Almost every major travel brand has a premium credit card, but not Hyatt. Here’s my proposal for a premium World of Hyatt Credit Card.
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The Premium Credit Card Space Is Crowded
Chase, Citi, Capital One, and of course American Express all have premium credit cards with annual fees that range somewhere between $400-800. They almost uniformly offer Priority Pass lounge access, all but Citi have at least one (and growing) airport lounge, they typically offer some sort of travel insurance, and usually a once-every-five-years benefit to offset Global Entry or TSA Pre-check costs. Those products have a lot of cardholders and some of the banks offer variants of the card, like the Morgan Stanley American Express Platinum card.
The travel co-brand versions like the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card, the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant American Express Card, or the Citi Advantage Executive World Elite Mastercard have benefit lists as long as their names. There are more premium cards than I care to name, the space is crowded, and for good reason. Big benefits justify big annual fees for consumers which Chase admitted they operate at a loss. However, these cards create a barrier to entry that applies only to either devout loyalists who have an enthusiastic interest in the brand and are more likely to engage, or they are high earners with great credit scores likely to swipe often (even if they don’t carry a balance.)
Despite Chase’s claims that they lost boatloads of money on the Sapphire Reserve, the card has recently increased the sign-up bonus suggesting that they again want the business that it brings.
With more products, brands, and banks participating, it seems clear that not only are premium cards key to gaining customers, but they are also key to retaining customers. Capital One only recently entered the fray with its own version, Venture X. Actions like this suggest to me that while the market is already crowded, banks don’t want to see their high-end customers use another brand’s card for a product they feel they can deliver as well.
The market is crowded at the top, absolutely, but for Hyatt, I would argue there is room for one more. Comparatively, Hyatt has more premium hotels than other hotel chains by percentage, it is a growing chain with new opportunities, and as it grows, its credit options should evolve as well.
(Proposal) The Chase World of Hyatt Globalist Credit Card
I took a stab at the name of this proposed credit card following some of the naming conventions present today. Beyond the excruciating title, words such as “reserve”, “limited”, or “select” might come into play too. Chase has an extensive relationship and opts for Visa products so those two are given.
The card would be a thin metal design along the lines of the Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card with a black and copper coloring similar to their current styling but utilizing the unique advantages of the metallic design to create a weighty, reflective, and sturdy experience.
Reasonable, Competitive Benefits
Here are what I feel would be reasonable, yet competitive benefits the new card should offer:
- Double tier-qualifying night credits – Qualify for Globalist status with just 30 nights as a cardholder. This could also come in the form of Marriott’s quick start approach (and Hyatt’s personal card) by awarding some number of elite qualifying nights perhaps 15, 20, or 30.
- 12x Earnings – For every night booked and paid for with the credit card, Hyatt would award 12x points per dollar spent. That’s 25% more than the business card and would add to a Globalist’s 6.5 points per dollar for up to 18.5 WOH points total per $1 spent.
- 100,000 WOH point signup bonus – To get new cardholders in the door, a huge bonus (30,000 more bonus points than the best ever offer from any product.) Rather than activating the signup bonus after a cardholder spends $3,000 on purchases within the first three months of account opening, this would likely require $5,000 to $7,500.
- TSA Pre-Check/Global Entry – This is a stalwart of the premium card space and it feels like a $100 benefit the year you need to use it even though it has no value the other four years before it becomes eligible for use again.
- Explorist Automatically – Mid-level elites don’t get a lot so there’s not much to give away with this perk, but it would add value for authorized users.
- Category 1-7 Award – Many cards award free night stays for spending on the card and not just holding it but rather than the personal card which awards a Category 1-4 free night certificate for spending $15,000 in a calendar year, this premium card and award level would likely require $30,000 in spending on the card to earn.
- Trip Insurance – Base-level trip insurance for trips booked with the card including pre-paid non-refundable travel purchased directly from the airline that comes into effect when canceled or cut short by sickness, severe weather.
- Bonus Categories – Spending in selected categories will accrue bonus points by earning at a higher rate, likely 3x base points.
- Additional Milestones – While the club-level upgrades in my account are forever wasted, others might find value in them and it encourages incremental spend along the way at $10,000, $20,000, and $40,000 annually in addition to the aforementioned Category 1-7 free night award.
It’s important to note that Hyatt is already awarding high spenders Globalist-lite status through its business credit card when they spend $110,000/year and full Globalist (with milestones) at $120,000 spent annually. Many businesses spend that easily in a year if not sooner. That proves that Hyatt is willing to sell the status for some amount of money, even if that feels like a high amount to the average consumer.
