Amex Canada has partnered with the Sheraton Centre Toronto hotel to create the first American Express Club Floor in North America.
The American Express-branded accommodation product is available only to customers who book with American Express Travel and are eligible for its Preferred Corporate Traveler room rate.
That reserves the swanky, executive class floor for frequent business travelers that Amex has identified for special consideration, or whose companies have a rate and service contract with American Express Travel.
The idea was spearheaded by Janice Rodricks, national manager of supplier relations for Amex Canada.
‘The travel industry has to respond to the rising expectations of consumers,’ she says. ‘Partnering with hotels and other travel service suppliers is one way to do that.’
Amex gets a brand showcase in Sheraton’s flagship Canadian property, providing an exclusive upgrade product for its corporate travelers and solidifying its claim that ‘Membership has its privileges.’
Sheraton, meanwhile, gets to catch Amex’s most valued corporate travelers and dump their profiles into its Sheraton Club International loyalty program database. Anyone who stays on the floor is automatically enrolled – for free.
Sheraton can also benefit from Amex’s extensive direct mailouts to its cardholders and travel clients.
‘By segmenting blocks of rooms for our corporate customers, they know that when they travel to the 1,400-room Sheraton Centre that we know where they’re going to end up, what room they’ll be in, and that they’ll be very very satisfied,’ says Stephen Foster, vice president operations, for Sheraton’s owners, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide.
Not exclusive to Sheraton, nine other American Express Club Floors have been created around the world at properties managed by Hilton International and Thistle Hotels in the u.k.
