How Demand For Ultra Luxury Travel Shows No Sign Of Stopping

22.03.2024 - 08:29 / forbes.com

The world of luxury travel has never been so buoyant. Recent launches by innovative and renowned brands are catering for a new group of ultra-luxury travellers who don’t need to look at the bill and who are demanding an increasingly exceptional way to see the world.

“Luxury hospitality is in the middle of a boom,” reports Skift, a leading travel industry intelligence platform. “What is becoming very apparent is a new group of ultra-luxury players who are pushing the industry to previously unseen limits, while catering to a mobile class of one percenters that don’t tend to look at the bill,” the platform reports.

Recent launches, proving this point, include a boom in private jet tours, such as those offered by Titan Travel. Its next 22-night trip for 2024—Captivating Cultures from Rome to Rajasthan—includes stops in Istanbul, Montenegro, Jordan and Uzbekistan all by private plane, with 28 guided excursions included, and priced from £29,995 per person.

Then there is the demand for ever-increasing luxury offerings on commercial airlines, which has seen Etihad launch its The Residence—a three-bedroom apartment in the sky, and Singapore Airlines’ Suites class—offering a further step up from First class, not to mention uber-luxury offerings in the world of hotels, such as Atlantis the Royal Dubai’s The Royal Mansion Suite, which costs a whopping $100,000 per night.

What’s more, as reported by Skift, luxury travel is only set to boom further this year: “With Virtuoso saying more than half of its network, of more than 20,000 luxury travel advisers, estimate their clients will spend more on trips this year. The continued strength is remarkable, given how bullish sales were in 2023. Kensington Tours, a luxury travel agency, said luxury trip values rose 9% last year.”

When it comes to actually getting to the airport, however, there’s nothing quite like a concierge and chauffeur service to elevate the journey. British luxury brand, Wheely’s membership model, is one of the latest services and comes with an intuitive app (with real live people on hand to help), and services such as specialised airport drops and pick-ups, on-demand and pre-scheduled chauffeuring and a concierge service. Headquartered in London, and operating in other major cities, such as Paris, and having just launched in Dubai, Wheely exists, says the company, “to help clients reclaim their time by connecting them to the places and people that matter.”

Laura Allen, Wheely’s director of Customer Experience, comments: “Unlike other luxury ride-hailing companies, Wheely operates in a different market—it is the first on-demand luxury chauffeur service of its kind. It’s more akin to having a private chauffeur. Our aim is that as the company grows, we