Why They Haven’t Launched One Yet
Hyatt has only recently expanded its co-brand card offering to include a business credit card offers as the brand grows. The chain has increased its footprint but recently waded into the all-inclusive space in a big with acquisitions of ALG, adding 100+ properties. This will bring new business aspects into the fold, but among them, a new type of consumer that will absorb larger bills and may want to finance them on a card or further engage with the brand.
But this is all new for Hyatt. The brand’s historically limited footprint may have felt as though the market for a premium card wouldn’t be worth the marketing effort. It’s been speculated that the brand has fewer than 10,000 Globalists meaning both that there might not be enough engagement for the product, but also that the brand doesn’t want to dilute its membership with underqualified participants.
As the chain closes the gap with Hilton, Marriott, and IHG (It has a long way to go but it’s moving in the right direction), it may be time to offer customers something new to try with huge chain perks and products.
Conclusion
This is pure fantasy, no doubt. I have no inside track (though I wish I did) but it feels like time for this type of product with tangible benefits and value that moves some into the Hyatt fold and offers loyalists a reason to move Hyatt to the top of their wallet.
What do you think? Is it time for a premium Hyatt credit card? Is the space too crowded already? What benefits or perks would be this a card worth having or moving your spending to?
I’ll just take a stab at Kyle’s proposed name and nothing else. If they were to launch such a card, it would be absolutely idiotic to call it “Globalist.” Way too much confusion. Think of all the “But I’m a Globalist! (credit cardholder)” scenarios that would invite.
I already think Amex/Chase/Marriott are Bonkers for their ridiculously named cards (and program, for that matter). I can’t even keep them straight or tell them apart. They’re Brilliant, Bold, and Bountiful, or something, right (plus Business)? I don’t know why Hilton/Amex reverted the Ascend back to Surpass, but I’m wondering if the name confusion with the Aspire played a role.
There’s a reason Hilton, Marriott, etc. all have low valuation on their points. It’s because they sell so much of it to the banks in the form of all these credit cards and tiers.
If you see this happen to Hyatt, you know the next step will be more devaluation of the Hyatt award redemptions.
Exactly – a horrible idea and hope Hyatt doesn’t sink to Marriott/Hilton lows
Ding ding ding!
Completely agreed
Yeah Kyle is being a paid hack here. Hyatt is the only hotel brand worthwhile because it’s difficult to achieve globalist. I’d like a cite on the 10k globalists it’s more than thatby the way.
@John Smith – I love comments like this. “Paid hack?” Who is writing the check and where can I pick it up? Hyatt probably doesn’t have any interest in me writing about a product they don’t have when they just introduced the Business card and continue to promote that heavily. Chase would probably like the same focus, but if you are familiar with financial marketing compliance, you’d know that I should have gotten a cease & desist by now for even naming a product with Chase in it. Visa probably doesn’t care about that but certainly isn’t sending me a check to talk about a card I invented and said I’d like to see as a wish list.
So who does that leave? Hilton, Marriott? Is there a black hat team at Hilton that pays me to talk about how other cards would be better than their own? Why not just a post to advertise theirs? Same question for Marriott Bonvoy but that’s even less logical, a counter effort from Marriott when they continue to rank their own program would be far too organized.
It couldn’t have been that I’m shilling those cards. We have a general link at the top and nothing else throughout but I’m not talking about their benefits and to be FCC compliant, I’d have to do a bit more than that.
So who or whom, exactly, is sending me that check? I’ll be a paid hack – try me! But it seems as though your unfounded, off-hand comment lacks as much base as the logic of your suggestion. It’s lazy John, be better.
Citation for the (approx.) 10k globalists reflects the initial American Airlines reciprocal marketing materials sent prior to the crossover announcement pre-pandemic.
I wouldn’t consider him a paid hack. However, many of the things he writes about on this blog are low on quality or substance in my view. I typically don’t bother reading his posts. I mistakenly thought this was an opinion piece by Matthew. It wasn’t till after commenting that I noticed.
