TravMedia Launches New Luxury Travel Webinar: 'Looking Beyond the Coronavirus Crisis'

As experts predicted luxury travel would be the first to rebound and is vital to kick-starting the global tourism industry, TravMedia's CEO & Founder, Nick Wayland, invited five leading US travel editors, PR professionals, and luxury travel advisors for a panel discussion on 'Luxury Travel: Looking Beyond the Coronavirus Crisis'.

“On a day when the World Health Organization (WHO) reported global cases topped 5 million, and on the heels of yesterday's U.S. Travel Association announcement that 51% of travel and tourism jobs in the US have disappeared, we were looking for signs of hope for our industry which today's luxury industry experts delivered,” Wayland said.

Panelists included leading luxury travel experts Annie Fitzsimmons, Luxury Travel + Advisor editor for AFAR; Jack S. Ezon, Founder and Managing Partner of luxury travel advisory Embark Beyond; Contributing editor to Conde Nast Traveler and editor-at-large for Robb Report, Mark Ellwood; Melanie Brandman, Founder and CEO, The Brandman Agency; and Misty Ewing Belles, Managing Director, Global Public Relations for Virtuoso.

Annie Fitzsimmons shared insights from AFAR and key takeaways from the recent ILTM industry study 'Why the $2.05tn Global Luxury Travel Universe Will Kick Start Economies Post Covid-19'. In today's webinar, Annie highlighted “how vital luxury brands are for recovery. It's not just fluff for rich people; some of the key points to come out is that it supports 170 million jobs globally of which 90% are small businesses, and (relatively speaking), it's much larger than other industries”.

Nick posed the question that “perhaps exclusivity is the ultimate in social distancing, like private jets, private islands, private villas?” to which Mark Ellwood responded, "Private, private, private” with the rationale that private jet destinations are going to be the first to open up, and he also shared insights on St Barts and Mustique's travel protocols. Tune in to the webinar recording for more details on the 'Second Cleaners, Second Coming', as coined by Mark. Mark went on to say he would expect more people to fly private in Q4 2020 than ever before.

Jack S. Ezon added to Mark's comments that private jets are going to be cheaper in 2020 citing “another factor is the price of oil and lack of lift now because it's harder to get from A to B”. He also announced that they “recently launched two programs that are really resonating, one is a Private Summer Camp program… and Private Journeys, primarily for singles who have been locked up alone, and they are traveling together with eight or ten people max, and we are keeping them in a semi-private situation to be able to reunite… it's so much anticipation and needs in that solo market, it's just a great opportunity”.

Melanie Brandman, Founder and CEO, of the Brandman Agency, and doyenne of the travel industry who represents a number of luxury clients globally, reiterated, among a lot of key industry insights that “While your doors may be closed, your brand is not”.

Misty Ewing Belles, Managing Director, Global Public Relations for Virtuoso, talked to the importance of having a travel advisor, and also that no one should be traveling without one. She also shared, Virtuoso Travel Week will be Virtual for 2020, and, the magazine that has been digital in May and June, will resume print publication in July.

Today's webinar was the tenth in TravMedia's global webinar series with valuable insights previously shared by top-tier media and PR industry panelists in Asia, Australia, and the UK markets. Germany will launch their webinar series next Thursday, May 28, followed by TravMedia France in the coming weeks. Future panels in the luxury series are already planned for Australia and Asia with dates to be announced soon.

To watch the recorded webinar view here.

For more information and recordings of previous webinars, visit: https://travmedia.com/webinars/

A recording of the TravTraining on TravMedia for Media, held in late April, is now available to view here: https://travmedia.com/HDVideo/Show/1470

Future U.S. webinars will assemble National and International Tourism Boards to share insights on how each destination plans to reopen and recover from COVID-19.

TravMedia also recently launched the 'At Home With… webinar series providing a platform for publishers and editors to share their current updates and the best way of working with them during this challenging time for our industry.

For more information on TravMedia or our global webinar series, please contact:
Lauren Michod
Vice President, Communications & International Relations
Lauren.michod@travmedia.com