The network's newest data names fallcations, city-maxxing and longevity tourism as the forces reshaping how its clients travel, drawn from booking figures and a survey of nearly 800 advisors.
Virtuoso has released its latest read on where luxury travel is heading, and the picture it paints is of a market that has quietly rearranged itself. The trends land alongside network sales projected up nearly 21 per cent year over year, with hotel partners growing 25 per cent and cruise 22 per cent.
The findings come from two places: Virtuoso’s own booking data across its network, and a July survey of nearly 800 advisors worldwide. They were presented at the 38th annual Virtuoso Travel Week in Las Vegas. Four themes carry the release.
Fallcations
The calendar has moved. Autumn bookings rose 59 per cent year over year, with sales up 69 per cent. September alone is up 77 per cent in sales and 55 per cent in bookings, and November grew more than 70 per cent on both measures. Virtuoso has taken to calling them fallcations.
The shift is sharpest in Europe, where autumn bookings climbed 49 per cent and sales 64 per cent. That happened despite rates to Europe rising more than seven per cent, which tells you the motivation is not a discount. Travellers want the version of Rome or the Douro Valley that is not shoulder to shoulder.
City-maxxing
The second theme is the multi-destination itinerary, now the norm rather than the ambitious exception. Roughly half of multi-city trips cross an international border. France and Italy is the dominant pairing, followed by France and the United Kingdom, with Italy and Switzerland close behind. Italy appears in 40 per cent of all multi-city routings.
The practical read is that the connection has become part of the product: the rail leg, the private transfer, the second city.
The confidence curve
Travellers are starting to return to committing further out and at a higher level. Leisure bookings placed one to two years in advance are up 50 per cent, and bookings valued above $50,000 rose 47 per cent. Bookings at hotels charging $1,500 or more a night grew 37 per cent. The average nightly rate at international luxury hotels now sits at $1,653, against $985 in 2019 – a gap that’s not only inflation.
Longevity tourism
Wellness has finished its move from amenity to itinerary, and it goes way beyond the standard hotel spa. Bookings at wellness-segmented hotels rose 28 per cent, sales 44 per cent and average daily rates 23 per cent, with interest concentrated in longevity, sleep, metabolic health and mental wellbeing. It’s part of the rising trend in transformative travel.
Read more: IV drips, cryotherapy and biomarker testing: Today’s wellness resorts go way beyond the spa
Two more findings
Half of advisors report clients actively seeking alternatives to overtouristed destinations, which lines up neatly with both the autumn shift and the wave of new flight routes opening secondary European cities.
And on the question the industry keeps circling, 74 per cent of advisors now use AI in their business, as do 70 per cent of Virtuoso preferred partners. Even so, 75 per cent of Virtuoso clients cite their advisor’s accommodation and destination expertise as the key benefit of working with one, against fewer than half of travellers generally. Seventy-nine per cent of luxury travellers say they are open to using an advisor for a future trip.
Data presented at the 38th annual Virtuoso Travel Week, Las Vegas.