👑 Earn top-tier status (for free)

Estimated read time: 4 minutes and 53 seconds

☀️ Good morning and welcome back to Daily Drop — the chess grandmaster of travel newsletters… We’re always thinking five points ahead. ♟️✈️

Here’s our next move:

• 🧳 American announces new lounge concept in CLT

• ✈️ Singapore Spontaneous Escapes (and a bonus tip)

• 🥹 Lounge win: Business class to Paris for Dad’s 60th

• 🏨 Earn top-tier elite status (for free)

🧳 American Airlines will debut a new lounge concept

American Airlines just announced a new kind of Admirals Club lounge coming to Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT) later this summer.

The new space, called Provisions by Admirals Club, will focus less on traditional lounge perks and more on a space for those with limited time who want a simple space to chill.

There’ll still be spots to relax, recharge, and hydrate before your flight — but the vibe is more grab-and-go than typical lounge.

Will this be a game-changer for AA flyers? Hard to say. But given the *ahem* variable quality of some Admirals Clubs, we’re here for the innovation.

As a reminder, one of the easiest ways to access Admirals Clubs is by earning status.

Personally, I can access them through my Alaska status, which I wrote all about in this newsletter.

Anyway, stay tuned for an opening date — and we’ll let you know how it stacks up once it launches. 👍

✈️ Singapore Spontaneous Escapes (and a bonus tip)

Every month, I tell you about Singapore Airlines’ Spontaneous Escapes — discounted award flights offered the month before travel (hence the “spontaneous” part).

This month’s list includes some solid U.S. routes to both Europe and Asia, like:

• 🛫 New York (JFK) → Frankfurt (FRA)

• 💺 Business class for just 56,700 Singapore miles

Availability is solid, and even if you’ve already booked an economy flight to Europe, it might be worth canceling for one of these epic last-minute deals.

Looking to fly to Asia? How about:

• 🛫 San Francisco (SFO) → Singapore (SIN)

• 💺 Just 29,400 miles in economy — not bad for a 15-hour flight on a great airline

Naturally, availability on this route is even better — basically every day of the month.

Now, what if you’re looking for intra-Asia awards on Singapore Airlines? Well, for that, I recommend turning to Alaska miles.

That’s right. Despite being in different alliances, Alaska miles offer amazing value on Singapore Airlines.

For example, I booked a business-class flight for next month from Jakarta (CGK) to Hanoi (HAN) via Singapore for just 25,000 Alaska miles. 👇

Just keep in mind that the Spontaneous Escapes deals must be booked by the end of the month, and they’re non-refundable — so make sure you’re committed.

🥹 Lounge win: Business class to Paris for Dad’s 60th

One of our Daily Drop Lounge members just pulled off the kind of win that makes you want to call your parents and say, “Pack your bags.”

They originally booked their parents in Premium Economy on an Air France flight for their dad’s 60th birthday trip to Paris. Not bad — but they really wanted them to fly in business class for the first time ever.

So they booked a “safety flight” — a decent redemption that got the job done — but they kept checking back. And back. And baaaack.

Then it happened: Two business class seats popped up for just 60,000 points each from their home airport. They grabbed them immediately, called Air France, canceled the original flights (yes, it took 90 minutes), paid a cancellation fee…

…and still walked away with a 5-cent per point redemption. 🤯

So what’s the lesson here?

• ✅ Always book a “safety flight” if you see something decent. Lock it in — but keep searching. You can always upgrade later.

• ✈️ Award availability is often better closer to departure. Airlines open up more space when they know seats won’t sell.

• 💸 A $75 cancellation fee is often worth it if it unlocks a massive upgrade or better experience.

• 🎯 Consider using flexible points programs that allow no or low-fee cancellations, just in case.

Come join us in the Daily Drop Lounge — our free community of 60,000+ travel nerds who will cheer you on, share wins like these, and help you squeeze every drop out of your points.

🏨 Earn top-tier elite status (for free)

There’s currently an amazing offer from a hotel program that we rarely talk about.

Right now, Preferred Hotels is offering 12 months of free Titanium elite status to new members who sign up for their loyalty program.

Before we delve into the details, let me provide some background on the hotel chain itself.

Preferred Hotels is a smaller collection of about 700 hotels worldwide that all participate in a loyalty program called I Prefer Hotel Rewards.

While the big programs have co-branded credit cards, frequent promos, milestone rewards, and large footprints, Preferred Hotels doesn’t really offer any of that…

But if you start off with Titanium status (their highest elite tier), it could absolutely make sense to book stays with them.

Here’s how this new deal works:

• Use this link to sign up for a new account

• On the form, the promo code should already be populated (see screenshot)

• Set your country to India… more on that in a sec

The promo is geared toward Indian residents, but I know from personal experience that Preferred Hotels honors the offer for anyone who signs up with the right code (you can update your country to the U.S. after signing up).

I did this exact thing myself for the same offer last year and was pleased to see that within minutes, I had a new account with Titanium elite benefits listed on my profile.

And as you can see, those benefits are actually meaningful:

In other words, you’ll get the sweet perks we normally have to work really hard for with other programs.

And while the footprint is smaller than the big chains, there are quite a few nice-looking properties in the U.S. and abroad:

There’s no telling how long this offer will be around, so here’s my advice:

Sign up, get the free Titanium status, and maybe get some use out of it in the next year. If not, you haven’t really lost anything except a few minutes of your time. 🤷🏼‍♂️

That’s all for today — now go book a safety flight, join the Lounge, and maybe find yourself in Singapore next month. 🤷🏼‍♂️

Ciao ❤️

37.8136° S, 144.9631° E

With contributions by Tiffany Eastham, McKay Moffitt, and Benji Stawski