Jack Ezon of Embark Beyond has shared their Q3 travel trends of this year, and personal connection is at the forefront:
“The way people are spending is changing for travel and virtually every category in their personal luxury lifestyle. Clients aren’t spending less, but they’re spending more selectively, and more on emotional value than on price. The brands earning spend in 2026 offer something unavailable elsewhere: exclusivity, craft, and a creative voice worth believing in. The brands losing ground raised prices without raising the substance behind them, and the customer noticed faster than the brands expected.”
Embark feels that “quiet luxury” is not the shift, but value proposition is. “Brand meaning now carries as much weight as the object itself. Connection is the newest currency. AI is making knowledge a commodity and humans are already placing a premium on human judgment. It’s a shift from ‘I targeted you’ to ‘I thought of you.’ Discernment itself becomes a luxury – not knowing what’s expensive, but knowing what’s actually worth attention. The most valuable thing wealthy people are buying now may be reduction of noise.”
In this report, Embark Beyond looks at:
- PACE: What our numbers are telling us now
- THE TOP 10 LUXURY TRENDS
- THE TOP 10 GLOBAL DRIVERS
- THE TOP 10 OPPORTUNITIES: What we think brands should actually do about it
This connection and personal human touch is something all of our partners do extremely well! It’s part of our selection process to invite a new partner to be a “Passage of Distinction.”
