Why Santa Is Ditching His Sleigh to Fly Coach This Christmas

Expedia.com®, one of the world's largest full-service online travel sites, today released the holiday video, “Santa Flies Coach” — showing how the Expedia+ reward points travellers earn this year can be donated to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital® to help kids fight cancer and other life-threatening diseases.

To bring this unique use of Expedia+ travel rewards points to life, ad agency 180LA enlisted the most frequent holiday traveler of them all — Santa.

Over the course of a week, Santa traveled 19,602 miles in 49.7 hours. He went from the North Pole (via Anchorage) and flew through Honolulu, Tokyo, Dubai, Paris, Dublin, New York City, and finally Memphis to visit the kids at St. Jude. Once there, Santa handed out gifts in addition to all the points he accumulated on flights and came so far to give.

“Santa flies around the world every year for children, so we loved the connection of giving him travel points to donate to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital,” says Vic Walia, Senior Director of Brand Marketing at Expedia. “More people travel during the holidays than any other time of year. We hope this campaign will encourage people to donate their Expedia+ rewards points to St. Jude, considering how quickly they can add up during this busy travel season.”

“It was incredible to see everyone’s reactions across the globe when they saw Santa traveling. Adults turn into kids again,” says Dave Horton, creative director at 180LA. “It turns out everyone in the world really does love Santa.”

People can donate their Expedia+ rewards points at Expedia.com/Santa. Donations like yours are the reason no family is asked to pay. Share with #SantaFliesCoach.

Expedia+ rewards members earn points on hotels, flights, activities and packages, and most major cruise lines. Members also have the unique opportunity to donate them in support of the lifesaving work of St. Jude Children’s Hospital, which is leading the way the world understands, treats and defeats childhood cancer.

To find out more about the Expedia+ rewards program please visit https://www.expedia.com/rewards/.