been a few small changes that are benefitting the travelers. This week’s good news comes from two of my favorite programs, Continental’s OnePass and Starwood Preferred Guest.
From Continental, it is the implementation of a change that was announced a couple weeks ago at the event they hosted in Houston and a compromise on a change that they announced last summer for reward tickets. The change was particularly severe for their gold and silver elite members, where the fees jumped 3-5x from previous levels. After having their ear chewed off enough from their frequent fliers, Continental agreed to change the policy again, and the new policy went into effect yesterday. The policy is a nice compromise. It allows free changes for everyone as long as the origin and destinations do not change and the travel dates – both old and new – are 21 days out. For changes closer in to the date of travel or changes to the cities there are still fees, but this way one can make a reservation several months out on less than ideal connections/flights and refine the details as better connections or routings become available. That is a big win, particularly for non-elites, but also a nice give back to the silver and gold elites.
On the Starwood front, they announced the results of their annual award category reassignments yesterday. This happens every year and hotels are shifted around, with some becoming more expensive to redeem for and some becoming cheaper. Over the past few years the trend has been strongly in favor of the more expensive direction. Plus they added a “peak dates” surcharge, making things even worse. Well, the 2009 changes are strongly in favor of the customer. Peak date surcharges have been removed on all but three properties worldwide. Moreover, the number of hotels going down a redemption level is actually more than the number going up. That’s great news for us. Some notable changes (courtesy of ALCO):
- Cat 6 (20,000/night) —-> Cat 5 (12,000/night):
- Westin St. John, U.S.V.I.
- Cat 5 (12,000/night) —-> Cat 4 (10,000/night):
- W Montreal
- Westin Aruba
- Westin Dawn Beach, St. Maarten
- US Grant, San Diego
- W San Diego
- Westin Riverfront, Avon, Colorado
- W Atlanta Buckhead
- Sheraton Kauai
- W Lakeshore Chicago
- Westin Michigan Avenue, Chicago
- Hotel Ivy, Minneapolis
- W Minneapolis
- Le Meridien Vienna
- Westin Dublin
- W Seoul Walkerhill
- Cat 4 (10,000/night) —-> Cat 3 (7,000/night):
- Westin Fiji
- Westin Chosun Busan
- Sheraton Fota Island Resort & Spa, Cork, Ireland
- Sheraton Austin
- Le Meridien Lingotto, Turin, Italy
- Sheraton Bilbao
- Four Points Darling Harbour, Sydney
So this is some happy news to head in to the weekend with. It is about time.
Posted by Seth on October 23, 2008 under Uncategorized |
It was only a matter of time before Marriott made this move to stay competitive in the frequent stay program space. Starwood has had a no blackout dates policy for a long time now (though some hotels do manipulate room types to limit availability), and Hilton recently changed their program to expand that option to all their members; it previously was reserved for their Diamond (top) level group. Now Marriott has joined the crowd, removing their StayAnytime reward product and removing the blackout dates from their program.
Of course they are spinning this as a great benefit to their members. And, of course, it is an it isn’t. They have added a new Category 8 reward level. Stays at those properties will now be 40K points/night, up from the previous max of 35K points/night at a Category 7 property. The hotels that will be classified as Category 8 are:
- Paris Marriott Hotel Champs Elysees
- Renaissance Paris Vendome
- JW Marriott Capri Tiberio Palace Resort & Spa
- Rome Marriott Grand Hotel Flora
- London Marriott Hotel County Hall
- London Marriott Hotel Grosvenor Square
- London Marriott Hotel Marble Arch
- London Marriott Hotel Park Lane
- Le Merigot, A JW Marriott Beach Hotel & Spa, Santa Monica
- Renaissance Chancery Court London
- New York Marriott East Side
- New York Marriott Marquis
- Renaissance New York Hotel Times Square
- South Beach Marriott Hotel
In addition, multi-night stays are getting a bit of a change. The current program offers a sliding scale, where the per-night rate is reduced the longer you stay at the same place. The new program will offer a 5th night free approach; shorter stays will no longer receive a discounted rate per night. This is actually beneficial for folks who were planning on a five night stay in a hotel in categories 1-5. For the category 6-8 hotels the five night price actually goes up in the new program. And for 2-4 night stays the cost goes up across the board.
Also, they are increasing the bonus earned by their Platinum members to 50% from 30%, a much needed increase to remain competitive.
All changes are effective as of January 15, 2009; rooms cannot be booked using the new levels until that time.
This is certainly one of those changes where the value will be measured very much individually based on travel habits. It would definitely be bad for me as I rarely have a five night stay anywhere. But for folks who like that approach to travel it might not be so bad.
