Also from that previous entry: Elite Traveler magazine exists.
Look at it. Take a good hard look at it. From their press kit:
Elite Traveler magazine that has set standards for providing the most affluent audience in the history of media (Household Income of $1 million+). While there are many travel and lifestyle magazines written for the affluent market, until now no magazine in this category has been specifically targeted to the Elite Affluent—the very top end of the market and the smallest but most lucrative slice. (The wealthiest 1/2 of 1 percent of Americans control over 25 percent of Net Worth in the U.S., according to the Federal Reserve.)
Keep going. Don't stop now! Hey look, a reference to that Two Elite Americans (is that what Edwards was talking about) split:
Today, there is a widening gap within the affluent community itself…Half of Conde Nast Traveler (49%), Town & Country (49%) and Vanity Fair (48%) readers did not buy ANY fine jewelry in the past 12 months, and those who did spent on average less than $2,000…By contrast, the readers of Elite Traveler not only enjoy the finest life has to offer, they demand it! They are unlike the lower echelon of the affluent market who must save and plan in order to treat themselves to luxury vacations and purchases. The Elite Affluent live a completely different lifestyle.
Do you love those who make between $200K and $1mil are referred to as the "lower echelon." Wow. Just the printed table of contents preview for their winter issue sets me off as well. "14 Days Touring Elite India." Can you picture the trust fund princess? "I've always heard that India was really spiritual and cultural, but I've also heard it's dirty. I want to visit it, but you know, not visit the common parts."
The rich are more than welcome to spend their money how they'd like, but if this doesn't serve as the prima facie for a graduated income tax I don't know what will.
I'm also considering starting another one of these magazines. "Logan Square Elite" will be the first column, focusing on the higher end taco establishments. Shoot comments if you'd like to write another article that we can then use to swindle high-end watch makers into buying our ads (ET has at least $35,000 a PAGE in ad revenue according to their info; picture at least 60 pages of ads) and we'll laugh all the way to the bank.
Ed says:
I love the mixture of revulsion and condescending mockery with which they say "can you believe that 48% of Conde Nast readers bought NO fine jewelry last year???"
Implication: They do not purchase fine jewelry, and when they do, they must financially plan and save like common Negroes in order to do so.
I subscribe to a number of travel magazines, and I can understand where this magazine is coming from. It is a huge problem, and has led to a proliferation of travel magazine titles ("Budget Travel", "College Travel", etc), to cater to every income bracket. The general interest magazines will always aim upmarket, because that's where the profit is. But it's hardly helpful for normal people to pick up a magazine, read about some destination, and then be given a list of recommendations for $2000-per-night hotels.
The truly scary part about this is that, as a CN Traveler subscriber, I can state with plenty of support that the magazine has already tilted severely towards the upper income brackets. Almost everything in it is beyond the means of any normal income. Yet these Elite Traveler folks are looking down on it like it's advertising Greyhound Bus tours to Mississippi.
Ed says:
Uh oh….wait a minute. We'd better inform the Elite Traveler folks of a problem with their website.
Their mission statement page (http://www.elite-traveler.com/edmiss.html) prominently features a picture of the Burj-al-Arab hotel in Dubai, which has been described as the greatest architectural achievement of the 20th century. As such, it has received a subsidy from a number of international organizations to offer some rooms at reasonably human prices (~600 per night….expensive as hell but not unaffordable) so that everyone can enjoy it.
Accordingly, Elite Traveler should eliminate this hotel before any of its readers stay there and accidentally bump into a commoner.
mike says:
Ed it is common knowledge that you are a person known to often "save and plan in order make purchases" and thus, Elite Traveler will have no time for you.
I see where you are coming from. I don't read travel magazines, but the travel sections of newspapers (especially nytimes) always assume that you have at least $3,000 to blow a week if you are vacationing. at least. You really have to dig through the travel writings in order to find things on a budget, and then it always has that condescending "if you must, i suppose you can staya at a hostel" tone to it.
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mimi smartypants says:
Speaking as someone who has traveled to many rather dirty places (Yemen, India), however, I often wish there was a sort of in-between travel guide. I'm certainly not an "elite traveler," but neither am I some scummy hippie who wants to sleep with bedbugs because IT'S LESS THAN A DOLLAR A NIGHT, MAN!! I find those type of guides (Lonely Planet, I'm looking in your direction) almost equally offensive as the Conde Nast bullshit because (a) um, the locals aren't stupid: they know what you paid for your ticket, your brand-name backpack, your shoes, etc etc, and (b) you are often causing all kinds of consternation as a white person attempting to stay in the lower-echelon fleabags. Far better to own a portion of your undeniable privilege and stay someplace small and reasonable. There are many, many compromises between open-pit toilets and Hilton/Sheraton sterile obsequiousness. (Did I spell that right?)
I once got all over the LP Middle East Guide's ass, writing them a letter and everything, because they recommended a certain lower-end hotel in Bahrain as being suitable for a girl traveling on her own. SURE IF YOU WANT EVERY SINGLE LOCAL GUY TO ASSUME YOU ARE A PROSTITUTE. Seriously, the hotel was well-known as a haven for hookers and to not tell that to unsuspecting backpackers is either a spectacular failure of on-the-ground intelligence from their writers or plain irresponsible.
Ed says:
I am afraid I can't extend much sympathy your way. I want to, but part of me understands that this is what you deserve for having trusted Lonely Planet guides in the first place.
They are written by hippies. Dirty ones. Dirty ones who are stoned perpetually and oblivious to the world around them. Utterly oblivious. What in their stoned haze seemed like "great local color" was actually "crushing poverty, disease, and an intense distaste for outsiders".
Frommer's "Budget Travel" magazine is the best in-between publication. It doesn't recommend sleeping in mud huts, nor Hiltons.
mimi smartypants says:
Ed, really, no sympathy asked for or needed. Which is good, since you are not the person to dispense it.
Who said I "trusted" LP guides, anyway? I said they were inaccurate, ridiculous, and offensive. And that when I lived in Bahrain I ended up writing them a letter about their dirty hippie inaccuracy. I was not that "girl traveling on her own," by the way.
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