People who work in 'luxury' industries (5-star hotels, fine dining, high-end brands), what is a complete rip-off that rich people happily pay for?
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I once DJ'd in a casino in Macau. The VIP tables would competitively send bottles of champagne to each other's tables just to signal their wealth. It would be announced over the PA system, but nobody would get the champagne. The bottles never actually existed! It would be like "Table 10 sends 5 bottles of champagne to Table 4" "Table 4 is sending 15 bottles of champagne to Table 10" "Table 10 is sending 30 bottles of champagne to Table 4" Etc Etc This kept on going until they were up to like 200 bottles of champagne. They weren't friends or anything - they were just showing their wealth off to this other table. They got a few symbolic bottles with indoor fireworks taken to the table by girls, but that's it. I asked the owner what it was about and he said they can pick them up on another day if they want, but nobody ever does - it's purely for show. Insane.
I have heard of this being a money laundering method, where the club takes a cut when the overpriced, nonexistent gift bottles are “bought back” from the clients.
Precisely. It’s a classic method. The huge risk for the club, besides legal consequences, is attracting the attention of financial regulators. Once they see consistent, high-volume ‘buybacks’ of inventory that likely doesn't even exist, it's a massive red flag.
One of the more interesting ones is having expensive replicas made of priceless jewelry in case of theft. My surrogate dad in Nassau county, Long Island knows of people who spent thousands and thousands of dollars on "costume" dupes of their best jewelry so they can wear that out and leave the real stuff at home under lock and key.
Imagine a set of costume jewelry worth more than your vehicle. That sort of thing.
About 20 years ago, I worked at a store that sold the “fabulous fakes”’. The women would spend a few thousand on new vacation “jewels” so they didn’t have to worry about losing their real diamonds if they got robbed.
Caskets and urns, I work in a fancier funeral home as support staff (not a director). We literally sell $80 urns imported from India for $600+. A $2000 casket goes for $8000.
Remember that you are allowed under federal law to bring your own urn or casket. Sometimes I feel like there is more financial flexing at funerals than at weddings.
My wife found a beautiful urn on Etsy that spoke to her for various aesthetic reasons (it was handmade in her Mom's favorite color, etc.). It was really meaningful for her. And cheap.
Just cuz we’re bereaved doesn’t mean we’re a bunch of saps!
I work for a high-end plumbing company. We do some truly enormous new residential builds.
The difference between regular and high end plumbing is purely aesthetic. All our pipes are meticulously organized and ran with non-flexible materials. We essentially do satisfying cable management but for pipes. It looks nice and wealthy customers like nice looking things.
if you make your product rare. we are very small olive oil producers, we have all the machines to completely produce the oils ourselves. we work very clean and organic in a way that goes beyond any certificates, so we won't fool anyone on this side. BUT there is certain special oils, ie. the very early harvest, or oil from wild olive trees. we have some wealthy customers, if we tell them we only have 10L of wild olive oil left, they want to buy it all... only to know that they have it and noone else. so we found ourselves lying sometimes about the amount of oil left, it makes certain rich people buy everything available just to have it 🤷🏻♂️
Exclusivity is a drug to the Ultra Wealthy.
My billionaire real estate client was having me go back and forth with the selling realtor on a property over a $10k difference in what he wanted to pay on a multi million dollar vacant lot. He made a point of telling me he and his wife were sipping a $10k bottle of port while having me dick around over 10k on the property. Also the most unhappy client Ive ever had. Rich and unhappy ain’t no way to live.
honestly the markup on wine at fine dining restaurants is insane. i worked as a hostess and watched people drop $300 on bottles we got wholesale for like $40 without even blinking.
The “VIP Lounge access” in night clubs , it’s basically milking a person with low self esteem.
