Luxury Clienteling Trends - The VIP Store

Luxury brands such as Chanel and Brunello Cucinelli are opening separate boutiques for their top clientele. Whilst they always had separate areas in their regular stores for the VIP clientele before, now they are going a step further to physically separate them for the normal clientele with a different location.

This is a massive investment into the relationship with their existing clientele, as rent, store fit-out and staffing will come with increased costs. So why are they investing this heavily into the VIP experience? It is likely off the back of a looming recession, a time where brands traditionally shift their focus onto retention of their existing clientele. It may also be due to an increased influx of new luxury buyers (remember the long lines out the front of luxury stores post-pandemic? ) which is great news for sales but not so fantastic news for the shopping experience of their top clients who shop at the same store as the ‘newbies’.

Of course providing a luxury client experience won’t be a problem at a separate location where ‘very-important-clients’ will remain among themselves and get to enjoy this next level of luxury shopping.