A free night at the Sheraton – simply for eating at the Westin
We have previously highlighted the SPG Triple Crave offer – where you will earn triple SPG points for dining at Starwood hotel restaurants (and remember, you don’t actually have to be a guest at the hotel to earn the SPG points).
This had an interesting and very positive result for me this week.
By paying for a (reclaimable!) work meal at an SPG restaurant, in one easy hit I earned enough SPG points to pay for my upcoming night at the Sheraton in Catania.
So how did I do it?
This “free night for one meal” that I benefited from basically combines two good value offers:
- The SPG Triple Crave offer, which offers triple SPG points on restaurant spend on Mondays to Thursdays until 30 December 2014; and
- SPG’s ridiculously low SPG points requirements for stays at their Category 1 and 2 hotels, which falls lower still at the weekend.
Getting the bonus SPG points from Triple Crave
After applying my 10% SPG discount to the meal, the bill came to €821. You earn 1 SPG point per US$1 spent at SPG hotels. €821 is US$1021, so I earned a total of 1021 SPG base points.
That is then trebled to 3063 points, as a result of the Triple Crave offer.
Spending the points at the Sheraton
Having earned those 3063 points, I then had the opportunity to spend them on what I consider to be one of the single best value redemption options in any hotel loyalty scheme – using SPG points for a Category 1 or 2 Starwood hotel.
We have discussed this in detail here, but in short 3,000 SPG points will get you a weekend night at a Category 2 Starwood hotel (weekday nights are 4k points), which includes the Sheraton Catania.
So there we have it – a free night at the Sheraton for eating at the Westin.
But I’m not going to spend €800 at an SPG restaurant, you say
While I fully appreciate that €800 restaurant spends will not be on everyone’s agenda before 30 December 2014, it’s nevertheless worth bearing in mind the following:
- SPG is free to join, and generally gets you a discount on dining at SPG hotels (I got 10%);
- You will earn SPG points on restaurant spend at SPG hotels, even where you’re not a hotel guest (unlike others, including the Hilton);
- The Triple Crave offer will give you triple SPG points on this spend until 30 December 2014; and
- SPG points redemptions at Category 1 and 2 SPG Hotels are often exceptional value, particularly at weekends.
Bear in mind the above calculations do not include any bonus points you might earn as a result of settling the bill with a credit card, too.
And if you can charge it to a Starwood Preferred Guest AMEX card, you’ll get an extra Starpoint per dollar charged, and a 100% bonus for using the SPG AMEX to pay for a Starwood purchase => 5 Starpoints total for each dollar in the base charge at the restaurant.
Absolutely – all sorts of potential credit card related extras on the spend too.
Sadly I don’t have access to the generosity of the US credit cards. So, in my case I charged it to an American Express International Credit Card (Euro).
The SPG point earning is not great here: I get one Amex Membership Reward point per Euro spent, so 821 MR points on the spend. These convert to SPG points at a pretty poor 3:1 ratio, i.e. 273 additional SPG points.
Far better with the Amex ICC card is to convert to Avios at a 3:2 ratio, so I get 547 Avios.
Wow this great, but why stop there? You should go ahead and eat 6 more times at the Westin, spend an additional 4,800 euros and get a whole week of free nights in Catania! Thank you so much for this insightful piece!
I really appreciate you reading and commenting on the blog, and I value constructive criticism. However, I think in this instance you’ve missed the point – I am entirely aware that not everyone is in a position to spend a small fortune on restaurant meals, and the article specifically addresses this.