Indian Luxury Travel Market: HIGH HOPES FROM HIGH END

One of the niches of outbound travel from India that has blossomed smartly, even during the Covid-19 pandemic, is the luxury travel market. Destinations, hotels, airlines and all other stakeholders of travel and tourism from around the world are closely watching the elite Indian travellers and laying down the red carpet to tap this highly promising segment.

- Ranvir Nayar & Varsha Singh

The figures can be mouth-watering for anyone. Over 1 million millionaires. The fastest growing large economy in the world. Three-fold rise in purchase of luxury goods by 2030. Fastest growth in sale of high-end homes, cars as well as luxury goods, ranging from the latest Hermès bag to a Lamborghini. Paying upwards of USD 100,000 just to spend a night in a penthouse in an ultra-luxury hotel.

It is a good time to be rich in India. But it is even better to be a vendor of something luxurious, a product or service. And this is what destinations, as well as all the other stakeholders in the entire supply chain of travel and tourism sector are gleefully discovering, as almost every day, a new report comes about the growth registered in the number of extremely well-heeled Indian visitors, who seemed to be hopping into their private jets and flying off to almost any corner of the world.

Endless growth potential

For many destinations, the relatively large number of Indian visitors has become even more significant in the total absence of yet another very promising market, China, which had remained under a total travel ban until February 2023 and which is yet to return anywhere near to its pre-pandemic performance.

This sharpened contrast has drawn a wide variety of players, ranging from destinations and experiences around the world to travel agents, transportation firms as well as shopping centres, travel curators and others to not only observe the growth in the Indian luxury travel market, but also to take a piece of this delicious and rapidly growing pie.