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The future of luxury hospitality – Part 4: Exclusivity in an age of access

Cathy Wood, Dec 10, 2025 1:37:44 PM

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Almost anyone can peer into the world of luxury with a digital swipe. Suites are toured on TikTok, resort pools loop endlessly on Instagram and a last-minute ‘five-star’ stay is never more than an app tap away. Luxury has never looked more visible, or more available.

Yet at the very top of the market something different is happening. The guests who matter most are not chasing what everyone else can see, they are hunting for what almost no one else can reach: privacy, space, time bent to their schedule and the quiet confidence that they are one of a very small circle.

For luxury hospitality brands, that tension is now acute. You are expected to be discoverable and welcoming enough for new affluent guests, while still feeling rare, protected and personally tuned for your Very Important Clients (VICs) and ultra-high-net-worth (UHNW) clients. Get it wrong and your best guests start to feel crowded, commoditised and quietly tempted elsewhere.

In this fourth instalment on our series of the future of luxury hospitality, we look at how exclusivity is being rewritten - from inner-circle VIC tiers and invite-only experiences to privacy, time and trust as new status symbols. We explore how brands that manage to be both open and rare can secure disproportionate share of wallet and loyalty at the very top of the market.

The series includes:

Part 1: Personalisation and technology
Part 2: Purpose and sustainability
Part 3: Wellness and the quest for meaning

The new paradox of luxury

Luxury has always lived with a contradiction. It is built on exclusivity - being apart from the crowd - yet most luxury brands want to grow, widen reach and welcome new spenders.

By 2026, that tension has intensified. Social media, online travel agents (OTAs) and globalisation have made luxury more visible and, in some ways, more accessible. You can scroll endless resort content on Instagram, snag a last-minute luxury stay via an app and follow influencers through properties that used to operate in near-anonymity. Luxury is being democratised.

Yet the truly affluent often do not want to feel democratised. High-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth clients frequently complain that luxury experiences are becoming too crowded and diluted. Affluential’s research notes that as luxury broadens its reach, HNWIs can feel “bundled with those who do not share their social status”. Uncomfortable, yes, but also commercially important.

For luxury hospitality brands, the strategic question is sharp: how do you grow appeal and revenue from new affluent guests without eroding the aura of rarity that your highest value clients expect?

Designing modern exclusivity

VIC tiers and inner circles

One answer has been the rise of hyper-exclusive programmes for the very top of the client base. Affluential talks about VIC tiers - Very Important Client programmes - aimed at roughly the top 5% of spenders or most engaged guests.

These are not standard loyalty schemes with points and free nights. They are invite-only inner circles designed to make the best clients feel known, insulated and genuinely privileged. In hospitality that might look like:

Unpublished membership levels for selected UHNW guests
Guaranteed access to the best suite type, even in peak periods
A single named contact on WhatsApp who handles everything across the portfolio
Invitations to private owner events, tastings, yacht weekends or residencies
Scope for guests to influence amenities and set up their preferred room profile globally

It is effectively a private club nested inside a public-facing hotel brand. According to Affluential, VIC programmes are already embedded in key markets: 73% of Chinese HNWIs and 69% of Japanese HNWIs are members of some form of VIC programme.

For marketing leaders, the implication is clear: if you do not have a clear “top tier” strategy, your best guests are probably already in someone else’s club.

Operational reality: bespoke as a business model

Of course, this level of exclusivity is operationally demanding. In a 50-room luxury property, perhaps 5 to 10% of guests will expect a level of customisation far beyond the norm - private check-in, bespoke menus, dedicated staff, flexible policies and sometimes their own security, chef or wellness team on site.

Ultra-luxury hotels have long worked this way. JLL notes that properties serving UHNWIs offer “extraordinarily personalised service and amenities”, often operating almost like a private estate for each guest. That is partly why their rates can be double or triple already high luxury benchmarks.

For everyone else, the lesson is not “copy private estates”, but to decide consciously where you draw the line. Which 1 to 5% of guests will you flex for? What do you build into standard operating procedures to handle unusual requests quickly and discreetly? And what will you politely refuse to protect the wider guest experience?

Privacy, seclusion and the geography of exclusivity

Off the grid and out of sight

Exclusivity is not only about tiers. It is also about space and privacy. CEO Today reports growing demand from executives and UHNW individuals for “remote lodges, private islands and discreet high-end resorts” that offer real seclusion and distance from the public eye (ceotodaymagazine.com).

That is why you see:

Villa-only resorts or compounds with large separation between units
Private islands and remote wilderness lodges marketed as “off-grid” or “off-radar”
City hotels offering private floors, key controlled lifts and secondary entrances

Privacy has become a luxury commodity in its own right.

Extending the bubble through partnerships

The exclusivity “bubble” increasingly starts before check-in. Services such as private terminals and VIP airport suites whisk guests from plane to car without any interaction with regular passengers.

For many properties this continues with house car fleets and automotive partnerships that feel as considered as the rooms themselves. At Badrutt’s Palace Hotel in St. Moritz, for example, guests may be collected in a Rolls-Royce Phantom once owned by Queen Elizabeth II and gifted to the hotel, a car that is as much a signal of belonging to a small circle as it is a transfer. Elsewhere, some hotels have commissioned bespoke Bentleys specifically for guest transfers and local excursions, creating a moving extension of the brand that wraps guests in the same codes of comfort and discretion from runway to resort.

