oneworld MegaDo | Master Thread

And, just as a side note....

Don't forget that Suzanne mentioned something about Elite Rewards for 2012. A little birdie told me we might like what they have planned for this more than last year.

Cool. Thanks. Haven't gotten the email yet (even spam)...will look for it over the next couple days.

Agree. Though I will say that as generous as AA has been and continues to be, they might be hard-pressed to recognize as big a per capita revenue effect (even amongst this esteemed group) as the TEQM/TRDM stackable promos that ran through January.

It would be very interesting to see a comparative analysis of which set of promos generates more revenue on a per capita basis.

When you think about it, the pre-DO OWMD promo required 20K base to qualify for EXP, and 10 r/t to max out the 55K RDM promo.

In this instance, the experiment does not accelerate elite status (perhaps because there's no further desire to do so as a result of the DEQAA and DEQ11 promos), but for an existing EXP or Plat to achieve the same 55K RDM bonus, one need "only" fly 18,333 base (18,333 x 3 = 55K), which can be done via 4 US domestic r/t transcons, 6 r/t fewer than the pre-DO promo.

EDIT: The above assumes that one flew 0 AA base miles in the YOY period. This was true in my case, as for many other UA customers that have joined AA as a result of the OWMD promos.

Of course there's the chance that one wins a monthly prize or the grand prize, but, at least in my personal situation, none of the incentives is an out-of-the-park home run. CK is a fantastic grand prize, but that would necessitate that I actually leverage it via even more AA metal flights. If AA had a deeper international route structure to EMEA or AsiaPac, this might be more valuable to me. Two SWUs are nice, but if one already has 16 SWUs sitting in one's account, this is less valuable. 25K RDMs is also nice, but again, "only" requires 12,500 base as an EXP or Plat to earn organically. The other benefits (Gifting Gold status, 500-mile stickers, 25% discount code, AC membership) are less valuable to me personally, but clearly YMMV.

I'm in no way knocking a great post-DO promo from AA. Like I said, I think it would be interesting to see which segment of OWMD participant benefits most from this (my guess: those on the DO who were not AA flyers and who still may not have AAdvantage elite status) vis-a-vis those who participated in the DEQM/DRDM or TEQM/TRDM promos..

Very true, but that's why I have the "x3" after my 8243 miles. I'm aiming for the 50% increase, MIGHT try for the 100%.

Agree. Doubt I'll benefit much from this since most of my flying is to asia over the next few months..also I don't know how much I flew last year...if it was a lot, i don't think i'll be meeting the thresholds.

What a great promotion: thanks Suzanne & AA! Already had 2 AA flights booked for later this month to take advantage of the SFO-ORD/DFW DEQM expring 3/31/12 & now with this promo, even more miles as I'm in the 100%, 3x bonus group! Sweet!

Once again, this challenge disadvantages AA loyAAlists. I had 18,000+ miles between March and May of last year, so I have to fly 27,000 miles in the next three months to get any sort of benefit. Color me disappointed. In fact, I'm switching to UA. OK, kidding about that last thing.

Good point, something to consider that may sway some travelers, however I'd expect those to be EQP based and that's a killer for me and the travel policies I have to abide by.

Don't assume.....

Do you know? If so, the suspense is killing us! Ok not really, but we'd love to know!

If it's EQP it's a non-starter for me and if it's miles I'm already going to crush that this year. It's just not a strong incentive for me though I think it could be for some others I know of.

I know there are going to be a few of us in town for the Food and Wine festival

Since re-qualifying for EXP is way beyond a done deal already for me this year, I have no chance to compete for a top two finish in any of these months and need 35k BIS just to get to the 50% bonus round there's no good incentive for me to play. I'm investigating intentionally moving some spend into a challenge for status on another alliance because there is some uncertainty around BK and the timing is right. Not a negative review folks, just a data point which AA might find useful. I'm one of the people who games the system and AA doesn't owe me anything more than what I've been promised. As far as I am concerned they have met and often exceeded those commitments year over year

I'm going to stop commenting on this topic unless I can add something useful to the conversation. For those who are playing, may the best travelers win!

