Many major travel agencies are opening special offices and offering unique services ahead of the summer travel season, expecting a boost in demand for holidays from retiring baby boomers, who have extra cash to spend. One company has opened a large branch with more than 2,000 kinds of holiday-related pamphlets on display. Another has set up special counters for railway enthusiasts, and yet another has established a branch exclusively for wealthy clients, where some tours cost millions of yen. While an increasing number of people book air tickets and hotels via the Internet, the companies aim to attract customers with special differences and carefully arranged plans. The firms are currently readying high-priced summer and autumn tours with an eye on the baby-boomer generation.

On May 26, Kinki Nippon Tourist Co. (KNT) opened Luxe Ginza Marronnier--a special sales office for luxury tours--on the eighth floor of a building in the upscale Ginza shopping district. The interior is furnished with high-class woodgrain furniture, a bar and separate rooms for consulting with clients. The office has no signboard and there are no pamphlets displayed inside. The office targets the wealthy, who do not mind paying for high-quality services. Some clients often travel from major cities, such as Nagoya, to Ginza to dine at luxury restaurants and visit the office. "We designed the office to have a relaxed mood because our clients often talk about their orders for an hour or two," said Atsushi Saito, manager of Luxe Ginza Marronnier. The office arranged a tour to Europe, costing 5 million yen per person, that used private jets and luxury oceanliners. It also created a tour to southern France in cooperation with art galleries, which guided clients around scenes depicted in paintings.

In Ginza, JTB Corp. and HIS Co. also have sales offices that target the rich. A JTB official said its office in Ginza acts like an antenna "to learn the needs of people who aren't satisfied with ordinary services." In May, HIS opened a section in its sales office attached to its headquarters in Shinjuku Ward, Tokyo, exclusively for railway enthusiasts. The sales office has a total floor space of about 3,000 square meters, and is one of the largest of its kind in the nation. The section manager said it was for people "who bring detailed information about, for example, the latest train models used in Italy and railways in China, and ask for very difficult arrangements." The section arranges tours for enthusiasts "in which trains are the purpose of trips, not the means of transportation," the manager said.

In March, JTB opened Travel Gate Yokohama, a large sales office occupying about 1,300 square meters on the first to fourth floors of a building near the west exit of JR Yokohama Station. The floors are divided into sections for specific travel purposes, such as studying abroad, trips for mature couples, and couples planning to get married abroad. HIS said Travel Gate Yokohama is like a shopping mall accommodating specialty travel service stores. The company also allows staffers in some specialized areas to take exams to become certified as experts on World Heritage sites. The companies have made efforts to foster employees who can meet the needs of clients with special interests.

The travel industry is currently upbeat as the recent economic upturn has stimulated demand for high-priced travel services, and baby boomers have boosted demand for holidays as they plan trips to celebrate their retirement.

A luxury international travel fair in France will feature an exhibition of digital reproductions of ancient Japanese paintings and a demonstration of Japanese tea ceremony, in an attempt to attract more foreign tourists to Japan. The International Luxury Travel Market (ILTM), to be held Dec. 3-6 in Cannes, France, is known as the most authoritative business-to-business travel industry event in the world. Customers of the luxury tour agencies that gather there hold at least 1 million dollars in assets. Two temples in Higashiyama Ward, Kyoto, will play prominent roles in the event. Kodaiji temple will perform the tea ceremony, while Kenninji temple holds the original works featured in the digital exhibition. Tensho Goto, chief priest of Kodaiji temple, said he hopes the event will serve as a starting point for people from around the world to experience the charms of authentic Japanese culture. Zenyu Asano of Kenninji temple said, "I hope more foreign tourists will visit Kyoto next year."

The Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry and the Construction and Transport Ministry will support the promotion of Japanese culture at the event as part of the Visit Japan Campaign to promote inbound tourism. Seven Japanese firms, including Kinki Nippon Tourist Co., will also participate at ILTM. About 3,500 people, including travel industry professionals, are expected to attend the opening party in Cannes on Dec. 4, where the two temples, along with other partners, will demonstrate authentic Japanese culture through various events under the banner of "Japan Night." The program of events will include a tea ceremony demonstration; performance of Japanese dance by geiko and maiko from Kyoto's Gion Kobu entertainment district; and an exhibition featuring digital reproductions of, among other classic works, a folding-screen painting of a pair of weather gods: Fujin, the god of wind, and Raijin, the god of thunder. Guests at the party will also enjoy culture and cuisine from Ishikawa Prefecture.

Mulboyne wrote:Yomiuri: Tempting travel's big spenders

American Oyaji wrote:I wonder if they'll try to fingerprint and photograph celebs as they come into Japan to do shows.

I wonder if they thought that far in advance.

Mulboyne wrote:America fingerprints all incoming celebrities, business leaders etc so I don't see why Japan would have any reservations about that.

American Oyaji wrote:Well, let's say that American celebs are at a different
..
I mean, Madonna. Can you imagine HER going through with the common folks?

Mulboyne wrote:Not much news here unless can you read Japanese. However, The Ministry of Land Infrastructure and Transport, together with METI has decided that there aren't enough rich foreigners responding to the Yokoso Japan campaign. They are thinking of the kind of high net worth individuals who travel first class or on private jets and who frequent the likes of Monaco, Cannes, Aspen etc.

