I have to say, in terms of Hotel credit cards, the Club Carlson card is far and beyond the best card you can get, I love SPG too, but I use that for flights mainly, the Club Carlson card however offers a value like no other, with the final night of each trip ‘comped’ by the hotel, your two night stays are essentially buy one, get one free.
The better hotels with Club Carlson charge 50K per night, and there are actually a surprising number of decent hotels that are not in that top category that come in even cheaper. For my trip to Madrid I just booked 2 nights in the Radisson Blu, paying a total of 50,000 points for both nights, I am not even sure how long we will be in Madrid yet, but I think that I can safely lock that in. When I did so, an interesting option appeared, one that I dismissed without thought, but a reader said was a no brainer, paying 75K would get me a Premium Award ‘Business Room’ which comes with breakfast.
PRICE:
75,000 Gold Points® (average) Per night Tax included For 1 night(s) per room
75,000 Gold Points® (average) Per night Tax included For 1 night(s) per roomROOM DESCRIPTION:
– +/- 20 square metres
– Buffet breakfast, premium movies, newspaper, bathrobe and slippers
– Room type / Bed type / Smoking preference confirmed
– Free broadband and in-room NESPRESSO coffee machine
– Buffet breakfast, VAT and applicable taxes included
– If an extra bed is needed a 60 Euros/night charge will be added to the room rateFEATURES:
– Valid for all Club Carlson Members worldwide at participating hotels.
– Guest will be redeeming Gold Points at the time of booking.
– Points will be immediately deducted from the Club Carlson account.
– Free night valid for room only.
VS the Standard Room Amenities of:
PRICE:
50,000 Gold Points® (average) Per night Tax included For 1 night(s) per room
50,000 Gold Points® (average) Per night Tax included For 1 night(s) per roomROOM DESCRIPTION:
– +/- 19 square metres
– Room type / Bed type / Smoking preference confirmed
– Free broadband and in-room NESPRESSO coffee machine
– VAT and applicable taxes included
– If an extra bed is needed a 60 Euros/night charge will be added to the room rateFEATURES:
Valid for all Club Carlson Members worldwide at participating hotels.
Guest will be redeeming Gold Points at the time of booking.
Points will be immediately deducted from the Club Carlson account.
Free night valid for room only.
On paper, it seems that the only real difference is Breakfast, Newspaper, Robe, Slippers. Though from my recent stay in the Radisson Blu in Basel I got to see both a Business Room and a Standard room and the Business one had a slightly nicer Nespresso machine and perhaps was about 20 sqft larger, so the room probably will be a bit better too.
Because of the Buy one night get one night free offer that the Club Carlson card holders receive, you can break down the cost of the breakfast to being 25K points for 2 breakfasts on two days. Which sounds like a bargain. You can earn 25K Club Carlson points by buying 10 Vanilla Reloads, so the cost would be $40, as my reader AEGT pointed out.
HOWEVER….
As a person who hates using the term opportunity costs I find myself doing it two days in a row, and my ‘opportunity costs’ of putting 25K woth of Club Carlson points onto my account via Vanilla mean that I am not putting $5,000 worth of spend at 5% Cash Back – that is a net profit of $210, so I am ‘paying’ $210 to get those Club Carlson points… madness I hear you cry.
I would go further though, and say that because of my own personal approach to breakfast, even $10 is too much per person per day. In my dream vacation, I would get a cup of tea in my room (provided by the machine for free), and I would shower up and go find a little local bakery to pick up something with a name I cannot pronounce and a filling that is a complete surprise. Whats more, if I paid more than $5 for said product, it would be a luxury indeed, and an amazing experience.
So, now that I look at generating 25K new Club Carlson points as an opportunity cost of $210, and since I know that I can get 2 nights in some stunning properties for 50K that extra 25K for breakfast is looking pretty bad value to me – I would rather hold those points and use them for another weekend trip.
The optimal usuage of the Club Carlson Visa can be determined by reading their earning rules:
- 85,000 Bonus Gold Points to start – Receive 50,000 Gold Points after your first purchase. Plus 35,000 points once you spend $2,500 on your card within the first 90 days
- Earn 5x points everywhere.
So, putting exactly $2,500 on this card will get you 85K plus 12.5K for 97.5K, but putting 3K spend on this card in the first 90 days will get you 85K plus 15K for 100K, the perfect spot to earn 2 x Weekends at a top class Club Carlson. Once you earn in this optimized manner, burning in any other way detracts from your overall value.
Note- the Club Carlson cards is one of the hardest to get, they look at credit applications longer than most, so you need to have frozen your scores or not applied for anything in about 12 months minimum (plus do this application first in an app-o-rama) to have any chance of getting the card, it took me two attempts, and they do not reconsider.
So, for me,since I would rather go out and experience the city, than eat some international hotel breakfast, and since the earning/burning is so optimal with the $3K spend level, the 75K room is a terrible play – but what do you think, is it worth it?
