11 Quirkiest Jobs That Will Be Billion-Dollar Industries by 2026 (Includes 4 Wildcards)

11. Bonus 4 — Space Tourism Experience Designers (Wildcard)

Commercial spaceflights demand more than rockets; they require carefully designed human experiences for brief but intense voyages. Space tourism experience designers craft training programs, microgravity entertainment, and in-flight rituals that make trips memorable and safe. Forbes and McKinsey analyze the commercial space market and note hospitality and services as potential value centers as launch costs evolve. This work feels delightfully odd—hospitality in zero gravity—but it merges design with aerospace engineering and human factors research. Funding for space startups and deals reported in industry press show growing investor interest, but scale-up to a broad consumer market depends on costs, safety certification, and repeatable demand. Predicting a billion-dollar industry by 2026 for the experience-design niche alone would be premature. Still, as passenger flights increase, experience services could become a valuable slice of a larger space-tourism economy. Evidence: industry reports and venture activity (Forbes, McKinsey, Crunchbase) support demand signals without definitive single-niche market forecasts.