Guests rank Starwood resorts online

Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide and Starwood Preferred Guest loyalty programme have launched spg.com/resorts, a new website to help travellers plan and purchase their ideal resort trip.

Starwood’s research shows that leisure guests buy vacations based on the specific experiences they want to have while travelling. The spg.com/resorts website focuses on what visitors will see and experience while staying at any of Starwood’s over 200 resorts around the world.

The site draws on images, including live webcams and actual resort footage, rather than words, to showcase each property. Travellers can learn more about a property before booking through the “Discover Your Perfect Resort” search process, a function that compares features at the various resorts, together with social media plug-ins.

Chris Holdren, senior vice president of Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG), says: “One of our members’ favourite SPG benefits is being able to stay in our inspiring collection of unmatched luxury resorts around the world. We developed spg.com/resorts to make it easy for them to explore each of these incredible resorts. The highly visual website highlights the experiential aspect of travel through stunning photography along with new resort search and social functionality.”

The launch of the site also coincides with the unveiling of the inaugural user-generated “SPG Member Favorites” list. For the first time, SPG invited thousands of its most well travelled members to identify their favourite resorts across nine categories: Best Beach Resort, Most Romantic Retreat, Best Exotic Escape, Best Family Experience, Best Golf Getaway, Best Island Paradise, Best Spa Indulgence, Best Winter Adventure and Best Small Wonder. The results can be viewed on spg.com/memberfavorites.

SPG also polled travel professionals to identify the best Starwood resorts by region, including Best in US, Best in Asia and Best in Europe. These can be viewed on spg.com/travelprofessionalfavorites.

To celebrate the launch of the site, the SPG programme invites travellers to participate in the “SPG Pack Your Bags Giveaway.” From 15 March through to 14 April 2011, a new “member favourites” category will be swapped out every Tuesday and Friday for guests to choose where they would like to win the trip of a lifetime. Ten winners will receive a five-night stay, plus airfare, to the resort of their choice. Members may enter once a day. To view official rules and enter, visit spg.com/packyourbags.