Four Seasons Private Jet Holidays

Imagine spending three weeks touring the world's wonders and staying in four-star hotels by private jet …

Well, TCS World Travel (a luxury tour operator) from TAG Aviation (who provides pilots, maintenance) and operated under the Four Seasons flag have made it happen.

This is what the recent a 16-day “Backstage With the Arts” tour round Europe’s highlights), cost $119,000 each...

The Jet

The Four Seasons' jet is not the usual private jet but a reconfigured Boeing 757-200ER

The interior went from 233 standard-size seats to 52 lie-flat seats in a 2-by-2 configuration. Each seat stretches 6.5 feet, with ample aisle and legroom, and offers 78 inches of personal space. Overhead bins are nearly double their original size (now fitting 189 bags), but take up less head space by tucking up into the crown of the fuselage. A new bicolor LED lighting system creates a clean, calm mood in shades of violet white and soft blues.
TCS's President Shelley Cline declined to disclose specific financial details, but noted that a typical commercial refit would cost around $15 million -- and this was not a typical refit.

The Experience

Four Seasons has been offering private jet experiences with TCS since 2012 but this is the first private jet fully branded to the resort company, giving them much more control over service and logistics than they had chartering other people's planes.
The idea is to apply the famous service standards of the Four Seasons Hotels at 35,000 feet.

There are, at minimum, 21 hotel-trained crew and staff onboard each Four Seasons flight, including three pilots, two engineers, a "journey manager" (travel coordinator), a concierge, and an executive chef. A doctor and a photographer also come along, when adventurous itineraries -- such as diving the Maldives' coral reefs, or game watching in the Serengeti -- require it.
Itineraries are planned to avoid long hauls. On around-the-world tours, flight times range from 3.5 hours to 8 hours, with an average of 6 hours, excluding short "hopper flights" such as Istanbul to Ephesus or Mumbai to Agra. Essentially it's an all-first shuttle from one Four Seasons resort property to the next, shielding you from ever having to manage a single travel hassle yourself. All accommodation, meals, drinks, ground transportation, and even custom excursions are inclusive.

Patricia Davidson, an interior designer from Calgary and her husband Jim, Executive Chairman FirstEnergy Capital Corporation are amongst the guests on the jet's inaugural tour. They regularly charters private jets from Sunwest and NetJets, and mentioned the Four Seasons guest services here as the selling point. Things like visas, insurance, and itineraries were all organized, with swift precision in a kind, respectful and playful manner.

The Food

Executive chef Kerry Sear, who considers the jet his restaurant in the sky and goes about it in a playful and fun manner.

Four Seasons chefs at the hotels provide local ingredients, which are then cooked fresh in the air with an aviation-code steam oven. (Typical commercial jet-style convection ovens can only reheat, leading to typically bad in-flight meals.) Sear chats to guests during the flights and learns their preferences, then coordinates with chefs on the ground to make sure patrons get what they want in the air, customising the food to every guests desire.

The Tribe

In fact the ethos here is more communal in general. There may not be purpose-made social areas like an A-380 bar/lounge, but with three pilots on board, one is always free to chat with guests, as they are with each other. Flying with Four Seasons is a choice to meet, socialize, share adventures and maybe get some deal flow going with members of your new tribe.

Patricia & Jim Davidson didn't sleep much on the flights, because they were always having much too much fun drinking champagne and giving their neighbors nicknames. They wound up forging new friendships and loved their space and all of the people who were surrounding them.

Special Goodies for the Tribe

Four Seasons made sure every passenger got Bvlgari toiletry kit, cashmere blanket, Bose noise-canceling headphones, and a custom-made leather travel journal by Moleskin with matching ballpoint pen. Guests also each receive an iPad Air 2 in advance of the trip, on which they can pre-load music and movies as a personalized entertainment system. They're all yours to keep.
Best part: there's free Wi-Fi -- unlike the actual hotel properties you'll sleep at. High-speed isn't guaranteed, but guests can visit any website and send emails; they just can't stream video content while on board to ensure a good connection. (Instead there's a select library of both new and contemporary films and TV shows available to download.) Taking the tech-forward cue from newer planes, the in-flight entertainment is as good as on any major airline flight.
As for the toiletries, Bvlgari is a Four Seasons favorite. And rightly so; the "au the vert" body lotion has a very light perfume, and a heavy, smooth consistency.

The cozy, full-size Mongolian cashmere blanket almost makes up for this slight, but it's such a bright shade of orange, it will either keep you awake or invariably clash with your outfit.

Four Seasons' B757 is a commercial jet as far as airport regulators are concerned, which means you're lucky if you get to board this plane from a Private Jet Terminal or straight out of your limousine. Pilots land in smaller civilian airports -- avoiding mammoths like Heathrow -- wherever possible. So in Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Mumbai,private jet airports are used; Sydney and Tokyo, not so much.

If a private airport isn't possible, Four Seasons arranges for expedited security lanes and the jet is ready for boarding as soon as you clear security. So, there's no need to arrive three hours early and hit the lounge like the rest of us plebs (which may or may not be a benefit given some of the new ones).

Flying the Four Seasons jet you're also still bound by those 3-1-1 no-big-liquids carry-on commercial security rules, which renders the spaciously redesigned overhead bins a little moot.
Sure you don't have to be shy about bringing that Louis Vuitton trunk -- this plane can handle it -- but you still need to check bags. For the risk-averse, that's worth noting, even if we can't imagine an item going missing.

These less-than-luxe details, however, aren't stopping guests from booking. The next Around the World Tour, scheduled in August, nine stops from Seattle to New York via Asia, is already sold out. Next year, the 24-day itinerary jumps to $132,000.

Could this be a start to new types of airlines

offering this high-end type of service?

Overall a great new concept where you can have a great holiday, travelling with like-minded people, picking-up new friends along the way and finding your next promising business deal started in the sky…

Fabrizio Poli (on the left) is an Aviation Analyst & Managing Partner of Boutique Aviation Company Tyrus Wings. He is also an accomplished Airline Transport Pilot having flown both private Jets and for the airlines. Fabrizio is also a bestselling author and inspirational speaker. You can tune in weekly to Fabrizio's business Podcast Living Outside the Cube.

Fabrizio can be reached on:

Email: [email protected] Mobile: +44 7722 350 017