Private nurse to very wealthy people. Sounds like a necessity (medical support) but most of the clients aren’t sick. Just rich and able to do it. They like the attention. I’ve seen so much. Private jets, chauffeurs who sit outside in cars for days on end going nowhere. I watched a 90 year old woman slather LaMer on her arms last week. It broke me. The amount of waste is staggering.
Your industry is legit crazy sometimes. "Oh yes of course you need to be flown from Qatar to Germany on a specialized medical transport private jet just to have your lip filler removed by some german secret celebrity doc. Sure, rent out an entire floor of the 5 star hotel so you don't need to see people while your face is swollen". I work with those flying ambulance jets a lot, this story is absolutely not uncommon. Equipped to do super important intercontinental rescue missions and high-risk patient transfers, actually get used to carry mildly unwell people to well paid specialty doctors.
Less common but the most vile scam I've seen.
I worked for a restaurant that wanted to be on a higher income shelf, in the middle of a white men in finance and gilets district. Very popular business breakfast spot.
They had a huge oven near the expo and you could see freshly baking sourdough bread. The oven was not actually "baking", it was set on something like 40 C so the bread was kept nicely warm but definitely not freshly baked. We didn't even bake it on site, it was delivered in the morning and put in the oven, as a display.
If someone ordered "bread and olives" or "charcuterie board" from the menu we would make a whole event of getting that bread out, slicing, arranging and serving. You would then expect any other order that had bread in there to get THIS bread.
Yeah, no. Any order, like things containing toast, full English, avo toasts etc had generic Warburtons used. FOH staff had to deal with complaints about it left right and centre.
I lasted 3 weeks, the restaurant about a year more after I left.
You cannot effectively slice warm bread. My very nice bakery has signs refusing to slice fresh baked bread. You can -obviously- rewarm bread. The chef at your place would have known this.
Perfect service is service you don’t see but feel. I have been a high end chauffeur for almost 30 years for the 1% of the 1%. Seamless and invisible, as much as possible. Anticipation, discretion and knowing the answer to all of the local questions. The guests assume you’ve been to the restaurant or venue before and know what you’re doing, and you do.
I’ve had to read the wiki on sports teams I know nothing about to anticipate the answers to questions the owners may ask me. Preparation.
It pays and is an immensely satisfying job.
It's that level of service that made the Ritz Carlton famous - they let staff spend $2,000 per guest to make the experience better/resolve issues, without needing manager approval.
I had a friend that worked at the one in our city while in college. So many little details - local newspapers shipped in for frequent travelers from a specific country, dry cleaning taken out by the room cleaners, done, and returned by the time the guest returned, the chef at the restaurant would make off-menu foods for kids all the time.
Anticipation of needs combined with tactful execution of the job seems like a reasonable, and not overly materialistic way, to want to be pleased, in my opinion. I can understand why the ultra-wealthy flock to businesses that provide these services.
see this is exactly what I want to pay for... i stayed at a very expensive hotel when I was visiting a city, and there was this lounge/nightclub that was very exclusive and everyone wants to go to/talks about. I had never been obviously, the hotel had a driver take us, and when we were arriving, there's a big crowd in front (im thinking were never getting in) and he starts going down the alley. I say isn't that it? pointing at the crowd. and he's like yeah but you don't want to get off there, they have an entrance in the back for vips. and i said im not a vip. and he said the hotel already added you to the list, and we skipped the line, didnt pay the cover and felt very cool going up this back staircase to our own table when it was already booked out.
i didnt even ask for that. i just told the front desk in the morning i wanted we wanted to try the club everyone talks about and they arranged all that without me asking. that is what i see as perfect service, i arrive, i have an idea of something i want to do and they make it happen perfectly without me needing to do anything and also being pleasantly surprised. my mind was kind of blown cause i dont normally stay in hotels that expensive.
i wouldnt have even second guessed if the hotel just dropped us off in front of the club with everyone else. i already thought it was nice they drove us for free. everything else was just amazing service that would make me want to stay at that hotel anytime i was travelling there and recommend it.