Stupid Chase screw up big with me application to the Hyatt Business card. I have been a Hyatt member for over 20 years and have the personal Hyatt card attached to my account. A few months ago I applied for the Hyatt Business card and fill out the application including my Hyatt Globalist number. I received the card and spent the minimum amount to trigger the perks and paid for 10 nights at Hyatt hotels with the card. However, I noticed my points were never credited to my account. After 2 months I decided to call Hyatt to figure out what was wrong. Chase had created a new Hyatt account under my name and all points were being credited on that account. Hyatt customer service told me they would merge both accounts but the lady at Hyatt also screwed up badly. Instead of keeping my 20 year old account open and transferring the points from the new one, she decided without asking me to close the old account and moving all my points to the one Chase created. When she told me that I was furious and told her to revert and she said she was sorry but nothing could be done. Now I have a new account with a different number. Not the end of the world but a stupid mistake from both Chase and Hyatt.
Ahaha… Serves you right for thinking you could outsmart Hyatt as you claimed in an earlier post
@Karen: Are you on some strong medication?
In addition to adding Explorist, Hyatt should upgrade the Explorist status level. Earnings at the Explorist level is weak, and it doesn’t provide breakfast. Hyatt should bump earnings and add the breakfast benefit to that level. Hilton and Marriott both provide free breakfast with their premium cards – Hyatt should do the same. Don’t have to provide suite upgrades, leave that to Globalists.
they for sure need to have a bonus night for every xxxx spend on the card like the regular hyatt and business hyatt have. It would be a downgraded hyatt card not to offer that and really it needs to be a better % return for spend on the premium card to justify that big AF.
If they give Globalist away at 30 nights they can’t continue to make the status as valuable as it is. 30 nights is less than one night a week, and with a 100K sign-up, you could easily get 20+ nights from the points alone. If Hyatt released a premium card, I’d probably get it, but I don’t think fast tracking Globalist is the way to go.
Exactly. The whole reason Globalist is great is because it’s relatively difficult to earn. Leave the premium credit cards to Hilton and Marriott, and keep WOH the way it is.
I’ve worked very hard this year, despite Hyatt’s limited footprint, to spend as many nights as possible in Hyatt hotels. I’m sitting at 57 nights and should make Globalist. After all of that effort, I am not interested in expanding the number of Globalists via credit card because that will inevitably lead to devaluation of the status.
Hey, the business card only offers four points per dollar on stays, don’t fall for the advertising where they include the points you get just from the stay…
Hyatt and American Airlines have a relationship. As a Globalist who loves Hyatt and detests the utter lack of benefits on the existing AA credit cards, I would love to see any sort of AA tie. While I doubt they can be linked since Chase doesn’t have an AA card and Hyatt does, there must be some way to forge an AA benefit. THAT I would pay for–basically anything to get me out of the Barclays/Citi purgatory. AA has the worst credit cards I have ever seen. As it is, I book AA trips in Chase cards for the trip coverage. I’m loyal to the airline, but not the card. If Hyatt could do something there like they’ve done with reciprocal spend, I am ALL IN.
Strongly disagree. With such a proposal, we have way too many Globalists which means no more upgrades. As the saying goes, if everyone is an elite, no one is.
I couldn’t disagree with anything on here more. I am sick and tired of credit cards diluting points. Everyone just wants everything free these days. Loyalty programs were true loyalty programs before credit cards destroyed them,
Strongly disagree with this idea. I have Hilton Diamond (through status match initially, then stay challenge), Marriott Platinum (credit cards and paid stays), IHG Diamond (initially status match, then paid stay) and finally Hyatt Globalist (paid stay).
The elite treatment by Hyatt is so much superior than others, bar none. I got upgrades to suites at the Luxury Collection and Marriott, but they were all because of suite night awards. Got a better upgrade conversion rate with IHG, mostly at Kimptons, but not InterContinentals. Hilton Diamond – forget about it. Stayed at Hiltons, Conrad, DoubleTrees, and very seldom got upgraded. I got 4 upgrades exactly to suites in the last 5 years I’ve had Diamond status – once at a Taipei Hilton that just opened (but not at DoubleTree which was newer), Waldorf Astoria Orlando. Richmond BC and Burnaby BC Other stays – Mainz, Praque, Bangkok, various places in the US, Amsterdam, Tokyo etc – no upgrades.
I did a short staycation and another staycation where I had my brother-in-law family in tow as guest of honor in the local Bellevue Hyatt and we got treated like royalty. Breakfast with unlimited ala carte order, huge suite upgrade etc.
Currently at Hyatt Regency Hakone, and the treatment is just as nice.
Other programs with their card offerings and quick status are dilluting the elite pool. By keeping the top level status aspirational, I think Hyatt inspires customers to stay loyal. I am only in year 3 of being a Globalist but damn if I don’t concentrate all my travels next year to requalify.