Any which way you look at it, it’s a suckers deal. 25K points would buy you almost 6 nights at the cheapest CC, or two night at the midrange one. As to the room, you’re already entitled to an upgrade as a Gold member. Got me an awesome room in Paris complete with the robe, the slippers and what’s not. 🙂
“the Club Carlson card is far and beyond the best card you can get” …. Whoaa their cowboy that is quite a claim. Just because on stays of exactly two nights you can get good deals at their mediocre range of hotels does not make this card an SPG beater by any stretch of the imagination. Not to mention this is the program most ripe for devaluation from a program with a history of devaluing without notice. And then paying a 50% premium for a business room? This is one helluva an odd post
It’s the best hotel card out there right now, sure if it devalues then it may not be, and sure, it will devalue, as will every program. Hands down best value, you get 4 nights in their top hotels, which are perfectly adequate and actually very strong in places where the US chains are not.
SPG wins out not for hotel value, but because it has incredible value for flights. I personally find it very hard to spend points on a SPG property, knowing what those points are worth when converted into miles.
With the biz card and two club carlson accounts, you can get 1/2 price on ANY even night stay. Try doing that with SPG. The hotels are plenty good for almost anyone but the biggest hotel snobs too.
On a recent stay in Sydney, I loved the Radisson and absolutely hated the Westin, where the shower was broken and they tried to charge $20 a day for internet!
I went through the same logic as you, 25k for breakfast is not worth it to me. The local bakery at 10eur is much more appealing.
“25K Club Carlson points by buying 10 Vanilla Reloads, so the cost would be $40”
“25K woth of Club Carlson points onto my account via Vanilla mean that I am not putting $10,000 worth of spend at 5% Cash Back – that is a net profit of $420”
10 vanilla reloads would be $5000 in spend with an opportunity cost of $210, no?
Still not worth it though. I love breakfast but don’t value it that highly since I’d rather go to a cheap local place.
Thanks Mike. Clearly I hadn’t had breakfast when I did that! Corrected.
Once you actually have breakfast at that hotel, trust me, you would know why it was worth it.
On a serious note, your $210 analysis is flawed because it assumes that you can only buy a certain number of $5K cards. You can buy as many cards as you want to using your 5% CB card and when you are done you can go and buy another $5K cards on your club carlson cc. At this point, you may correctly argue that I only have 10 BBs to which I will say buy regular VGC instead which can be drained quite easily too. So your cost might increase to $50-$55, but no way close to $210.
We could split hairs about it all day long, but I would still rather $40 spent outside in a bakery, just the way I travel. I would stick with my position though, any time, to infinity and beyond that you pull out the Club Carlson card you aren’t pulling out my 5% card and losing out.
Cool.
I redeemed extra miles for the business room at the Radisson Blu Frankfurt. Even though my online booking stated buffet breakfast the hotel said it was not included. I called Club Carlson and the person I spoke to on the phone said that it wasn’t included. I was busy at the time and didn’t press the issue.
When I am busy most rules go out of the window, stuff like this is theoretical and idealistic a lot of the time. I break a lot of my own rules when other pressures dictate.
I pretty consistently get upgraded as part of gold status, but often not to a business class room. For instance, stays at the two Radisson Blu’s in Shanghai in January I was upgraded to better rooms, one a giant suite, but none with breakfast included. Upgrades and benefits are very inconsistent, except consistent that breakfast is hard to come by, even the Concierge benefit is only for continental.
Where hotels have Business Class the breakfast benefit is officially only for one person and only Americas and Asia Pacific. Nice way to put strain on marriages first thing in the morning as they decide who gets breakfast.
I find them a bit hit and miss, but generally quite good. I like the gifts too, and did well in Basel (not so well in Lucerne, or perhaps vice versa) I don’t think I would get in the way of a hunger crazed spouse, and neither should you!
We’re also going to Madrid with a newborn, and staying in a loft apt. with a washer/dryer about 5 blocks from that hotel.
I agree that this card beats the IHG for annual fee free nights and perhaps for signup bonus value. However, a) I’d only put real spending on the SPG and no other hotel card, and b) hotel cards seem to be best for signup bonuses and churns (in those terms, assuming no problems with meeting minimum spending thresholds, Fairmont and SPG beat Club Carls’ son).
If you are there in December dinner is on me! Now, I personally do not put regular spend on the SPG because SPG points are, according to me and most people I know, worth less than 2 cents per point. Do you value them higher?
Nope. But when my used CL on the Arrival gets high and my two 2x AA cards are used for $1K each, and it’s non-bonus, my next default is SPG. Example of this: recent Amex GC purchases. I guess you make a point: I don’t really value hotel miles in general.
Going in May. Can later send you a review of our airbnb’d place, and the best changing rooms/breastfeeding spots in the museums/nearby cafes.
Yeah would love the review- thanks! Personally I’m putting everything on fidelity amex and blue amex right now as my points are ok
Since everyone else is pointing out flaws in your “opportunity cost” analysis, I’ll point out one more — your choice (as you describe it), is paying $40 for $250 cash back or paying $40 for free breakfasts. So your opportunity cost (under this, perhaps flawed, scenario) is $250, not $210.
