✈️ It's time to cry "tiers" of joy

Estimated read time: 3 minutes and 58 seconds

Good morning and welcome back to Daily Drop, the newsletter that’s so nice they named it… once. But it’s a darn good name (in my unbiased opinion)…

Here’s what’s on the docket today, folks:

• ✈️ Southwest makes hitting elite status much easier

• 🏨 Wyndham is offering… excellent promotions? 😱

• 🌍 The most colorful celebration in the world

✈️ Southwest makes it easier to earn Tier qualifying points… for now

In addition to offering the greatest offer in travel history last month (which is still happening for one more week, btw), Southwest is now offering not one, not two, but THREE ways to fast-track yourself to elite status.

In case you need a refresher, Southwest has various tiers of elite status, each of which gets you various perks when flying with the airline.

In order to qualify for the A-List statuses, you need to either fly a LOT with them, or rack up what they call Tier Qualifying Points, or TQPs.

Companion Pass requires a slightly different type of qualifying point… but don’t worry about that for now.

TQPs can be earned in all kinds of ways like flying with Southwest, using their shopping portal, or spending on their co-branded credit cards.

Now, however, there are more ways to rack up some quick TQPs:

1. Earn double TQPs on all flights until May 31st, 2023

2. For flights booked with points before May 31st, you’ll earn 10% of the redeemed points as TQPs

3. Earn 3,000 TQPs for every $5,000 you spend on a co-branded credit card (in addition to any TQPs you already earn from the card)

In order to do any of the above, you need to register for the offer, which you can easily do from the “Promotions” area of your online account.

To be clear, these are not Rapid Rewards points you’re earning, only TQPs.

Still, this is a great way to either renew your existing Southwest status or shoot for the stars if you want to hit it for the first time this year.

If you just want to skip all the nitty gritty, you can still just sign up for a Southwest credit card, all of which are still offering a full year of Southwest’s Companion Pass (the top tier of elite status), but only if you sign up for the card before the deadline next week… so you better hurry.

🏨 Wyndham is offering… excellent promotions? 😱

Not to be harsh, but Wyndham is one of the more forgettable hotel chains out there…

Let’s just say that if hotels were members of the Beatles, Wyndham would be Stuart.

Oh, did you think I was going to say George? Or Ringo? Nope. Stuart Sutcliffe was a founding member of the band and left after one year. And then died immediately.

That’s how forgettable Wyndham is…

…until now.

As of this month, Wyndham has over 100 million reward members. To celebrate, they’re offering 5 weeks of promotions, the first of which is already live… and it’s pretty darn good.

Here’s how it works:

• Stay 2 nights (on a single booking), earn 7,500 bonus points

• Stay 3 nights or more (on a single booking), earn 15,000 bonus points

• You can earn up to 30,000 bonus points in total

• You need to register for the offer before May 14th

• Stays must be completed by May 19th

Wyndham reward nights can be booked for as little as 7,500 points, so you can Think of this as a “buy two, get one free” or “buy three, get two free” offer.

Overall, this is an incredibly generous promotion, given that you can technically earn up to four free nights after staying just six nights.

For example, you could book two stays of three nights each at this historic hotel in a beautiful town in Germany for just $62 (or 58 Euro) per night.

The six nights would cost you $372, which is already a great deal if you ask me… But then you also get 30,000 bonus points, which could book you another four nights at hotels around the world.

So you’re getting ten hotel nights for $372, or $37 per night, on average.

Need I say more?

🌍 World Festivals: Holi

Holi is one of the most colorful celebrations around the world. And I mean that literally. If you've ever dreamt of becoming a rainbow, you're gonna love this.

The celebration is a massive party full of music, dancing, and color. LOTS of color.

The highlight of the celebration is people throwing bags of colored powder at each other. Strangers, friends, enemies, it doesn’t matter. Everyone is fair game. Just grab a bag and start throwing that color.

One of the best things about Holi is the way people put aside their differences to celebrate and have fun together.

When everyone is colored with the same powder, they’re seen as equals. It doesn't matter your skin color, class, education, or income.

During Holi, everyone is the same. Isn’t that nice?

This year, Holi falls on March 8. Oh shoot, that’s today… Well it’s never too early to start planning for next year, right?

A great option to get there is to use Flying Blue points, the rewards program for KLM and Air France. It’s easy to earn points with Flying Blue because you can transfer points from so many programs.

A flight from the U.S. to Delhi only costs around 35,000 Flying Blue Points, or potentially even less if you take advantage of one of their monthly Promo Rewards.

Many cards on our Top Cards List earn points that can transfer to Flying Blue, so there is no shortage of options for getting yourself there.

So if you’re looking for one of the most unique cultural experiences in South Asia, learn more about it and mark your calendars for Holi 2024!

That’s all for today! Every day I get so excited when I’m writing this newsletter and see all of these amazing travel deals… We’re living in such an awesome time in the travel hacking space.

FYI, more than half of the deals and promotions in Daily Drop apply to anyone in the world! So all you international folks can take advantage of things like that Wyndham promo.

Thanks for being here, y’all. I look forward to seeing you all tomorrow. ❤️

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