A couple of 12 months in the past, Marriott Bonvoy scrapped its eight award classes and moved to dynamic pricing. As an alternative of award classes (which had a spread for the variety of factors you’d have to make use of for an evening), dynamic pricing offers the lodge megachain the flexibility to cost at its discretion for award stays.
Since different journey suppliers have typically used dynamic pricing to devalue their loyalty packages, we feared the worst once we discovered Marriott would observe go well with.
Marriott dedicated to protecting 97% of inns inside their earlier class pricing bands by 2022. However now that we’re properly into 2023, what’s occurred to the worth of Marriott factors?
Over the past 12 months, we have run three information assortment phases for numerous inns within the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio. To calculate what number of cents per level members can redeem them for, we eliminated the taxes from the money stays (since you do not have to pay taxes on award stays) and divided the money fee by the factors worth. We have run assessments for every evening for the subsequent 5 months.
Whereas our pattern dimension would not account for Marriott’s huge portfolio, we will numerically again up our valuation of Marriott factors at these properties.
That is what we have discovered.
You may want extra factors for an award evening
However somewhat than a straight-up devaluation of Marriott factors, the rise in award costs largely resulted from hovering lodge costs as leisure and enterprise visitors rebounded from the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic. As money charges elevated, award charges adopted. This development has continued in our most up-to-date information assortment. Most significantly, our common cents-per-point redemption information remained comparable throughout the three samples.
With award charges rising with money costs, former Class 8 Marriott properties routinely worth over 100,000 factors per evening. Discovering rooms for beneath 120,000 factors per evening at The St. Regis New York throughout peak fall journey dates is tough.
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Assuming this development holds, we will anticipate Marriott award nights to rise if money charges proceed to extend.
Associated: Award program devaluations are hitting premium and luxurious redemptions the toughest — here is how
Marriott factors have not been devalued
Whereas some properties have been disproportionately appreciated or devalued by dynamic pricing, as an entire, the worth of Marriott factors stays unchanged.
This is a have a look at the worth of Marriott factors for 5 months, based mostly on information from 17 inns. The information is proven by way of cents per level:
| April 2022 | July 2022 | February 2023 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| JW Marriott Scottsdale Camelback Inn Resort & Spa | 1.08 | 1.26 | 1.09 |
| The West Hollywood Version | 0.58 | 0.59 | 0.76 |
| The Westin Denver Worldwide Airport | 0.66 | 0.61 | 0.70 |
| Moxy Miami South Seaside | 0.61 | 0.96 | 1.03 |
| The St. Regis Maldives Vommuli Resort | 1.80 | 1.63 | 1.51 |
| SpringHill Suites by Marriott Springdale Zion Nationwide Park | 0.75 | 0.41 | 0.67 |
| Sheraton Grand Seattle | 0.48 | 0.47 | 0.52 |
| Residence Inn by Marriott Chicago Oak Brook | 1.24 | 0.84 | 0.96 |
| Le Meridien Dallas, The Stoneleigh | 0.97 | 0.94 | 0.91 |
| Waikiki Seaside Marriott Resort & Spa | 0.78 | 0.60 | 0.72 |
| Aruba Marriott Resort & Stellaris On line casino | 1.01 | 0.88 | 0.89 |
| W Amsterdam | 0.82 | 0.88 | 0.74 |
| The London Version | 1.04 | 1.00 | 0.73 |
| Moxy Paris Bastille | 0.41 | 0.75 | 0.49 |
| The Westin Tokyo | 0.47 | 1.17 | 0.64 |
| The Westin Singapore | 1.17 | 1.17 | 1.73 |
| The Ritz-Carlton, Grand Cayman | 0.89 | 0.99 | 1.35 |
| Whole common | 0.87 | 0.89 | 0.91 |
Associated: The 26 greatest Marriott inns on this planet
Backside line
The character of dynamic pricing is risky — your Marriott factors could be price x as we speak and y in just a few months. Furthermore, their worth will differ by property.
Within the case of those properties, our cumulative common exhibits that Marriott hasn’t devalued its factors. Nonetheless, be ready for sticker shock if you see the money and factors costs on your subsequent tropical trip.
Regardless that Marriott hasn’t devalued its factors total but, our information factors to a whole lot of instability in Marriott redemptions. For instance, Marriott factors at The Westin Tokyo are price 45% much less in February 2023 assessments than in our July 2022 assessments. In the meantime, on the Moxy Miami South Seaside, they’re 70% extra priceless in our February 2023 assessments than in our April 2022 assessments.
The unpredictability and diploma of those redemption adjustments go away me pessimistic concerning the long-term prospects of Marriott factors.
Put in a different way, when you’re holding on to a big sum of Marriott factors, now could be the time to redeem them.
