Last week, Meredith Calloway (Chief Growth Officer) and Alvin Adriano, VTA, CTIE (Vice President, Professional Development) joined Host Agency Reviews to host a webinar on how advisors can position their businesses to take advantage of this luxury bubble.
It’s an opportunity worth paying attention to, driven by a few forces at once. According to Skift research, households earning $100,000 or more have gained $30 trillion in new wealth since the pandemic, strong stock and real estate markets keep growing that wealth, and an estimated $124 trillion will pass to a new generation between now and 2048. Affluent travelers are also prioritizing experiences over material things more than ever, and the industry is betting on that demand continuing.
For many advisors, though, all of that feels like it belongs to someone else’s business. The most common hesitation we hear is “I don’t have a network of affluent travelers.” It’s an understandable concern, but it isn’t the deal-breaker it seems to be. Demand for luxury travel is outpacing the number of advisors equipped to serve it, so the space isn’t crowded, and a luxury clientele is something you can build. Making that shift comes down to four steps:
1. Build a brand people can feel. Your brand is more than a logo, colors, and a website. Nike doesn’t sell shoes, Disney doesn’t sell theme park tickets, and Ritz-Carlton doesn’t sell rooms. Each one sells a feeling, whether that’s achievement, magic, or belonging, and everything they put out reinforces it. Decide what you want someone to feel when they come across your agency, whether that’s trust, excitement, or the sense that they’ll be well taken care of. Then make sure every touchpoint delivers that feeling, from your marketing to your client conversations. Luxury clients aren’t shopping for the lowest rate; they’re deciding whether you’re credible, whether they can trust you, and whether you’ll deliver.
2. Surround yourself with the right partners. One of the biggest mistakes advisors make when moving into luxury is believing they need to know every destination, hotel, and restaurant themselves. Instead, what they really need is a strong ecosystem of partners. For example, working with a trusted destination management company (DMC) lets you sell any destination with expertise, whether you’ve been there yourself or not. A good DMC acts as an extension of your business, bringing on-the-ground knowledge, local relationships, and the ability to build an itinerary around exactly what your client is looking for. Your role is to understand your clients and how they like to travel, and your DMC’s role is to turn that into an experience that delivers. Beyond that, relationships with luxury partners and hotel elite programs let you offer your clients access and amenities they can’t get on their own, like upgrades, added perks, and an added level of personalization from the moment they arrive.
3. Find your community. Entrepreneurship can be isolating, especially when you are acting as the salesperson, marketer, accountant, and IT department all at once. Some of the biggest breakthroughs come from a single conversation with another advisor who has already figured out what you’re working through, whether that’s attracting luxury clients or charging a higher fee with confidence. You can be an independent advisor without figuring everything out on your own. Spending time around people who are doing what you thought was impossible makes it look a lot more possible.
4. Develop the mindset to sell luxury confidently. This is the step advisors talk about least, and it may matter most. Plenty of advisors have the knowledge, resources, and connections to succeed and still hesitate to approach the higher-end client, charge the fee, or put themselves out there. When those moments come, two voices tend to show up. The voice of fear says you aren’t ready, you don’t have the right clients, or you’ll make a mistake. The voice of truth says you can learn, build the relationships, and grow. Being unprepared is different from being uncomfortable, and most growth only asks for the second. Confidence is a muscle, and it gets stronger every time you use it.
Knowing what to do is one thing. For busy travel advisors, the harder part is setting aside time to act on it. Between client requests, supplier calls, and trips that need attention, the work on your business is always the easiest thing to push to next week, until another year has gone by and your plans are still sitting untouched. Hope is a fine thing to have, but it isn’t a business strategy.
That’s why we created Mapped Out: Your 2027 Travel Business Strategy Workshop. This three-hour virtual session will give you dedicated time to look under the hood of your business. You’ll dig into your numbers, find what’s driving your results, uncover opportunities you may have missed, and identify what’s holding you back. You’ll leave with the practical frameworks and tools you’ll need to turn it all into a plan for 2027.
This workshop will be held on Thursday, November 12, from 1 to 4 PM ET. Early-bird tickets are $49 (regularly $99), and only a limited number are available. If 2027 is the year you want your plans to turn into progress, secure your spot at giftedtravelnetwork.com/mapped-out.