The Tune of Momentum

Running a business that’s very expensive can lead to interesting conversations. Most of my friends, family, and colleagues cannot come close to paying full retail pricing for Fortis’ service.

Just two Christmases ago, my cousin texted me to see about trying Fortis for her holiday trip to New York. She wanted a transfer. I texted her a long reply about being glad to help her, but the best I could do was wholesale pricing on one of our great local chauffeurs. The price, several multiples of Uber Black, merited the following response – “Good for you. I’m glad someone can afford to pay that, but it’s not me.”

Keep in mind this was wholesale pricing! She probably would’ve deleted my contact if I’d given her the retail price.

The fact of the matter is that Fortis is more than the sum of our people, technology, brand, processes, and service providers. Even then, my cousin, and probably yours, too, won’t comprehend why someone would pay so much for what is obviously still an SUV with a chauffeur.

The fact of the matter is that Fortis is more than the sum of our people, technology, brand, processes, and service providers.

Momentum for a principal is a concept that’s hard to quantify. It’s more than the components in the trip. Momentum that compounds leads to huge return on investment for those with the highest cost of time. For 99% of people, this doesn’t make sense. Nor should it, really.

The private jet owners, the envelope-pushers, the world-changers of tomorrow have a home and work environment where their gatekeepers have gatekeepers. They have no conversations they don’t wish to have. The same goes for their aircraft, their hotels they visit, and their meetings around the world. They are catered to in a way that is seamless.

The red-headed stepchild of the travel world is the secure private travel downstream from the private jet – the chauffeured car, the facilitator, the security agent. These transactions happen without enough volume to make them uniform or enough client intelligence to make them tailored. Ground transportation comes off as awkward as a middle-schooler at a dance. And this happens to a principal that hasn’t experienced awkward moments since they, themselves, were at their own middle school dance.

For someone with a high cost of time, the awkwardness is not just an inconvenience. It’s an unraveling of a world in which they don’t need to pay attention to the mundane. When principals lose the feeling that the details are taken care of, they lose confidence in the trip and their team. They aren’t complaining because they are entitled. It’s so arresting to have a service failure, that it punches through the windshield through which they see the world. It’s hard to go back to your phone call when that happens.

What Fortis clients pay for isn’t the technology, team, service providers, brand, or anything else. They pay for the beautiful music this orchestra makes. It makes a song called “Momentum,” and it’s a tune best appreciated when you’ve heard other bands try to play it.

It makes a song called “Momentum,” and it’s a tune best appreciated when you’ve heard other bands try to play it.

Someone who doesn’t use a computer doesn’t value a Mac above a PC. It’s all just a machine with a keyboard to him. Someone who uses a computer for only surfing the internet and email is fine with a Chromebook. But for those who make and edit videos, who use high memory, who use the computer as a creator, the Mac is a tool for momentum. It doesn’t matter that the expense doesn’t make sense to the user of the Chromebook; it just has must make sense for them.

Momentum only occurs when the sum total of all the things Fortis provides helps a traveler achieve more than they can imagine. And that only happens because these seasoned travelers know the broken part of travel and the scars it can cause. When you have what you need without asking and your unspoken needs are anticipated, you have momentum that is hard to achieve. And that redeems your time. The service creates something truly valuable and memorable. It is worth the investment.

Momentum only occurs when the sum total of all the things Fortis provides helps a traveler achieve more than they can imagine.

So here’s to all the momentum creators in luxury travel. What you do is needed, valuable, and often under-appreciated. And for those that know, you are worth every penny.

Just don’t tell that to your cousin.

- Nathan Foy, Fortis CEO and author of What Rich Clients Want