For luxury hotels, smart partnerships with private aviation providers, VIP terminal operators and automotive brands can extend that feeling of protection and insulation across the entire journey, long before a guest reaches the lobby.

For marketers, the story is not “we keep you away from everyone else”, but “your journey is seamless, calm and uninterrupted at every touchpoint”.

Tiered brands and meritocratic exclusivity

Widening the funnel, protecting the core

Most luxury brands now play a tiered game. They:

Create more accessible sub-brands or “lifestyle” concepts to welcome younger and aspirational affluent guests
Keep a flagship or heritage brand at the top of the pyramid
Layer on a quiet VIP or VIC service that operates across the entire portfolio

Done well, the funnel widens at the base while the apex narrows and strengthens. You bring more people under the tent, but preserve an inner sanctum for your most valuable audience.

The risk is when the accessible tier starts to dominate the narrative, making the brand feel crowded or overexposed. That is where clear differentiation in design, pricing, distribution and storytelling becomes critical.

Avoiding outdated elitism

There is a line between exclusivity and exclusion that feels ugly or out of touch. The luxury client base is now far more diverse - more women travellers, younger founders, global wealth from Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Modern exclusivity is better framed around behaviour, loyalty and shared values than lineage or old-money codes. It is about:

How much you engage with the brand
How deeply you invest in it
How aligned you are with its ethos and way of travelling

...Not who your grandparents were.

Marketing language should lean into ideas like insider access, loyalty, passion and contribution and stay away from anything that hints at social gatekeeping.

Time, scarcity and unrepeatable moments

Time as the ultimate status symbol

For UHNW travellers, time is often the scarcest resource. Anything that saves time or bends time to their schedule feels inherently exclusive.

In practice, that might mean:

True 24-hour check-in and check-out for top guests - their timetable becomes the hotel’s timetable
Holding one or two rooms or a villa unbooked at busy times to allow last minute changes for VIPs
Frictionless logistics: pre-filled forms, minimal admin, no queues anywhere

Yes, there is a short-term revenue cost to keeping some capacity flexible. But the long-term value of loyalty from a guest who feels their life is made easier every time they stay can be substantial.

Designing scarce, un-Googleable experiences

Scarcity is still a powerful driver of desire. Limited-time, limited-capacity and “one of one” experiences speak directly to guests who see themselves as collectors of moments.

For example:

A seasonal experience with strictly limited slots - one couple per night can dine in the kitchen with the chef
A 12 seat only world tour on a private jet with an expert host, with your hotel network as key stopovers
A time-locked experience that literally cannot be repeated, such as Air Charter Service’s eclipse charter flight in August 2026, where a limited number of guests fly from London Stansted to stand in the path of totality for a single day before returning home that night

The key for marketers is to create things that cannot be mass produced and, ideally, cannot be easily copied or booked elsewhere. These become your brand’s crown jewels.

Trust, security and quiet luxury

Discretion as a brand asset

For many wealthy guests, exclusivity is about trust. They favour hotels and resorts known for:

Strict discretion, including staff training and NDAs
Sensible limits on photography or filming in certain spaces
Robust cybersecurity around guest data and digital interactions

Some ultra-luxury resorts even limit photography in parts of the property to allow guests to relax without ending up in other people’s feeds. That may sound strict, but for some clients it is a selling point.

Subtle signals of status

Quiet luxury has not killed exclusivity; it has changed its dress code. Instead of gold nameplates and overt hierarchy, status is signalled in softer ways:

The unlisted phone number that only certain guests receive
The handwritten “welcome back” note that references a detail from two stays ago
The feeling that everyone on the team knows who you are and what you like without fuss

This is experiential exclusivity, not performative display. It suits a generation of HNW travellers who may be low key in aesthetics but still keenly attuned to whether they are being treated as one of many or one of a few.

What this means for luxury marketers

A simple framework for modern exclusivity

To turn these ideas into action, marketing and brand leaders can think across four lenses:

People - Who are your true VICs. How do you identify them, listen to them and design for them while still welcoming new aspirational guests?
Product - What is genuinely scarce, private or unrepeatable in your offer. Where can you create new “crown jewel” experiences each season?
Place - How does your physical layout support privacy, seclusion and smooth movement for top guests without making others feel second class?
Platform - How do your brand, content and CRM tell an exclusivity story subtly? Are you celebrating outcomes and insider moments, not just facilities?

For each lens, you can ask a short set of questions in your next strategy session and build a practical roadmap.

Metrics and signals to watch

Beyond occupancy and ADR, you might track:

Share of revenue from your top 1 to 5% of guests
Engagement and retention among VIC or top-tier members
Uptake of limited or invite-only experiences
Qualitative feedback around privacy, ease and feeling “seen” or “known”

You can also watch softer signals: are your best clients increasingly asking for discretion, or complaining about crowds, or skipping high season altogether? Those clues tell you whether your exclusivity strategy is keeping pace with their expectations.

Rarity as a deliberate choice

In an age where almost anything can be browsed, copied or booked online, the true differentiator in luxury hospitality is not just quality, it is rarity.

Exclusivity will not take care of itself. It needs to be designed, operationalised and communicated with care. The goal is a brand that feels “open enough” for new affluent guests to start their journey, yet “closed enough” at the top that your most valuable clients feel unmistakably part of an inner circle.

Get that balance right and you do more than protect your aura. You build a portfolio where aspirational guests are motivated to climb the ladder and UHNW guests are reassured that, however wide your reach becomes, their sanctum remains intact.