On this afternoon in early September, the American Express CEO is giving Fortune an exclusive preview of the new and enhanced benefits in store for its Platinum cardholders in the highly anticipated, forthcoming update, the first in four years, that they’ll unveil the morning of September 18. Seated in his glass framed office overlooking the Hudson River in Lower Manhattan, sporting a rose-hued jacket, tan jeans and loafers sans socks, the homespun Queens native—who seldom gives interviews and by the way, doesn’t drink coffee as he’s unimpressed by the aroma—is buzzing with such fervor over the coming goodies that you might think he’s on a super-caffeine high from the Diet Coke he’s sipping out of a traditional 8 ounce glass contour bottles that he insists “which is part of what makes it taste a lot better. It’s great marketing by Coke.”
Marketing it something Squeri knows quite a bit about—and will be relying on to sell the new card, whose annual fee will rise from the current $695 to $895. That’s ahead of the $795 charge for Platinum’s closest rival, the Chase Sapphire Reserve entry that got its own uplift in late June. But Squeri insists that the improved Platinum will provide the richest benefits of any widely-used card today. It’s also worth noting that the uplift represents the biggest investment Amex has ever in a card refresh. “If you use the credits, you’ll they’ll get over $3,500 a year in value on both the consumer and business cards,” he says. “At the $695 fee, that value was $1500 a year on the consumer card. People are going to do the math. They’re going to say, wait a minute, you want me to pay $200 extra for over $1,000 in additional value?” And if people really feast on the new benefits, they could get even more from the new menu, Squeri avows.
