Luxury has been around since 100,000 years when the Stone Age women draped themselves in mollusk shells to indicate their status in the tribe. Luxury is a social currency that symbolizes achievement and success, wealth, and social status. This remains a key factor in the demand for luxury; whether it is visible through ownership or conspicuous consumption of intangible experiences.

There are essentially two ways of consuming luxury: Ownership and Experience. Former is to own luxury goods like a high-end car with world-class features or haute couture with fine craftsmanship tailor-made to your personal taste.

Another is to satiate yourself with Luxury Experiences. In the Food & Beverage world, intangible attributes, such as experiences, are fundamental to creating value. “Experience or experiential” is not just a buzzword, but it is really about how larger than life or powerful you can make someone feel. 

But there is no one-size-fits-all approach to navigating the psychology of a luxury consumer, there are a few psychological clusters that your customer segments likely fall under. Example: The ones looking for uniqueness, The ones who want to look costly to signal status, and the ones who want to use it for personal branding or building a self-narrative. Whatever may be the driving force, luxury in Food & Beverage is associated with some key aspects such as authenticity and craftsmanship, as well as the human element in customization, personalization, and service.

Let’s try and understand these in detail: 

Let’s talk about Authenticity & Craftsmanship. Luxury is not generic, it may be transient but its impact is long-lasting. It is the symbol of fuller, better, and more abundant lives. It is rare and minimalistic and not crowded. It starts with the ingredients all the way to serveware. As menus are getting more and more ingredient-led, Luxury food ingredients are very much a part of the chase for the next explosion of flavor. We are talking about the ones you can only order if money is no object. 

One example is truffles, typically expensive because they’re difficult to grow. The Italian White Alba Truffle is one of the most extravagant varieties. It only grows in a specific region of the world during particular times of the year. On average, people spend around INR 65 Lakhs for a kg of this kind of truffle. A similar example is offering gold in its edible form. Experts can shape the mineral into gold leaves and it is mostly used as decoration on highly-priced desserts. Food is an art and much more because it doesn’t just require to look attractive, but also needs to be edible, smell delicious as well as taste flavourful. It is teamwork and it's essential to hand pick the culinary experts specializing in specific cuisines. In addition to chefs, one needs food design and impact experts to create awe-inspiring setups and concepts. 

The world has a lot to offer so global collaborations are a mainstay to stay ahead of the curve as well as food trails must be undertaken to gather a deep understanding of different cultures around local cuisines. There are dishes inspired by people or places like the pavlova dessert which is named after the famed Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, who toured Australia and New Zealand in 1926. As the New Zealand story goes, the chef of a Wellington hotel at the time created the billowy dessert in her honor, claiming inspiration from her tutu. It is very crispy outside and very creamy and light inside. The show cooking consists of filling the dried meringue Shell (individual size) with different creams and toppings.

Luxury is not about putting customers through a sensory overload instead it’s about more subtle ways of creating a minimalistic luxury aesthetic. The food must impact all the senses. It must compel the consumer to slow down and explore the flavors with thoughtful contemplation and appreciation. 

Edible Landscape

Now coming to the second aspect of Customization, personalization, and service. The human element is of prime importance here as a luxury experience is curated and personal. It cannot be templatized or automated. It involves the entire customer journey. A sense of time, experience, and value is intrinsic to enriching a luxury offer. Over the years the takers for luxury have changed and so has the meaning of luxury. With increasing wealth, a broader spectrum of clients can now afford the luxury, the frequency may vary but the desire for owning or experiencing luxury has increased. As luxury becomes more accessible to a larger audience, it is the experience that must become a differentiator responsible to make a luxury product or service unique and sought after and hence experiences are the building blocks that help us create new definitions of luxury. 

But in real terms Luxury is an offering where there is simply no limitation on budgets. It is focused on culinary experiences that create history with the objective to surpass expectations. It involves giving paramount priority to individual treatment, personal rapport, and attention to detail. It is about an incredible presentation such that one can almost feast with the eyes. It offers expertly designed menus topped with intriguing layouts and flawless white-gloved service, uses only the highest quality ingredients for preparation, and a great focus on intricate scenography to achieve a cohesive look of the Food & Beverage spaces with the overall event design and decor. The layout must be innovatively done and all the elements should be in sync with the central theme of the event.  

Dessert Room

There are also a lot of performances around food & beverages. Apart from the usual juggling and fire shows by bartenders, there has been an introduction of a multitude of other live acts and engagements for the customers. Small ways of engaging the guests to go a long way, like the ‘Image Detox Show’ wherein the guest can print their favorite photo, logo, or anything else they want on their preferred delicious detox juice.

Luxury brands are now expected to reaffirm their exclusivity to offer a highly personalized service. We are building a consumer profiling methodology through which we aim to identify and match the signature style of our important customers based on their personalities and preferences. Today’s luxury consumers are also socially and ethically aware and want their purchases to have an added, enriched and ethical value. The ethically-minded customers consume with a conscience and while they expect the highest quality of experiences that are timeless, they also step up to serve and contribute to projects with an enriched philanthropic value.

The new and evolving luxury behavior embraces a larger purpose, personal connections, and transformative experiences, with deep emotional and ethical learning. Brands need to recognize this shift and change the brand trajectory look within to discover new ways to provide for the individual and for our world. It’s time for a new generation of mindful brands that aim for a better life for all.