Went right over my head, sorry.
He’s saying:
Buy VRs on 5% card: Pay $40 to get $250, so you’re up $210
Buy VRs on Club Carlson card, use points on breakfast: Pay $40, get no money
So in the first scenario, you’re up $210. In the second, you’re down $40. So the opportunity cost of getting breakfast instead of cash back is $210 minus -$40 or $250.
So by getting cash back instead if you spend $250 on breakfast you’re exactly even money-wise to if you had used the Carlson card and redeemed for breakfast.
I look at it like this:
Buy VRs on 5% card: Pay $40 to get $250, so you’re up $210
Buy VRs on Club Carlson card, use points on breakfast: Pay $40, get no money
Pay $40 on Breakfast from the $210 = $170 (still gotta eat)
So really its $170 that I leave on the table by opting to go the points based route, and my $210 goes down not up.
If you are getting all fancy with the use of ‘opportunity cost’ and want to say that I could buy $250 worth of breakfast for an out of pocket $40 I do see where you are coming from, but call me a crap analyzer when I say that’s not how I think about it.
I see it as the opportunity to generate a net profit of $210, that I then use to buy breakfast from, leaving me with a full tummy and $170 in my pocket. The $250 stuff doesn’t gel with my mindset to such thinking.
My main point is that I don’t value a hotel breakfast, my second point is that I could earn more money by opting for cash, and if I am doing the latter I wouldn’t ever actually pay $250 for breakfast so that sort of mathematical approach might be more accurate, but for some strange reason to me (that I hope I was able to explain) is just not the way I look at it.
Your overall point is correct of course that it makes way more sense to go with the reloads, but the math is incorrect because you’re assuming the club carlson points are completely free when you buy the reloads (I know you realize you have to pay $40 for those VRs, but you’re not factoring the $40 cost into the math for the club carlson option but you are factoring it in to the 5% cashback option, making your difference off by $40).
There are no fancy uses of the word opportunity cost in what we’re saying. This is a direct comparison of how much more money you have in your pocket after each option. I understand the $250 thing is causing you confusion so I’ll show how it works using the exact same numbers you used in your example. Let’s look at the balance of your theoretical bank account step by step assuming breakfast costs $40 like you said in your last post:
Option A: Buy VRs with 5% card
1. Buy 10 VRs, bank account balance: -$40
2. Get 5% cashback which is $250 so bank account balance: $210
3. Buy breakfast at $40, bank account balance: $170
Option B: Buy VRs with Club Carlson card, use points for breakfast
1. Buy 10 VRs, bank account balance: -$40
2. Don’t get any cashback, bank account balance still: $-40
3. Don’t have to buy breakfast, bank account balance still: -$40
So as you can see you do not have $170 more in your pocket doing option A, you have $210 more because Option B leaves you with a negative -$40 balance whereas option A leaves you with positive $170.
The reason this post leaves you with $210 and my last one left you with $250 is that as I said in the last one it leaves you with $250 minus the cost of breakfast…since now we’re assuming breakfast costs $40 then $250-$40 = $210 more in your pocket.
Hopefully that makes more sense?
Yeah I guess you got me. I think net profit left behind which is inaccurate but helps me with value
Makes sense! I think $21 per reload too since it’s easier but when you start comparing cashback to points sometimes you have to change your thinking to separate the costs and revenues. The mistake is understandable, you actually had me believing I was wrong and you were right for a couple minutes this morning when I read your reply until I wrote it out on paper again and re-proved it to myself.
I max out both my 5% and my Carlson, so the discussion wrt to “opportunity costs” is moot as it presupposes doing one eliminates the option of doing the other.
I’d do 10 VRs and get $250 less fees = $210 net.
I’d also do 10 VRs and get 25K Carlson for $40. For a couple, that $40 cost would cover breakfast for 2 for 2 days = $10/person/meal. Can’t really beat that as you’d also have the $210 in your bank account from the 5%.
Well, first off, as long as you are happy with it then your plan is good, and you are certainly making out like a bandit compared to the average joe who actually pays. For me, I would say that I would prefer to take the $420 and pay for my breakfast outside of the hotel, but we all have our own preferences.
But doing one does eliminate the option of doing the other. You bought 10 VRs with your Carlson that you could have just as easily bought with your 5% card. So you’re still giving up an additional $210 as shown above. It doesn’t matter whether you had money in there to start with from the last month.
Jon – How does doing one eliminate the option of doing the other? You can buy as many VR as you want on your 5% cb card. Once you are satisfied (or more like you can’t buy any more cause you have a finite Credit Line on 5% cb) buying VR on 5% you can then buy VR on Club Carlson. You are limited by the number of card you can put on your 5% cb card in a day/month and once you hit that limit you can always buy it on your Club Carlson.
You’re imposing limits where there are none. The only limit that matters is how many VRs you can liquidate in a given month.
Jesus guys, what’s next? A dissertation? This whole thread seriously makes me ROFL. 🙂
I think I already wrote a dissertation, if you want to award me with that PhD I won’t complain.