IHG is running a new quarterly promotion called “Into the Nights” where with a minimum of stays (usually 3 or 4), you can get your choice of 2 free nights at any IHG hotel, or 50,000 IHG points.
I initially was pretty excited about the offer – especially when I thought that you could also get 50,000 AIRLINE miles, though it looks like that is probably not possible.
Initially my specific offer was showing up as blank, but it was finally fixed, and now my offer and my wife’s look like this:
My Into the Nights offer
Carolyn’s IHG Into the Nights offer
There are lots of different offers out there, but from what I understand these ones (especially my wife’s) are pretty common. If you stay frequently with IHG, you probably got one that is a LOT harder to do, but nobody says that you have to always use that same IHG account – the accounts are free to open, if you know what I mean (wink, wink)
Doing the math on my offer
So, let’s talk about my offers. The first one requires 4 nights stay at any IHG brand, and the second one is 2 nights at a Holiday Inn and another night anywhere else. I am having trouble finding any Holiday Inns anywhere nearby for under $100 total (with taxes and fees). When we can stay anywhere, we might be able to get a Candlewood Suites or Holiday Inn Express for cheaper. I’m going to use $300 as my baseline cost for both offers.
So is $300 worth 2 nights at any IHG hotel anywhere?
Intercontinental Bora Bora
Considering even one night at the IC Bora Bora (IHG’s answer to the Park Hyatt Vendome) goes for over $1000, paying $300 for 2 nights there seems like a no-brainer, right?
But…. I’ve got no plans to stay at the IC Bora Bora. We’ve got no trips to the Pacific Islands, don’t have anyone that would be willing to watch our kids for that long, and wouldn’t want to take them here anyways (I just know they’d fall in 😀 ).
Besides, on a lot of levels, I honestly would rather stay at a Best Western or Holiday Inn Express than at an Intercontinental.
Valuing the points
The other way to look at it would be to value the points. 50,000 points for a cost of $300 is a CPP of 0.6, which is good but not amazing. When American Express ran their Daily Getaway sale back in the summer, you could buy 50,000 points for $325, or 0.65 points.
You can also use the Points + Cash “trick” to buy points at 0.7 cents every day.
Originally I thought I’d be able to use IHG Promo codes to get a bunch of extra points, but IHG has been recently cracking down on people signing up for promo codes, so I don’t think I’m going to try it.
But… again, I already HAVE a lot of IHG points. I got the Chase IHG card a few months ago, and my wife got one last month. So between the 2 of us, we’re sitting on 150,000 points already. That’s something like 30 nights of points, if we used them all on PointBreaks. AND due to our Chase IHG cards, we already have 2 free night certificates coming our way.
Who should do the promotion?
Well, obviously if you’ve got a lot of paid stays upcoming anyways, this is a great way to get a ton of nights at super-aspirational places. Especially if you are able to get the “basic” offer like one of the ones posted above.
Or maybe if you don’t have the Chase IHG card and can’t get it for some reason?
Other than that, it’s hard for me to recommend this promotion for family travel. Unless your kids are impressed by 5 star hotels (mine aren’t!) – they just want a swimming pool and a waffle maker!
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
My math is poor so can you help me out with “50,000 points for a cost of $300 is a CPP of 0.6,” I think I can complete my 3 nights at a cost of $200 so want to know where do I stand?
If you spend $200 to earn 50,000 points then you are paying about 0.4 cents for each point. That is a good price for IHG points, but it all depends on how much traveling that you do. Personally, we don’t travel enough that it would be worth the out of pocket expense. We both have the Chase IHG card, so that’s over 150,000 points + 2 free nights. Your situation may be (and probably is) different.
If you want to give me a better idea of your thoughts, I’d be happy to share how I might play it
I would take the offer and use the two nights in NYC. I go to NYC for a weekend almost every year as I live within four hours. Unfortunately my offer was 5 nights and one had to be a breakfast rate so the value was iffy.
Now Lynn, nothing says that you have to keep the SAME account number. From what I saw, most new accounts got the offer that can be done in only 3 stays. Might be worth it depending on your situation
Dan, I have a couple of suggestions for you. First, see if you can get an IHG number for one of your in-law’s. It may be identical to your wife’s offer. You can always use their name first and just add your name as a second guest. I’ve done that several times. You can also use the points for yourself by following the same method.
That way, you would only need 2 stays. Both would have to be in a Holiday Inn and include a Saturday. You can book 2 rooms each time and take the kids along. You may even get an upgrade due to your status. Notice, 2 nights can be consecutive and at the same hotel, so you can get away with only 2 stays.
The place where you can really leverage these is at beachfront hotels in Florida during Spring Break. You can fly Southwest or just drive your crew.:)
You can also redeem these at Holiday Inn near Disney, that can fit 8. I’ve mentioned it to you before. My advice is to take another look and see if you can pull this off. If you complete the promo, you would have 4 nights, or 2 nights when using 2 rooms. Redeem points for a 3rd/4th night, or stay elsewhere using Club Carlson points. Just a thought. You probably saw my post on this, it has links to more posts on this whole topic.
Don’t I still need 3 stays to complete the 2nd “Stay More” promotion?
I looked at it again after you sent the tweet, and it definitely does look like the nights can be consecutive. Of course, you can always call.
Unfortunately, you were targeted with a pretty weak offer. Mine was about 40k points and 2 free nights for essentially 3 one night stays. Definitely mattress run worthy. Is your account relatively new?
I do the same with Marriott and hyatt free nights.
And with Marriott i get 4 free nights at around the same time.
1 personal, 1 business, 1 gf personal, 1 gf business.