If you’re thinking about booking one of two gorgeous new villas in Tuscany (lucky you – they cost more than €4000 – $6670 – a night), you are not just planning an amazing luxury getaway. You are becoming part of what is coined “the experience economy”.
Villa Thesan in Tuscany – now embraced in the Belmond brand and part of its Castello di Casole property.Credit: Mattia Aquila
Don’t worry, as a traveller, it’s hard not to be. Whether buying AirPods at an Apple Store for inflight listening or sailing on a Disney cruise, you are participating in a broad sector driven by millennials and projected to exceed $20 trillion by 2028, a four-fold increase from 2019.
In the past two decades, big (and often not so big) brands have increasingly focused on being “immersive” – taking the basic exchange of money for goods and services and adding enrichment and identity to go with your purchase, hopefully engendering a sense of belonging resulting in loyalty to the product (and a surge of endorphins resulting in addiction to it, too).
Cruise companies are experts at it. It’s also what all those different hotel brands owned by the one conglomerate aim to do – give you a style of hotel that feels very you in a distinct and holistic way, so you’ll keep coming back.
The world’s biggest purveyor of luxury goods, LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton is a master of it and its purchase of the Belmond travel group at the end of 2018 spoke to the importance of the consumer-enveloping concept to the overall luxury market. The $US3.2 billion ($5 billion) acquisition came at a time when pundits noted a trend of wealthy consumers leaning towards spending their money on luxury experiences, rather than handbags and cufflinks.
No surprise then, that, in adding two stunning villas to its Castello di Casole, a Belmond Hotel property, Belmond pulled out all stops to ensure the experiential aspect was amplified.
The pool and the villa.Credit: Mattia Aquila
Castello di Casole is on a 1300-hectare Tuscan estate where important Etruscan treasures were unearthed. The hotel inhabits a castle dating back to the 10th century that had been in the hands of a noble Sienese family before the film director, Luchino Visconte bought it and hosted stars such as Sophia Loren and Burt Lancaster on holiday there.
Under the auspices of Belmond, it has 39 exquisite suites that embrace the traditions of Tuscany with activities that do the same, from horseback riding through vineyards to truffle hunting.
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