The Inaugural Luxury Travel Illume Brings Spotlight On Indian Luxury Travel Market
IN ITS FIRST EDITION, GROUNDBREAKING TRAVEL ILLUME EXPLORED AND UNCOVERED THE VAST OPPORTUNITIES AVAILABLE IN THE INDIAN LUXURY TRAVEL MARKET
Singapore 22 February 2022 – Launched by the travel marketplace Luxury Tribe, and the premier of a three-day virtual event on the state of travel for India’s HNWI, ILLUME today produced thought-provoking, insightfully curated travel intel from some of the industry’s foremost players in its debut edition.
Bringing together a deep cadre of experts, from award-winning broadcast journalists to retail finance executives, experts in the consumer luxury sector and wealth creation, elite wedding planners and hoteliers, and top travel agents and marketing mavens, all with intimate knowledge of the Indian market, the event’s various panels dissected India’s booming luxury travel sector from both trade and consumer perspectives.
ILLUME kicked off with an introduction by Sheetal Rastogi, Editorial Director of World Travel Magazine (the key media partner for the event) and Co-founder of Luxury Tribe. “ILLUME is designed to bring the latest trends in the Indian luxury travel market and to bring the conversation of the potential of this multi-billion dollar market to the forefront,” she explained in her opening remarks, before continuing how Luxury Tribe will host two events each year going forward, connecting luxury travel providers.
“The last two years have redefined how people wish to spend their time. People are ready and willing to take their bucket-list journeys, those exceptional experiences sooner than later. We aim to bring the top minds in luxury travel together so we can share and discover the latest approaches and strategies to take business opportunities to the next level.”
Themes of presentations and discussions covered all aspects of the luxury travel business and included a presentation on the burgeoning tourism sector in Saudi Arabia. In her keynote address on The Affluent Indians and Their Spending Trends in 2022 and Beyond, Manasi Narasimhan, Vice President and Head, Marketing & Communications, South Asia, Mastercard, described how the pandemic has changed the way Indians spend, save, and interact with brands.
“The affluent expect to be recognised for who they are. They have done a lot to get to where they are, and the more a brand or organisation recognises that, the better it is for everyone.” Looking forward, she said a lot of wealthy people have re-evaluated their priorities in life, with a huge desire to give back to society and make a tangible difference by doing things like setting up a school or orphanage, and brands should talk to this cause.
She also touched on the growth of health and wellness, and the innumerable options to customise this for the consumer. In terms of travel, she identified how economic upheaval has affected everyone, and as a result people are planning more for the future, knowing now that nothing is certain.
During the panel talk Understanding the Affluent Indian Consumer in a World Turned Upside Down, which cast a microscope on what affluent consumers really want, Anas Rahman Junaid, Founder & MD, Hurun India, noted how he had witnessed an increase in spending toward exclusive luxury products on the back of the pandemic, a way for the wealthy to deploy their capital when outlets like travel became limited.
According to Abhay Gupta, Founder & CEO, Luxury Connect & Luxury Connect Business School, “The prepandemic levels have already been achieved. Q1 itself most luxury brands worldwide have crossed the 2019 levels, some of them have exceeded …. The market is really bullish for 2022.“ Accomplished BBC journalist Rajan Datar was excited to host What Does the Affluent Indian Traveller Want? Travel Trends for 2022 and Beyond, describing this type of traveller as the Holy Grail, with some of the country’s top consumer-facing travel agents as panellists.
“The year and a half we have had cooped up in our homes, we have come to realise that you can earn the money, but time is the real commodity,” said Taruna Seth, Founder & Navigator in Chief, Encompass Experiences LLP.“That is the reason more than ever that travel designers are more sought out more than ever before. People are looking for smaller, bespoke properties, lots of buyouts, and exploring the unexplored.”
According to Loveleen Multani Arun, who as Director, Panache World deals with lots of affluent travellers, her clients are as international as anyone else, and will do as many experiences, and will have the same needs as an American, or German.“If you approach it that way, you can’t go wrong.” International hoteliers spoke during The Latest in Luxe Experiences and How Brands are Embracing the Brave New World of Travel. For Doris Goh, Vice President, Commercial, Como Hotels & Resorts, “the key is to continue curating experiences for guests.”
She has noticed an increase in people booking long stays at resorts, taking advantage of the time and space. “In cities they are checking [protocols] every day, in a resort destination, you have less of that, and we have the space of social distancing and people find that comforting.”
Charlotte Morin, Corporate Director, Marketing, Capella Hotel Group, spoke of the meaning of luxury, which “today is to be off your phone and connect with people you would never have met before. Hospitality is a people industry.” She was proud to say that her brand had opened three hotels during thepandemic, “because life goes on!”
Top planners took the virtual stage in The Grand Indian Destination Wedding Trends. Bhavnesh Sawhney, Co-founder, FB Celebrations Pvt. Ltd, has organised nine large weddings from September 2021 to February 2022, including destination and pre- and post-wedding in the Maldives, and explains that these weddings have never gone out of style. “I think the pandemic hit us in India from April 2020-October 2020 and after that our wedding season started, then the second wave affected us until September 2021 … but we were not really affected overall, we worked around it.”
One trend that Ekta Saigal Lulla, Founder, Weddings by Ekta Saigal Lulla, noticed was how planners didn’t want to call too many people, because many would ask about the number of other guests, worried about the others that would be there. “There has been a paradigm shift in numbers, from pre to post pandemic,” she continued. PR and marketing remain essential tools in getting out the word, as was evident in Selling Travel in the New Normal.
Hemant Mediratta, Founder & CEO, One Rep Global, pointed out that the pandemic has changed the ways travellers are thinking, seeking more meaning in their travel and this has had an effect on travel providers. Yeishan Goel, Founder & CEO, THRS, highlighted a shift in the way hotels operate. “[They] are encouraging people to just be themselves, and this is a fantastic job opportunity for anyone interested in the industry. As the world is evolving, there will be a new type of hoteling, and the pandemic has accelerated this.”
For Christine Galle-Luczak, Founder & Managing Director, Heavens Portfolio, travel offerings going forward will be more researched and more understanding of what there is in the world, and travel will be a discovery and exploration, the true meaning of travel. “People have had time to digest the world and designed this incredible bucket list. And travel providers have digested the pandemic and have been reshaping offerings and experiences and these two worlds will connect again.” Private lodges, private islands, everything private, she noted, will be very strong post-pandemic.
With these fascinating insights, ILLUME wrapped up for 2022, and attendees and panellists left filled with shared wisdom and a newfound appreciation for the riches of experiencing travel, for a while just a possibility, but now very much a reality.
About Illume
ILLUME is the new arm of Luxury Tribe. ILLUME brings together luxury travel experts & influential leaders worldwide to share insightful perspectives & discuss trends in the luxury travel, hospitality & wellness industry with the award-winning broadcast journalists on panel.
About Luxury Tribe
Luxury Tribe is an exclusive, by-invitation-only virtual marketplace that connects the world’s most renowned hospitality brands with India’s most sought-after, yet hard-to-reach high- net-worth travellers. Organised by Southeast Asia’s & India’s leading luxury travel and lifestyle publication, World Travel Magazine, the exclusive three-day-event offers unprecedented access to India’s top travel designers and buyers while its component, ILLUME, offers ahead-of-the-curve, expert-led travel intelligence briefings and
workshops. www.theluxurytribe.com
For more information please contact:
Khushboo Rastogi
Exhibition Director, Luxury Tribe
Email: khushboo.r@theluxurytribe.com
Email: pr@theluxurytribe.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theluxurytribe
