When It Comes to Private Jet Perks, the Sky’s the Limit
6 min
With competition among private aviation firms as fierce as ever, the perks available to new and existing customers keep getting bigger. Gone are the days when complimentary transfers and customised in-flight amenities moved the needle. The industry’s top providers have entered into a virtual arms race, trying to out-do one another with one splashy offering after the next.
“The partnerships with celebrity chefs, VIP access to famous vineyards and sporting events, being invited to play in golf pro-ams … these comped memberships and perks valued at tens of thousands of dollars are part of a tried and tested marketing strategy among private jet companies,” says Doug Gollan, president and editor of Private Jet Card Comparisons, a buyer’s guide that tracks pricing, rules, and policies for more than 80 jet card, membership, and fractional providers.
Jet cards are a way to charter a private flight by pre-paying into a company’s program; a membership requires customers to pay an annual fee to unlock private aviation services; and fractional ownership allows individuals or businesses to share the cost and use of a private jet.
Key players such as NetJets, Flexjet, VistaJet, Wheels Up, and OneFlight have hospitality areas at in-demand events such as Formula 1, the Masters, and the Super Bowl, “places customers want to go, and where you want to make sure you are getting the VIP treatment because the crowds are overwhelming,” Gollan says.
Courtesy of VistaJet
Though the perks don’t motivate users to pick a company, they play an important role for the jet companies, Gollan says.
“The perks don’t drive savvy [ultra-high-net-worth] consumers to choose one company over the other. However, they generate awareness of the companies via media coverage; they spark interest via partnering with luxury partner companies—fashion houses, private vacation clubs, luxury hotels, and automakers—and they allow the partners to market to each other’s clients,” he says. “They also allow executives to mix with their customers.”
This is important because there is a high cost of acquisition when it comes to finding potential clients who can afford private aviation. According to Gollum’s latest subscriber survey, around 40% said they were considering switching providers.
“That’s in line with previous years,” he says. “The perks and the personal interaction can be important in getting renewals.”
Earlier this year, flyExclusive announced that eligible customers will be granted one 12-month complimentary membership to Inspirato, which allows participants to book luxury travel experiences—including five-star vacation homes from Breckenridge, Colo., to Bordeaux, France—without paying a membership fee.
“We do see a wide variety of short-term perks offered in today’s market to win business,” says Brad Blettner, flyExclusive’s chief revenue officer. “We work to build relationships and lean into what our customers value—time, choice, and control—because every minute matters.”
Since becoming a flyExclusive client in 2020, a Delray Beach, Florida-based CEO of a software company who declined to be identified, has attended a number of private member events, from fishing trips and the 2024 U.S. Open at Pinehurst—where flyExclusive hosted around 100 guests in a luxury suite—to the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, Fla..
“In terms of the additional stuff, it’s icing on the cake. We’ve had amazing experiences,” he says. “It’s more than just a jet card. It’s like joining a real club with events you can look forward to. The perks definitely enhance customer loyalty.”
Another provider famous for its events is Wheels Up, whose members receive an invitation to join the brand every year for the Masters. During the golf tournament, the “Wheels Up Clubhouse” offers an array of luxury hospitality, including food, beverages, and entertainment.
Sentient Jet, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, has added 12 partners—ranging from high-end hotels to luxury leather goods brands—to its latest “Exclusive Benefits Guide,” an annual premium perk available exclusively to its jet card owners.
Now in its 11th edition, the guide includes benefits across the worlds of travel, food and beverage, wellness, sporting events, and beyond. The estimated total value exceeds US$225,000, including exclusive discounts and partnerships with brands such as Auberge Resorts, Human Longevity Wellness & Medical Testing, and the Little Nell in Aspen.
“Sentient’s Exclusive Benefits Guide is like the Neiman Marcus holiday catalog, except everything is free or discounted. It’s impressive,” says Gollan of Private Jet Card Comparisons.
