Main Accommodations of the World (LHW) has a loyalty program named Leaders Membership, which I needed to check out on this put up, because it’s doubtlessly fairly rewarding. I particularly needed to take a better have a look at this now that Citi ThankYou has added Leaders Membership as a switch companion.
What’s Main Accommodations of the World?
Main Accommodations of the World (LHW) is a group of unbiased luxurious accommodations, with over 400 properties in 80 nations across the globe. Chances are high that you just’re acquainted with a few of LHW’s properties, even in the event you didn’t know they had been related to the group.
It is best to consider Main Accommodations of the World as extra of a resort advertising and marketing group than as a single resort group. LHW doesn’t handle its accommodations, however quite markets a gaggle of in any other case unbiased luxurious accommodations. As a matter of reality, many properties of smaller resort teams, like Rocco Forte, and so forth., belong to LHW.
Consider Main Accommodations of the World as being alongside the traces of Small Luxurious Accommodations of the World (SLH), which World of Hyatt has a partnership with. I might say that on stability LHW properties are a bit greater finish than SLH properties, as LHW has some really iconic properties, just like the Ritz Paris.
Main Accommodations of the World Leaders Membership loyalty program
Leaders Membership is the title of Main Accommodations of the World’s loyalty program. This system is free to affix, and comes with some important advantages you wouldn’t essentially anticipate from a program that’s free. Let’s go over the small print.
LHW Leaders Membership membership advantages
Only for becoming a member of the Leaders Membership program, you obtain the next advantages:
- Improve by one class upon arrival, topic to availability
- Every day continental breakfast for 2
- Early check-in and late check-out, topic to availability
- Complimentary in-room Wi-Fi
- Members-only room pricing
On high of that, after you full your first eligible keep as a Leaders Membership member, you’ll obtain one pre-arrival improve per calendar 12 months that can be utilized for any qualifying keep. You merely must request the improve if you guide, and also you’ll learn earlier than check-in whether or not the following eligible room class is out there.
LHW Leaders Membership Sterling membership advantages
If you happen to spend not less than $5,000 on qualifying Leaders Membership stays in a calendar 12 months, you’ll obtain Leaders Membership Sterling standing. This comes with further perks, together with the next:
- 5 pre-arrival upgrades per calendar 12 months
- A 5% annual factors bonus, primarily based on all of the factors earned
Frankly the incremental advantages right here don’t appear big. 5 pre-arrival one class upgrades aren’t that important (particularly in the event you in any other case get an improve topic to availability at check-in), and a 5% factors bonus is hardly something to get too excited over.
Incomes factors with LHW Leaders Membership
All Leaders Membership members are eligible to earn factors for his or her qualifying stays. Particularly, you’ll be able to earn one level per eligible greenback spent on qualifying room charges, for as much as three rooms per keep.
The query is, which stays qualify for incomes factors? Since Main Accommodations of the World is a advertising and marketing group and never a resort administration firm, you typically received’t earn factors in the event you guide direct with a resort. As an alternative, you sometimes solely earn factors when reserving by means of Main Accommodations of the World channels (like lhw.com or the LHW name middle), and when offering your Leaders Membership quantity on the time that you just make your reservation.
You sometimes received’t be rewarded in the event you guide by means of different sources, like on-line journey companies, Virtuoso, Amex Nice Accommodations & Resorts, and so forth.
One other nice solution to earn Leaders Membership factors is thru the Citi ThankYou program in the US, as these are factors earned with playing cards just like the Citi Premier® Card (assessment). Particularly, you’ll be able to switch factors at a 5:1 ratio. This may very well be an effective way to redeem transferable factors for luxurious unbiased accommodations that may’t in any other case be booked with factors.
Redeeming factors with LHW Leaders Membership
Incomes factors is nice, however how do you truly redeem them? Free night time redemptions with Main Accommodations of the World begin at simply 4,000 factors, although pricing varies primarily based on how a lot a resort would cost in money. You may see the price of every keep by logging into LHW’s web site together with your account and looking out resort availability.
Whereas there’s some variance, it might typically seem you get someplace round eight cents of worth per level towards the price of a resort keep. For instance, a $769 resort keep in Paris would price 9,587 factors. In different phrases, this system offers you the equal of an ~8% rebate in your resort spending, which is stable.
To think about it in another way, since you’ll be able to switch Citi ThankYou factors to Leaders Membership at a 5:1 ratio, meaning you will get roughly 1.6 cents of worth per ThankYou level towards the price of an LHW keep. The one consideration is that in some instances you would possibly discover that properties have decrease charges by means of channels aside from LHW.
Is the LHW Leaders Membership program value it?
Main Accommodations of the World’s Leaders Membership program is fairly rewarding on stability, when you think about that LHW is extra of a resort advertising and marketing group than an precise formal resort group. There are areas the place this system isn’t very rewarding, and different areas the place this system excels, not less than on paper.
If you happen to ask me, this system isn’t very rewarding by way of the precise advantages supplied. Whereas free breakfast and room upgrades sound thrilling, the most important catch is {that a} majority of LHW properties belong to packages like Virtuoso.
With packages like Virtuoso, you obtain perks like complimentary breakfast, room upgrades, and resort credit, when reserving by means of an eligible journey advisor. As you’ll be able to see, there’s lots of overlap by way of the perks right here.
What’s thrilling about Leaders Membership is which you could earn a rewards forex for stays at unbiased accommodations that don’t in any other case have loyalty packages. Sadly it will typically come at a value, as you would possibly discover cheaper charges for accommodations when not reserving by means of LHW. It’s undoubtedly a “your mileage could fluctuate” scenario.
Backside line
Main Accommodations of the World (LHW) is a gaggle of over 400 unbiased properties, together with what are considered a few of the greatest accommodations on this planet. Leaders Membership is the loyalty program of LHW, which is free to affix. Whereas it gives some perks, most of them are redundant with what you’d get by means of packages like Virtuoso.
What’s distinctive about Leaders Membership is the power to earn factors for stays at unbiased properties, and you may also switch over factors from Citi ThankYou. It is a good alternative for unbiased properties, although all the time crunch the numbers, since LHW received’t all the time have the bottom charges for its member properties.
What do you make of LHW’s Leaders Membership loyalty program?