The Ministry website has three Japanese language PDF files with results of the research and proposals to help hook the big ones. Worth ploughing through if you are a connoisseur of the way the Japanese government wrestles with the idea of how to present itself to the outside world. METI's site has four PDF files but I haven't checked them yet to see what might be different.

Their main conclusions are to go on a promotional binge while also beefing up the local infrastructure. In particular, they want to recruit professional concierge who know how to handle rich people and local co-ordinators who can steer them towards rich people pursuits.

It is certainly true that wealthy people don't seem to be able to get the same kind of exclusive access that they might enjoy in London, Hong Kong, Paris etc. Most wealthy people go through Japan for business rather than seeing the country as a vacation destination. One of the things missing in Japan is that wealth usually means corporate wealth which means that "exclusive" translates into private ryotei, golf courses, corporate retreats and Ginza hostess bars. And that's mainly for the guys. Wealthy women might lunch and shop around Ginza, Omotesando etc but they mainly seem to flaunt their wealth outside Japan.

Mulboyne wrote:Leaving aside your slightly bizarre idea about the prominence of US celebrities, most major airports have VIP facilities but the immigration procedures are the same.

The Russians are coming! The well-heeled kind, that is. Thanks to a booming economy, fueled by abundant natural resources, Russia's nouveaux riches are discovering Japan in style. Typically, these tourists fly to Japan in business class and stay in deluxe hotel suites that can run into hundreds of thousands of yen a night. Some take in the sights of Mount Fuji from a chartered helicopter, hog a sushi bar in Tokyo's tony Ginza district or get pampered at a ryotei traditional Japanese restaurant in Kyoto. In early autumn, two Russian couples in their 40s took a two-hour helicopter flight from Tokyo for a close look at a majestic Mount Fuji against the clear skies. A private photographer who accompanied them from Russia was busy shooting pictures from various angles as the helicopter edged close to the 3,776-meter peak. To charter a helicopter costs about 300,000 yen per hour, according to Eurastours Inc., the travel agency that arranged the outing...more...

Mulboyne wrote:Asahi: Cost no object for Russia's newly rich

gboothe wrote:".....In 2006, 60,795 Russians entered Japan, up about 24,000 from 2002, according to Justice Ministry statistics...."

I wonder how many of them were young blond females?

hundefar wrote:I wonder how many of them are naturally blonde.

Iraira wrote:I suppose that I have to be the first to volunteer to check the Southern shrubbery for true blondage, AGAIN. The lengths that I go for you guys. Sheesh!

...The plan also looks to attract wealthy foreigners, who may want to fly their private jets to Japan to receive medical care...

rooboy wrote:that they DO NOT fucking have the luxury places that comes from centuries of European art or genuinely magnificent monuments, buildings that European countries have or in the case of the US and my home OZ, some fucking amazing, breathtaking, unspoilt wilderness.

I love this place but like Korea, China, and just about any Asian country, Japans a motherfucking eyesore in too many places, overbuilt, concreted over etc and it just looks fucking dilapidated. Seems the craphole called Korea shares Nippon's illusions - they wanna have gaijin retire there in places like Jejudo (which I've visited when I saw my mate in the gulags of Korea - South, not North).

Apparently rich/well off gaijin/waygooks in Korea can pay 500,000 dollars at real value, that is half a million, to live on an island which is passable but then again anywhere in Korea that's not kneefucking high in trash and doesn't stink 90 percent of the time of shit, is passable. The deluded Koreans (just about all of their thinking falls into this categry) call Jejudo 'the Hawaii of Korea'.

Yeah, right and my mate's shitty one room with no insulation in fucking horrible winters and summers that are more like Thailand than Japan, and ceilings that can be pushed up cause the construction is such garbage and the mould growing all the time is the Golden Temple in Kyoto.

Just goes to show how arrogant and inward looking Japan and Korea are. The Asian fucking syndrome - feel insecure because the west looked outwards while they were hiding themselves away and produced peaceful revolutions in art and philosophy etc, developed technology that China had but did fuck all with because of the same frog in a well mentality.

Then trumpet how 'advanced and cultured' Japan/Korea/whatever are. Japan actually has culture unlike Korea but the ugliness and the lack of concern about quality of life and normal landscapes that look like the worst ghettoes of the world etc drags it down. Korea's worse but no surprise cause they're a bunch of shitty, culture-less people who think behaving like zoos and pests is something to be admired.

nottu wrote:Japan is neither inviting nor hospitable to tourists. If you got real money, Japan's a really bad deal.

UnchiSuki wrote:I'd like to see japan bring in some kind of retirement visa for wealthy foreigners.

ie: if you are over 50 years old, and you have, say, over US$500,000 in the bank, then you should be able to aquire residency if you want to reside in japan - and spend your life savings..

UnchiSuki wrote:I'd like to see japan bring in some kind of retirement visa for wealthy foreigners.

ie: if you are over 50 years old, and you have, say, over US$500,000 in the bank, then you should be able to aquire residency if you want to reside in japan - and spend your life savings..

IparryU wrote:Is there a club for people like me?