The provider’s best-known perk can be enjoyed every May through its partnership with the Kentucky Derby. (Sentient was the first private aviation partner of Churchill Downs beginning in 2016.) Card owners enjoy a “behind the gates” experience including access to Sentient’s private suite, where they can mingle with celebrity guests. A highlight is the annual Derby Day breakfast, a French-inspired bash in the Hotel Distil hosted by celebrity chef and Sentient Jet brand ambassador Bobby Flay. (As an extra perk for new card owners, Sentient offers a complimentary hour of flight time and a US$2,500 betting voucher.)
“Our longstanding partnership with the Kentucky Derby and Bobby Flay goes beyond a hosted breakfast—it’s a reflection of how we like to curate experiences for our card owners,” says Kirsten LaMotte, senior vice president, business development, partnerships and events at Sentient Jet. “We are proud to help our card owners focus less on the stress of getting to their events, and more on helping create unique travel memories.”
Meagan Jordan
VistaJet offers its biggest perks through its “Private World” portfolio of bespoke adventures crafted by the provider and its network of hundreds of trusted partners. In 2023, member requests more than doubled from the previous year, and 2024 is on track to surpass this, according to the company.
“We view Private World as a valuable enhancement to our members’ lives that extends beyond their time spent in the air,” says Matteo Atti, VistaJet’s chief marketing officer. “Private World is more than hedonistic; it’s a testament to our dedication to our members’ lives, in the air and on the ground.”
Notable examples include personalised wine tours, rejuvenating wellness retreats, and ultimate Formula 1 packages—a benefit of VistaJet’s partnership with Ferrari—featuring private dinners with drivers Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.
The newest curated experiences and events for VistaJet members include a luxury cacao travel experience in Ecuador, and a humpback whale helicopter safari in Mozambique.
Like most providers, VistaJet refrains from commenting on specific customers.
Nearing 25 years in business, Flexjet has introduced its “Red Label” program. Offered to super-midsize aircraft fractional owners and above, key features include flight crews assigned to a single, specific aircraft, custom cabin interiors, and exclusive experiences such as the inaugural “Chairman’s Club” event. Clients have jetted to the likes of Anguilla and Lake Como, where they’ve been hosted by Flexjet’s chairman Kenn Ricci and CEO Mike Silvestro. (The only caveat was that the owners were required to use their fractional share to travel to the destination—the rest of the trip was complimentary.)
At the Anguilla event, 12 couples enjoyed accommodations at Cap Juluca, a Belmond Hotel, along with golfing and spa experiences, an exclusive luncheon on a private island, and a fireworks display that concluded the extended weekend. Earlier this year, 15 couples were hosted at Lake Como’s Villa d’Este while enjoying one-of-a-kind experiences including shopping with a Vogue fashion editor and a helicopter excursion to Lake Iseo where they enjoyed a private tour of Ferretti Group’s Riva shipyard (a tour not available to the public).
Next year, Ricci and Silvestro will be hosting the next Chairman’s Club event in San Miguel, Mexico.
According to David Gitman, CEO of Monarch Air Group, a Fort Lauderdale-based private jet charter provider, the private aviation industry has been experiencing a correction following a surge of interest during the pandemic.
“As the market cools off, the consumer has many more choices now as there are more available aircraft, compared to the shortage we experienced a few years earlier. This causes charter companies to provide more perks to the consumer,” he says. “In my opinion, the main perk that is happening right now is the competition between the various private jet providers. Clients that are not locked in to an agreement are benefiting from this market correction.”
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In a series of social-media posts, the eldest child of David and Victoria Beckham threw stones at the image of a ‘perfect family’.
3 min
David Beckham was at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday with Bank of America chief executive Brian Moynihan to promote their new partnership. But all anyone wanted to talk about was his son.
After the obligatory questions about business and the World Cup, a host on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” lobbed Beckham an out-of-left-field query about how young people can preserve their mental health in the age of social media.
“Children are allowed to make mistakes,” Beckham, 50, said. “That’s how they learn. So, that’s what I try to teach my kids, but you have to sometimes let them make those mistakes as well.”
