Here’s a problem most of us would love to have. What if you had so much money that you needed to hire someone just to help you enjoy it?
For about 145 families, that someone is Fischer Unlimited, a New York luxury concierge firm that charges $150,000 just to become a client, plus a $25k annual fee. “Their time is precious,” says CEO and president Stacy Fischer-Rosenthal. “They really want to make sure that professionals are handling their needs.”
Take Taylor Swift tickets. During the Eras Tour, one client wanted to go at the last minute. Fischer didn’t just find seats. Stacy’s son, Max Rosenthal, the company’s vice president, says the firm got the client into the owner’s box and arranged a private helicopter transfer for the weekend.
What’s their secret? “It’s about the relationships,” Max says. The trick is finding the right person to call, then having that person persuade whoever has what your client wants.
Getting people past the velvet rope is the family business. Stacy’s father, Bill Fischer, founded the company as Fischer Travel more than 60 years ago. He started charging fees once he figured out how to get clients into places like the Hotel du Cap in Antibes, which didn’t work with travel agents. About 30 years ago, he asked every client to pay $5,000 to stay on. Some left, some stayed, and the firm went all in on high-end travelers.
Stacy joined 44 years ago, when her clients were twentysomething hedge funders who wanted to skip the line at nightclubs. Now she handles everything from dinner reservations to birthday gifts, which is why the company recently changed its name. “We really do so much more than travel,” she says. Her staff of about 45 includes no independent contractors, and some families have been clients for three generations.
And the requests can get huge. Last August, in a scene straight out of Succession, a client chartered Belmond’s Royal Scotsman train for a weeklong birthday trip with 20 friends. The firm paid four booked parties to travel a different week. At a pop-up shop at Gleneagles, guests were fitted for tartans and Barbour jackets, with everyone’s sizes already stocked. The client brought 70 pieces of luggage, so valets ran outfits to each cabin from trailers full of clothes. There were vintage cars, castle tours with a Scottish lord and a fireworks finale in Edinburgh with 100 more guests. About 400 people worked on it. The bill is coming in around $24 million.
Other jobs require detective work. One client noticed that Prince Harry always wears a bracelet he was given in Africa after his mother died, and he wanted a replica. Stacy’s vendor in South Africa couldn’t pin down where it came from. Then a business partner offered to ask Meghan Markle. Harry’s former nanny, who had been on that trip, helped trace the bracelet to the village where it was made. The all-in price was about $15,000, including a book documenting the search.
Max insists the firm doesn’t just throw money at problems. “No very successful person became very rich by spending recklessly,” he says. But white-glove service doesn’t come cheap. “We’re not a discount shop,” Max says. “But if you want access, if you want to be able to walk into a hotel and not check into a front desk and just go straight to the room, that’s the service that we provide.”
Here’s a problem most of us would love to have. What if you had so much money that you needed to hire someone just to help you enjoy it?
For about 145 families, that someone is Fischer Unlimited, a New York luxury concierge firm that charges $150,000 just to become a client, plus a $25k annual fee. “Their time is precious,” says CEO and president Stacy Fischer-Rosenthal. “They really want to make sure that professionals are handling their needs.”
Take Taylor Swift tickets. During the Eras Tour, one client wanted to go at the last minute. Fischer didn’t just find seats. Stacy’s son, Max Rosenthal, the company’s vice president, says the firm got the client into the owner’s box and arranged a private helicopter transfer for the weekend.