Our heartfelt thanks to our sponsors, partners and everyone who worked tirelessly to make the 2014 Freddie Awards a success! Special thanks to the Museum of Flight for a spectacular evening. We look forward to seeing everyone in Atlanta for the 2015 Freddie Awards!
Gary Leff brings the evening to a close with some advice to the winners on how to properly box and ship their Freddie Awards. The excitement continues at the Museum of Flight as guests move to the after party to mix and mingle. It’s been a great evening so far and the night is still young!
American AAdvantage has done it again, winning Program of the Year in the Americas for a third year in a row, squeaking by Avianca to take top place. Even after all these years, AAdvantage delivers value that members appreciate. The program works to keep their elite members happy and many would say that the program offers the best domestic award availability of any U.S. airline and some of the most lucrative international award redemptions in the industry.
And the crowd is pleased with American AAdvantage taking the honors.
Suzanne Rubin, President AAdvantage Loyalty Program, accepts the award, thanking Randy for the event and for all the customers who voted for AAdvantage. And more importantly, she thanks the customers for the candid feedback AAdvatage receives. AAdvantage looks forward to continuing to earn your loyalty.
This is the second year in a row that Virgin Australia Velocity has won a Freddie for Program of the Year, and the program upped its value ranking from 8.76 last year to an admirable 9.04 this year. The program is known for its ease of award redemption, which goes straight to the heart of a frequent traveler. Velocity offers last seat availability for additional points and members can pay with a combination of points and cash for flight awards. Members can even get a flight on non-partner airlines with their Velocity points.
Thomas Alberts once again accepts the award on behalf of Virgin Australia and will be taking home the program’s fifth Freddie Award of the evening. (Don’t worry, Thomas, we can mail the awards to Australia – you’re into extra bag fees territory now.)
With an impressive and commanding value vote and percentage of voters for the second year in a row, AIR FRANCE – KLM Flying Blue takes the Program of the Year Freddie Award. Flying Blue offers members a great many ways to earn miles, decent award availability including limited-time Promo Awards of up to 50 percent off and even the lowest level elite members, Silver, get 50 percent more award miles on SkyTeam flights (and then 75 and 100 percent for Gold and Platinum); Gold and Platinum members get free lounge access.
Attending the Freddie Awards this evening from Flying Blue is Herbert Verschuren, Vice President Customer Marketing and Sébastien Reliat-Brunetière, Head of Loyalty Marketing and Communications.
Congratulations, Flying Blue. Sébastien accepts the award.
And in case you would like to keep count … AIR FRANCE – KLM Flying Blue has won four Freddie Awards this evening: Program of the Year, Best Promotion, Best Redemption Ability and Best Loyalty Credit Card.
Marriott Rewards hits lucky seven with its win of Program of the Year in the Americas for the seventh consecutive year. This is the 15th time through the years that the program has won this honor in the Americas. Marriott is all about consistency—in the guest experience, customer service and loyalty program—and their members showed their appreciation by turning out to vote in large numbers.
Bob Behrens, Vice President Marriott Rewards accepted the award.