Just a day earlier, his 26-year-old son Brooklyn Beckham had posted a series of accusations about his soccer-famous father and pop-star-turned-fashion-designer mother, Victoria Beckham.
He said that his parents had controlled him for years, lied about him to the press and sought to damage his relationship with his wife, Nicola Peltz Beckham. Their goal, he said, was to affect the image of a “perfect family.”
“My family values public promotion and endorsements above all else,” he wrote on Instagram. “Brand Beckham comes first.”
That brand has been burnished over decades of professional triumphs, tabloid scandals and slick dealmaking.
Recently, both David and Victoria Beckham put their legacies on-screen in docuseries that cast them as hardworking entrepreneurs and devoted parents. Their image appeared stronger than ever. Now their firstborn child is throwing stones.
Representatives for David Beckham, Victoria Beckham and Brooklyn Beckham did not respond to requests for comment. A representative for Nicola Peltz Beckham declined to comment.
In the U.K., the Beckhams are as close as you can get to royalty without sharing Windsor DNA. David is perhaps the most famous English player in soccer history, while Victoria parlayed her Spice Girls fame into a career as a respected fashion designer.
Their partnership was forged in the cauldron of 1990s celebrity gossip, with their every move—in their careers, their bumpy personal lives and their adventurous senses of personal style—subject to tabloid scrutiny.
“They were Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce before Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce,” said Elaine Lui, founder of the website Lainey Gossip.
Over time, the couple became savvy managers of their own brand, a sprawling modern empire including a professional soccer team, fashion and beauty lines, investment deals and commercial partnerships.
In recent years they each released a Netflix docuseries—“Beckham” in 2023, “Victoria Beckham” in 2025—featuring scenes from their private family life. (Brooklyn and Nicola appeared in David’s series, but not Victoria’s.)
“The way they’ve performed their celebrity has been togetherness,” Lui said: Appearing and engaging with the world as a happily married couple, in both relative calm and amid scandal. And as their family grew, their four children became smiling ambassadors for Brand Beckham, too.
Until Monday night. In a series of Instagram Story posts, Brooklyn accused his parents of “trying endlessly to ruin” his marriage to Nicola, an actress and model, and the daughter of billionaire investor Nelson Peltz . Brooklyn declared, “I do not want to reconcile with my family.”
Where Victoria and David seemed to see press scrutiny as part of the job, Brooklyn and Nicola are operating in a manner more typical of their own generation. Brooklyn’s posts call to mind the “no contact” boundaries some children have enforced with their parents in recent years to much pop-psych chatter.
Andrew Friedman, managing director of crisis communications at Orchestra, said he’d advised many clients through family drama. “Going public,” he said, should be a “last resort.”
He’s also warned clients that using social media to air grievances opens a can of worms. “Nuance is not welcome in social-media feeding frenzies,” Friedman said. “Sensational and unusual details will overshadow the central issue.”
Brooklyn, the eldest of the Beckhams’ four children, has built a following in his parents’ image, though without the benefit (or burden) of a steady career.
He’s worked as a model, photographer, cooking-show host and most recently founded a hot-sauce brand. Brooklyn and Nicola went public with their relationship in 2020 and married in a lavish 2022 ceremony at her family estate in Palm Beach, Fla.
Rumors of a family feud flared almost immediately after the wedding, including whispers about the fact that Nicola didn’t wear a dress made by her fashion-designer mother-in-law.
Brooklyn on Monday recounted further grievances related to a mother-son dance and the seating chart. In the months and years that followed, celebrity journalists and fans closely tracked both generations of the family, looking for cracks in the relationship.
But official dispatches from Beckham World suggested that things were just fine. In a scene from the final episode of David’s Netflix series, the Beckham family, including Brooklyn and Nicola, joke around on a visit to their country home. It’s a picture of familial bliss.
“We’ve tried to give our children the most normal upbringing as possible. But you’ve got a dad that was England captain and a mom that was Posh Spice,” David says in voice-over.
“And they could be little s—s. And they’re not. And that’s why I say I’m so proud of my children, and I’m so in awe of my children, the way they’ve turned out.”
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