Twenty percent of Americans polled in a survey said they would be unable to take their next vacation without cashing in rewards points, indicating that the current economic climate has increased the importance of travel rewards points in vacation planning.

Published: 01 Jul 2009

Twenty percent of Americans polled in a survey said they would be unable to take their next vacation without cashing in rewards points, indicating that the current economic climate has increased the importance of travel rewards points in vacation planning.

The survey (commissioned by the Wyndham Rewards loyalty programme and conducted by Rabin Research on June 16) found that nearly one-third of Americans (31 percent) belong to one or more travel industry loyalty or rewards programme, and almost half of them (47 percent) plan to redeem travel rewards points for their next vacation. It featured 1,040 Americans.

“Knowing that travelers are still taking vacations, but watching their overall spend more carefully, we wanted to find out exactly how important rewards points are to Americans,” said Jill Noblett, Wyndham Hotel Group senior vice president of Loyalty and Direct Marketing. “This survey tells us reward points are rather significant.”

According to the survey, nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of Americans say rewards points are either “very important” or “extremely important” given the state of the economy. Twenty-nine percent responded “very important” and 35 percent responded “extremely important”.

In an effort to help summer travellers stretch their vacation dollars further, Wyndham Rewards has launched “Save Summer”, a promotion that features 15 to 50 percent off at participating brands, the opportunity to win up to 750 free hotel nights and the possibility of walking away with one million Wyndham Rewards loyalty points.

Consumers may download a widget to their Facebook, MySpace and other social networking profiles that allows them to register for the “Save Summer” promotion and share it with online friends. Every time a friend enters the promotion the originating consumer automatically gets another chance to win. Membership in the Wyndham Rewards programme is not required to enter, and no purchase is necessary. The promotion is available now through Sept. 10, 2009.

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