Virtuoso's Travel Agents Say Luxury Bubble Presents New Booking Challenges
Photo Credit: Virtuoso Travel Advisors are seeing an uptick in for bookings to Japan in 2023. Photo by David Edelstein on Unsplash / Photo by David Edelstein on Unsplash
Skift Take
Affluent travelers, prepared to spend as much as $48,000 per person this year on travel, are ironically driving a competitive price surge unlikely to come down in the year ahead.
Affluent U.S. travelers are ready to drop some serious money on their travel plans in 2023 and they’re keeping Virtuoso’s global network of luxury travel agents busier than ever.
The company reported a surge in bookings for 2023, up 152 percent compared to 2019, with no signs of the luxury bubble stopping any time soon. David Kolner, Virtuoso executive vice president, added high demand was fueling competitive pricing across travel. Kolner, in an interview with Skift this week, said he was recapping from a recent owners meeting held in San Franscisco.
Kolner said hotels are leading the way in bookings, up 235 percent over 2019, with the average daily room rates (ADRs) booked from the Virtuoso network "continually hitting records."
“We're expecting another ten to 15 percent increase in (room rates). That's 83 percent over 2019,” he added, warning prices are not going to come down and advisors who are waiting to book that special room in Italy, for example, might already be too late for summer 2023.
Increased pricing pressure was echoed in earn
