First the bad news. This is an offer for new enrollees to Ritz-Carlton Rewards or existing RCR members and you are not eligible for the Ritz-Carlton Rewards free night offer if you are a Marriott Rewards member.
Members of The Ritz-Carlton Rewards program as of January 13, 2012 and new members who were not previously members of the Marriott Rewards® program are eligible to receive this offer.
And now the good news. Register for the Ritz-Carlton Rewards free night offer by March 1, 2012. Stay two times at participating Ritz-Carlton Hotels and earn one free night certificate valid for a Tier 1-3 Ritz-Carlton Hotel. You may earn up to two free night certificates during the promotion.
- Register for promotion by March 1.
- You must have been a member of Ritz-Carlton Rewards as of January 13, 2012 or a new member who has not been a member of Marriott Rewards to be eligible for this offer.
- Free night reward certificate is earned 3-5 days after second qualifying stay and is valid for one year from date of issuance.
- Free night certificate is not transferable and may not be gifted.
Promotion excludes the following hotels and properties:
- The Ritz-Carlton Millennia, Singapore,
- The Ritz-Carlton, Montreal,
- Phulay Bay, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve,
- The Ritz-Carlton Destination Club®, The Ritz-Carlton Residences, and Partner Hotels.
The exclusion of Tier 4 and 5 only excludes 9 hotels from the free night certificate usage. There are more than 60 other hotels in the Tier 1-3 Ritz-Carlton Rewards. Here is a list of all Ritz-Carlton locations.
Loyalty Traveler Analysis
The potential of a free night after just two stays is my favorite promotion since this can be leveraged to pay low rates and redeem for a property that might cost more per night than the two qualifying stays.
Looks like Ritz-Carlton Rewards and Marriott Rewards have taken over Faster Free Nights. Marriott Rewards MegaBonus restricts the free night certificates to category 1-4 hotels which excludes hotels in a number of places. Ritz-Carlton Rewards has few hotels in Tier 4 and 5. These free night certificates are valid in the vast majority of Ritz-Carlton Hotels around the globe.
New York Central Park, Hong Kong and Shanghai Pudong are the only three hotels in Tier 5. New York Battery Park is Tier 3 so there is at least another Ritz-Carlton New York option.
Tier 4 hurts a little more for Americans with Bachelor Gulch (near Vail, Colorado), South Beach (Miami), Grand Cayman and St. Thomas taking out some key North American destinations. Barcelona and Tokyo are the other Tier 4 hotels.
Ritz-Carlton Tier 1-3 hotels are in more than 30 U.S. cities and resorts like Los Angeles, San Francisco, Lake Tahoe, Boston, Denver, Atlanta, Dallas, Phoenix, D.C., Maui, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Miami and many other places. A free night should be easy to redeem in a desirable location.
Unfortunately my wife and I are both Marriott Rewards members. I think we need to make some hotel dates with friends and family who are not into loyalty programs to take advantage of this high value offer.
Sample Rate Analysis
I highly recommend this offer for people who are eligible to enroll in Ritz-Carlton Rewards. Two people working together can get really high value from this promotion.
There are several Ritz-Carlton hotels around $200 per night.  You can earn one free night certificate for $400 to $500 with 2 one-night stays. There is a limit of two certificates per member. A couple can earn four free night certificates in all. There are several Ritz-Carlton hotels to redeem free night certificates where the rates will be over $500 per night.
This is not a cheap promotion. This is geared for people who would normally pay high rates for luxury hotel stays.
You will likely need to spend about $1,000 to earn two free nights and $2,000 to earn four free nights working with a partner. You can minimize the hotel stays by traveling with your partner and stay two nights at the same hotel on low rates and on two different reservations with one night in each person’s name.
Four $500 trips between February 1 and April 30 can earn four free nights for a trip anytime over the next year. Altogether a couple can put out $2,000 and stay eight paid nights, eight different stays of course, and then redeem four free nights for another $2,000 vacation.
That is a 5-Star promotion in my analysis.
Ritz-Carlton Reservations offers flexible dates rate search to ease the search for lower-cost Ritz-Carlton hotels.
Ritz-Carlton Maui hotel rates in October 2012 are a fixed $519 per night.
There are good vacation redemption opportunities for two to four free nights with this Ritz-Carlton promotion.
Hat Tip to AAdvantage Geek pointing me to this offer.
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