Ten years ago, Dennis Tito became the world’s first space tourist. Since that first private flight, which cost Mr Tito an estimated $20m, six more space tourists have paid for a 'seat' on one of these trips. In addition to the huge ticket price, these seven have had to endure months of training to equip them with the fitness and skills to handle space travel. They then flew on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to and from the International Space Station on trips lasting between 9 and 15 days.

Up to now space tourists have used the Space Adventures company, an American-owned firm as their tour operator. The services it offers illustrate the brand segments already appearing in space tourism. The firm has agreements to use space transport providers, Soyuz, for ‘long-haul’ orbital spaceflights and Armadillo Aerospace for ‘mid-range’ sub-orbital trips, a ticket for which starts at around $100,000. It operates a modified Boeing 727 for zero-gravity ‘short-breaks’, which cost around $5,000 per person and will work with Boeing on its new spacecraft, when it enters operation.

Biz/ed has reported before on the appearance of the Virgin brand in space tourism. In 2008, Virgin founder Richard Branson announced the start of marketing his Virgin Galactic service – offering sub-orbital space travel to those able to pay the $20,000 deposit on a total ticket price ten times above that. In this firm’s case, a carrier aircraft releases Space Ship 2, otherwise known as the VSS Enterprise. Last week saw the firm make its first ‘feathered’ flight – not a piece of reverse-evolution, but a reference to the spacecraft’s design which enables it to slow down the pace of its return to Earth, making this part of the journey safer and more controlled.

Virgin Galactic’s milestone was achieved not only ten years after the advent of commercial space tourism, but also 50 years since the first manned space flight by Yuri Gagarin. It’s interesting to note that despite the development of space tourism, or ‘personal spaceflight’ as some call it , there are currently only 6 people in space, even though more than 500 people have been there before.

Despite the increase in space services that commercial operators have developed and the market segmentation already taking place, the cost of becoming another name on that list is likely to mean that only a few will ever become a real astronaut.