Southwest wants you to earn 90,000 bonus points. They're calling it your last chance. Like every other last chance they've offered for the past decade.
The Companion Pass sits at the center of this pitch. Fly with someone for free after you've already paid Southwest to fly you places Southwest flies. Which is basically saying "spend enough money with us and we'll let your friend also experience middle seats to Kansas City."
Here's what they don't mention in the offer: you need to earn 135,000 qualifying points in a calendar year to get the pass. So you're taking on a credit card to chase points to unlock the privilege of buying more flights. It's a pyramid scheme where the prize is Tulsa.
The technical analysis here is straightforward. You're financing your way into a loyalty program by paying annual fees to a bank so you can accumulate miles with an airline that doesn't assign seats. The math works if you were already planning to spend thousands on the card anyway. Which means the math doesn't work.
But retail traders love a signup bonus. They see 90,000 points and think they've hacked the system. They open spreadsheets. They calculate spend requirements. They convince themselves this is different from the last three cards they opened for bonus points they never used.
The real genius is the urgency. Last chance. Hurry. The offer expires. Then next month there's a new last chance with slightly different numbers and the same people who missed the first last chance can panic about missing this one too.
The Companion Pass itself expires every December 31st. So you grind all year to earn it, then you get maybe a few months to use it before you start grinding again. It's a hamster wheel at 30,000 feet where the pellet is Albuquerque and your companion gets to watch you run.
Photo by Miguel Ángel Sanz on Unsplash
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