Marketing to the super rich only makes sense if companies can recoup the cost, 'there’s no point in catering to extremely rich people unless you have very expensive things to sell them,' said Doug Lansky, a former television host on the Travel Channel and consultant.

He added: “Hotels should ask themselves if they want a rich person who pays 350 EUR a night or a middle-class person who has saved up for a while and would spend 400 EUR a night.”

As for cities – they should adopt “smart shopping” policies to make it more practical for travelers of all income brackets to spend money, Lanksy said.

“Copenhagen is an example of a city that doesn’t have smart shopping polices,” he said, “All of the stores close at 6 pm, when most people want to shop.”

Hotel concierges can cater to super-rich and non-rich travelers alike by scheduling daily running groups, “since whether you’re a billionaire or not, you want to have an authentic local experience,” Lansky said.

Then there’s Instagram: it draws in the masses while also detracting from higher-paying guests’ enjoyment of an art or museum experience.

On that, Lanksy cautioned, properties and cultural venues “will have to start weighing whether to ban photography.”

Still, he recommends “treating everyone like a travel journalist or a social media star and wowing guests – a strategy used by both Disney and Four Season’s Hotels.”

This is strictly an exclusive feature, reprints of this article in any shape or form without prior written approval from 4Hoteliers.com is not permitted. Michael Scaturro is reporting exclusively for 4Hoteliers.com at ITB Berlin 2019 - www.4Hoteliers.com/itb.

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