Black Card: Don't Ask, Won't Tell

January 18, 2007

Q: The other night, a friend paid for dinner with a black card from American Express. Some other people at the table were oohing and aahing over it, but I had never heard of the card. What's the deal?

A: You know the old saying, "If you have to ask how much it is, you can't afford it"? Well, with the black card, even if you can afford it, you can't ask for it. If you go to the American Express Web site that offers consumer cards, there are a variety of choices -- the traditional green, the newer blue, etc. -- but no black.

There is more lore than hard data about the card.

One story says it initially was an urban legend sort of thing -- the card with no limit, available only to a select very few. After getting lots of calls about the phantom card, American Express decided to make it real.

True story? Perhaps, said Desiree Fish, vice president of public affairs and communications at American Express.

She explained that when the card was introduced in 1999, the company was "freer in giving out information about that product." Since then, American Express has been far more discreet in publicizing details of a card that the vast majority of us cannot have.

Also, mystery is a big part of the card's considerable aura.

For instance, on the Internet, there is talk that the card comes in a velvet-lined box delivered by a security guard. Probably not.

We do know this. The card cannot be requested, only offered.

If you have charged $250,000 or more the previous year to American Express cards, the fabled card might just show up at your mansion. Celebrity seems to help lower the financial bars.
The annual fee now for what American Express calls the Centurion card is $2,500, up from the initial $1,000.

Recently the card has been issued in titanium -- not the color like gold or platinum but the metal itself. The card is heavy. If the edges were sharpened, it could be used as a weapon like Oddjob's bowler hat in "Goldfinger."

Speaking of James Bond films, there's a scene in the new "Casino Royale" in which Bond, with no reservation, goes to an exclusive Bahamian hotel and shows a black card to the concierge. He's given a suite at once. In an episode of "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip," when a cast member is thrown in jail and bail is set at $1 million, the network president says to charge it to his black card.

A Kanye West lyric says: "She was like, `Oh, my God, is that a black card?' / I turned around and replied, `Why yes, but I prefer the term "African American Express."" Nelly Furtado's "Promiscuous Girl" remix notes: "I smoke purple, my car white / credit card black, girl I'm alright."

Right on.

Black card holders get free accompanying tickets on trans-Atlantic flights, access to private clubs at airports, after-hours shopping at exclusive stores, a personal concierge to do one's bidding whether it be to track down and buy Kevin Kostner's horse in "Dances With Wolves" or procure sand from the shore of the Dead Sea for a child's school project.

"We can't confirm those stories," Fish said. "But I can tell you that the card is for the ultrarich and the annual spending is unlimited, so there probably are some interesting tales."

So, we asked, is the black card division in a secret subterranean room reached through a door accessed only with a combination of passwords and retinal scans?

"I definitely can't comment on that," Fish said.