More than 150 luxury travel leaders are on their way home after four uplifting days in Auckland, trading crisis playbooks and doubling down on personal development and relationships, with Virtuoso’s senior leadership framing the advisor’s role as more vital than ever.
“We say we’re in the travel business. We’re in the human connection business,” Virtuoso co-founder, Chair and CEO Matthew D. Upchurch told Karryon at the event. “We happen to express it through travel.”
Upchurch, now marking 40 years with the network he helped build with his father Jesse, said the conviction that underpins Virtuoso hasn’t shifted: travel is not a luxury line item but something more fundamental.
“Travel is fundamental to your humanity,” he said. “Some would even say your mental health.”
It’s a sentiment that carries weight at a Forum continuing to process the fallout of the Middle East crisis, where a network poll at the event reported only seven per cent of clients are cancelling outright, and 71 per cent rerouting rather than abandoning plans.
A bedrock of resilience
The Forum ran from 23 to 26 March at the Park Hyatt in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, in partnership with Tourism New Zealand. But the wider programme stretched well beyond those four days. A pre-conference activity day gave delegates first-hand experience of a range of Auckland’s luxury offerings. Pre- and post-famils took attendees deeper into New Zealand’s regions, turning the event into a showcase as much as a strategy summit.
A traditional pōwhiri opened the formal sessions before the programme moved into personal development workshops on AI, leadership and advisor wellbeing, alongside dedicated one-on-one appointment time between advisors and preferred suppliers.
Tourism New Zealand Chief Executive René de Monchy set the scene at the event’s welcome reception at the QT Hotel, making the case for why the timing mattered. Australian arrivals hit 1.53 million in the year to January 2026, up 8.8 per cent year-on-year. Twelve per cent of holiday visitors are now staying in luxury accommodation. Twenty-seven per cent dined in high-end restaurants, and five per cent used helicopters as a mode of transport.
De Monchy called the Forum “an important moment to reposition Aotearoa as a compelling, premium choice for discerning travellers.” Kiwi luxury, he said, is less about opulence and more about finding your own version of the country’s 100% Pure positioning: landscapes, people, cuisine and space.
Speaking to Karryon Australia and New Zealand General Manager for Virtuoso, Greg Treasure said the energy between sessions told the real story.
“People here are here because they want to be here. It just changes the whole energy of how it feels,” Treasure told Karryon.
He framed that bond as something forged in crisis.
“This community really does become this bedrock of resilience,” he said. “When you talk to most of them about how they got through COVID, it was collaboration together, working together. That built up really strong bonds and meaning.”
The sense check: nervous but growth-minded
Midway through Forum, Virtuoso ran a live Owner/Manager Outlook Survey. The results were telling. Geopolitical conflict topped the list of concerns at 86 per cent. Political uncertainty followed at 73 per cent. Supply chain issues, reflecting concerns about fuel availability, came in at 44 per cent.
But EVP of Strategic Communications David Kolner, who presented the findings, said the concern is more about how wealthy people feel than how wealthy they are.
“We haven’t really seen this factoring into the prioritisation of keeping those experiences,” Kolner told Karryon. “People are like, ‘I’m maybe not going to buy that thing now, but I still am going to go to Italy and eat the pasta and drink the wine.'”
Where clients are adjusting, they’re pivoting, not pulling out. Asia is absorbing 90 per cent of redirected demand, followed by Australia and New Zealand (60 per cent) and Africa (44 per cent).
And yet, more than 60 per cent of respondents still expect sales growth in 2026. Seventy-five per cent of Virtuoso agencies are planning to hire.
The long game, not the quick win
Michael Londregan, Virtuoso’s Senior Vice President of Global Markets, put the Forum’s central theme bluntly.
“Luxury travel is a long game. There’s no short game. If you’re trying to get quick wins, this segment is going to spit you out,” Londregan told Karryon.
The advisors who thrive in this segment, he said, think in terms of lifetime value, not individual bookings.
“They’re thinking, ‘This is not a $28,000 transaction. This is a $280,000 relationship that I will get if I do a great job and I build trust and I put them in the centre of my thinking.'”
Londregan said the Australian market in particular has sharpened since COVID: “Everyone’s chasing a focus instead of chasing the middle.”
He also landed the AI conversation better than most panels manage.
“If I said, ‘We’ve now got a plane that doesn’t require any pilots, it’s all AI,’ would you get on?” he said. “But a great pilot with no instrumentation? You wouldn’t get on that plane either. What we really want is a great advisor with great technology at their fingertips.”
The Forum closed with its third annual regional awards at Auckland’s Museum of Transport and Technology (MOTAT), home to one of the Southern Hemisphere’s most significant aviation collections. A fitting backdrop for an industry built on the promise of flight.
Mosman Travel’s Sharyn Kitchener took out the coveted Southern Cross Award, with 19 members and partners recognised across the night, before Main Beach Travel’s Mike and Mandy Dwyer walked away with a PONANT Le Commandant Charcot cruise to the North Pole valued at $100,000.
What’s next
Virtuoso’s Forum circuit continues in Bali in early April. The network’s 2026 Luxe Report flagged global luxury travel growth of 10 per cent, according to IATA. Travel Week in Las Vegas in August will feature Brené Brown as the keynote, 15 years after her first Virtuoso appearance.
Forty years. A small collective of bespoke travel planners turned into a US$35 billion (AU$56 billion) global network. Upchurch said the three beliefs that got it there still hold: human connection, excellence, and “human-enhancing technology.”
“I’m most excited about turning challenge into opportunity with a refreshed perspective on what’s possible,” he said. “I’m grateful for a community that believes in growing together.”
Catch up on all of our coverage from the event.
- ‘Beware the threat of sameness’: Virtuoso opens Auckland ANZ Forum with timely reminder
- Virtuoso ANZ Forum 2026: Only 7% of clients cancelling travel despite Middle East crisis
- Virtuoso names 2026 ANZ award winners at Auckland Forum
Want to experience New Zealand for yourself? Check out Tourism New Zealand’s Explore Self-Famil Programme.
KARRYON UNPACKS: The live poll data backs up what advisors are feeling on the ground: clients are adjusting, not abandoning. With Asia absorbing 90 per cent of redirected demand and 75 per cent of the Virtuoso network hiring, the opportunity is there for advisors who can pivot fast and lean into the relationship. The message from Auckland is clear: play the long game.
