Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) has just joined the SkyTeam alliance, having switched from Star Alliance. This came after the airline emerged from bankruptcy protection, and is now partly owned by Air France-KLM.
Well, the airline has just launched what I’d consider to be the most fun and gamified promotion we’ve seen from any airline loyalty program in a really long time.
Fly 15 SkyTeam airlines, earn one million points
SAS’ EuroBonus frequent flyer program is giving members an incredible incentive to try flying different SkyTeam airlines this fall. The more SkyTeam airlines you fly, the more bonus points you earn:
- Fly five different SkyTeam airlines, earn 10,000 SAS EuroBonus bonus points
- Fly 10 different SkyTeam airlines, earn 100,000 SAS EuroBonus bonus points
- Fly 15 different SkyTeam airlines, earn 1,000,000 SAS EuroBonus bonus points
That’s right, if you fly 15 SkyTeam airline, you can earn a million bonus points. When I first saw the airline marketing a “who wants to be a EuroBonus millionaire” promotion, I figured it was a gimmick, and that maybe one lucky person would win that in a sweepstakes. But nope, anyone can earn this.
You’ll of course want to consult all the terms yourself before investing much time in this, but let me highlight what I view as the biggest points:
- Registration is required through the carrier’s app
- You must travel between October 8 and December 31, 2024
- For a flight to be eligible, EuroBonus points must be earned or redeemed to pay for the flight, so even award flights (if booked through EuroBonus) would qualify
- The number of airlines is based on the operating carrier, rather than the marketing carrier
According to SAS EuroBonus’ partner page, there are 17 SkyTeam airlines, so you can skip two of those airlines. The partner page doesn’t list ITA Airways or Middle East Airlines, and then you could leave out two additional ones.
Purely in terms of geography, it would probably be easiest to leave out Aerolineas Argentins and Kenya Airways. You can easily fly Delta and Aeromexico in North America, and otherwise all the airlines are in Europe and Asia (including the Middle East).
I love the concept behind this promotion
While airline frequent flyer programs are still incredibly useful, there’s no denying that they’re a lot less fun than they used to be a decade or more ago. I think a lot of loyalty program executives have lost the desire to have promotions that create incredible engagement, and which can be gamified a bit.
Look, I get it. Often it’s hard to show the direct return on that. Furthermore, in the age of everyone being on the internet, interest in things can sometimes get out of hand, in the event that an offer is too generous.
So that’s why I love this promotion so much. The reward here is potentially massive, this could get people to do something they wouldn’t otherwise do, and for those that earn a million points, this is something they’ll probably be talking about for the rest of their life.
A decade ago, when I was single, I would’ve jumped on this in a heartbeat. Heck, I’m almost tempted to give this a shot anyway, because it’s just such a puzzle! Now, for those purely “mileage running” this, you’re essentially earning 67,000 bonus points per SkyTeam airline you fly.
If you were to take some SkyTeam flights anyway, perhaps it makes sense to do the math based on the return of the flights you wouldn’t take otherwise.
The issue is that EuroBonus otherwise isn’t that compelling of a loyalty program. I’d value those points at no more than a cent each. So you can definitely come out ahead here, but I’m not sure it’ll be worth most peoples’ time.
In the long run, it’s rumored that SAS will adopt Flying Blue as its loyalty program, but it’s anyone’s guess if or when that will happen.
Bottom line
SAS EuroBonus has a cool promotion, celebrating the carrier joining the SkyTeam alliance. The maximum reward is one million bonus points, which you can unlock if you fly 15 SkyTeam airlines before the end of the year. It has been a long time since we’ve seen a program offer a promotion this fun… well done, SAS!
I’m curious how many people will successfully complete this. None? A few? Dozens?
What do you make of this SAS EuroBonus promotion?
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