Reminder: Radisson Stay 1, Get 1 Promo Ends Oct 31st

Reminder

Just a friendly reminder, the Radisson Stay 1 Night, Get 1 Night Free promotion ends on October 31st.

The promotion is good for stays through December 31st, you just have to make your reservations by October 31st.

I talked about the promotion in detail and how to stack it to get an even bigger discount, so if you are planning on taking part in this promotion, please read that post here.

I already did 1 stay at the Radisson O’Hare for $77 during the Chicago Seminars, earning 1 Free Night Certificate.

The Free Night has already posted, so I am going to use it at the Radisson Martinique – New York when I fly out of JFK in February for the Alitalia mistake fare to Madrid.

I was actually walking to Dinner last night in Korea Town and accidentally walked passed the Radisson Martinique. Looks pretty nice and is in a pretty decent location within walking distance to Penn Station and Times Square.

As for the price, the going rate was $242.10 ($281 after tax). I paid around $77 for my O’Hare stay which earned me the Free Night Certificate, so all in all I saved $204. I will probably split the $77 with my friend, so it should only cost us $38.50 each! We are staying here in February, so not really peak tourist time, but normally this Hotel goes for around $400+ a night. If you have an upcoming stay in NYC, I’d recommend doing this promotion.

Scaling The Promotion

Although 1 free night is great and is saving me around $204, I have a lot of Family and Friends in NYC, so I am here often and rarely here just for 1 night.

Club Carlson’s loyalty program rules are really lenient, that you can just go online and change the name on the account for free. This is something that no other Airline or Hotel loyalty programs ever allow.

So in an attempt to stock up on these Free Night Certificates, I simply used a few different email addresses, and booked two 1 night reservations at Radisson LAX. One for was my upcoming LA trip in a week, and then the other is for Frequent Traveler University at the end of November. Both of these stays are actually legitimate stays and not just Mattress Runs, so I figure I might as well get 2 Free Night Certificates from my stays. Each night is going to cost me around $100, but again as you saw above, by redeeming it in NYC, it automatically pays for itself many times over.

Once the Free Night Certificates post to each account, I will simply just go to ClubCarlson.com and merge them with my main Club Carlson Account in which I have Elite Status.

If you are married or are seeing someone, you don’t even need to make multiple accounts because Club Carlson allows mergers and point transfers of accounts that don’t have the same name or address. Really it is the Wild West with Club Carlson and anything goes!

As I talked about in my previous post on the topic, if you have any holiday plans like going to see Grandma for Thanksgiving or flying to visit your Family, try and squeeze in a Radisson stay if you can. Almost all major Airports have a Radisson and it will probably be only around $100 a night. The Free Night Certificate that you earn is good until December 2013, so you have a full year to use it! Also most of the rates for Radisson are fully refundable, so you can book it now as part of this promotion and then go cancel it for free if needed.

A lot of people at first are confused about the idea of Mattress Run, in which you pay for a Room solely for the purpose of earning Points or a Free Night Certificate, but in reality it is that you are paying up front for a service down the line. Even if you pay $77 and don’t stay at the first hotel, once you have your Free Night Award, you will use it and actually stay at the hotel. As I always say, you can pay a few bucks now (in my case $77), or you decide not to do it and then scramble at the last moment to find a cheap hotel and pay $281 down the line. At the end of the day, it is all about long term planning.

Bottom line is that this promotion is awesome, so I suggest everyone take advantage of it. I suspect Club Carlson will again bring back their 50,000 Point Free Big Night promotion again in the Spring of 2013, so doing both of these promotions could net 2 free nights for around $200ish. Not a bad deal!

-Parag