Very generous offer from AA, although I believe i'm going to be struggling to be able to do anything. With so much travel on my plate already booked over the next 3 months, trying to find time to visit the USA again to do a run is going to be near impossible. That said, I do have to head to London in April, perhaps some kind of quick week trip to the USA and just do an insane amount of travel/sleeping on planes/in airports is in order!

I actually want to see EQM/EQP ratio for this group during the challenge period. I am not sure the miles flown will be all that profitable to AA.

Sent from my Nexus S using milepoint

You never know, there are some of us that are traveling for more fixed things

I'm one of them too, as I shifted business travel to AA, but when this group is taken as a whole, I imagine a lot of will go on MRs or SRs.

Sent from my Nexus S using milepoint

I'm not even sure about that. At least I think the population of people who do more than 2+ runs will be limited to a handful of folks, primarily because of the time and money.

For those who flew a lot in the year-ago period, the bonus thresholds may be difficult to achieve. And while there is a potential prize for flying the most base miles or segments, it's kind of like the "prisoner's dilemma" scenario, whereby one's behavior may likely be dictated by what one thinks other's behavior will be. If folks think that someone else is likely to fly more then it may discourage one from even making the initial attempt.

Now if AA were to maintain a public leaderboard, then that changes the dynamic, and would really get the competitive juices flowing.

But as it stands, doing a quick, back-of-the-envelope funnel analysis, I think you boil down 175 participants to a much smaller hard-core group in a hurry, in which case I agree with your earlier post that perhaps this will not be as profitable to AA as it would first appear.

For free no less. Sadly I was a tad too slow to get in on that...even if I'm already here.

Hmm...

DEQ11 (DEQM/DRDM) still runs through 31Mar, right? So theoretically, SFO-ORD-SFO under the post-OWMD promo looks like this:

SFO-ORD = 1846 base / 1846 EQM
DEQ11 = 1846 bonus / 1846 EQM bonus
EXP = 1846 bonus
post-OWMD (for someone who flew 0 base miles 01Mar11 - 31May11) = 3692 bonus

So o/w = 9230 RDMs / 3692 EQMs and r/t = 18460 RDMs / 3692 EQMs. CORRECTION: r/t = 7384 EQMs

Current price for a same-day turn (even before discount codes and gift cards) = $213.60, so CPM (RDM) = <1.2.

Hello Chicago...preparing text messages to my wife.

Me Likewise "0".
But technically 0 x 1.00 = 0 and 0 x 2.00 = 0 so an increase of 100% or 200% is zero.

But I have to assume that if you had zero miles last year in that period - flying 2 miles would put you at triple.

Also good to see that reward travel and lifetime passes are excluded. We likely need a new thread for this post challenge.

I am disappointed as well. I was really excited to be able to participate, but the loyal AA customers with alot of mileage last year have unrealistic expectations. I had 20,164 miles last year. The status challenge did not apply to me as I had already requalified for EXP. My husband and I were one of the 20 people that maxed out on the additional points, so I should be happy. But...it just seems a little unfair that the people that flew very little last year will get the bonus and people that have been extremely loyal have to fly over 30,000 to get the bonus. Seems like a combination would have been nice...like meet the challenge or fly a certain number of miles. I had an unusually high number of flights during this period last year. However, if the challenge would have started 2/1 instead of 3/1, I may have been able to make it.

Looks just like the Hyatt promo. Those of us that stayed 25+ stays or 50+ night for Diamond got very little out of the promo, while the newer customers got the chance to earn bonus points, diamond status, etc..

Sent from my iPhone using milepoint

I love the competitive notion here, although my travel is pretty full for that period and pretty European-centric. I will be in the states for a week or so in April, but other than flights in, will be dealing with family medical issues so I won't really be able to be in the competition much. (with this group, my ~12K AA-metal miles during that period should be a sneeze). Still I appreciate the offers a great deal!