by Elska Vuong
If you watched the Academy Awards last month, you might have noticed something… aside from Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga, that is. Marriott has finally unified all of its rewards programs into a new loyalty program called Bonvoy. During the show, Marriott featured a splashy 60-second commercial directed by Oscar-nominated director Jean-Pierre Jeunet as a part of its effort to introduce Bonvoy. The campaign will include activities across 22 countries throughout the year and leverage major cultural events to further highlight the new travel program, according to Marriott.
The new program, which merges together Marriott Rewards, Ritz-Carlton Rewards, and Starwood Preferred Guest, comes after years of keeping the Marriott and Starwood loyalty programs separate, following Marriott’s acquisition of the smaller company in 2016. The acquisition made Marriott the largest hotel company in the world. Bonvoy has an estimated 120 million members, in turn making it the largest loyalty program for a single hotel company globally.
With the ad campaign and its associated tagline, “Rewards Reimagined,” Marriott hopes to raise Bonvoy’s brand recognition, along with the profile of its 30 hotel brands. “It’s about the emotional part of what good travel means,” said Karin Timpone, global marketing officer for Marriott International. “That’s what the campaign is all about — people experiencing the joy of good travel and they have one word to describe it, and that one word is ‘Bonvoy.’ The more people hear that, the more they connect that idea of good travel to our portfolio and that program.” The company reportedly spent extensive time researching, before deciding on Bonvoy, shorthand for ‘bon voyage,’ including investigating how the name would be pronounced by foreign language speakers.
Part of the new tagline also reflects a shift in focus from a loyalty program that is exclusively points and in-hotel-perks-driven. The new program and campaign emphasizes customized, special experiences you can have as a Marriott Bonvoy member, including musical performances, sporting events and culinary collaborations. “We think [Bonvoy is] good because it relates to travel, and relates to Marriott, and also points to something new — that the loyalty program is now the richest set of benefits, and much more than what it was in pieces,” said Timpone.