Open letter to John Kennedy, Radisson Blu Hotels & Resorts

We all are receiving dozens if not hundred email newsletters every day / month.

Just now I've received one from Radisson Blu, the Radisson Blu newsletter. Nice layout, nice colors and nice photos I must admit. But listen to this special announcement in the header of the newsletter:

"Win one of 10 gift cards with a value of EUR 100 each" (this has been translated from German into English by myself, so no one else to blame).

Wow! This is amazing! This is mind blowing! This is unique! This is...

Ok, here comes my letter to John Kennedy (his name is underneath the newsletter but I don't know who he is...).


Dear John Kennedy

I think you are joking. This can not be true. Your Radisson Blu chain is offering 10 times EUR 100 vouchers for the winners of this unique promotion?

EUR 100???

I have to repeat it:
EUR 100???

How much is the average night at one of your Radisson Blu hotels? I will have a quick look, wait. Ohh, I see, the Radisson Blu Dublin costs EUR 150 (SGL, no Breakfast), the Radisson Blu Portman London EUR 255 (SGL, no Breakfast)or the Radisson Blu Hamburg for EUR 135 (SGL, no Breakfast).

Hmm, this newsletter was send to the MICE industry, I assume. So you expect us to bring you - this is a guess - about a minimum of 30 room nights per year (per account). So this would be 30 nights x EUR 150 EUR 4'500 revenue. And now we can win a price of EUR 100? This is very generous, indeed.

I think this is cheap, very cheap. In terms of Marketing, this is a disaster (at least in my case).

Maybe with all the acquisition in eastern Europe there is no more money left for the poor marketing team. I feel very sorry for them.

How about giving away 10 x EUR 1'000 or 5 x EUR 5'000 or something like this? This would mean something to us readers and yes, we would participate and yes, your brand awarness will rise and yes, even people on Twitter will write about it and so on.

But maybe that's not what you want. Maybe you think 10 x EUR 100 is very generous...

I hope to get a replay from you, I would love to understand why you are doing such a thing. I am always eager to learn.

Sincerely
Christian W. Frei
CEO
MICEpoint