The third quarter of 2021-22 looked very promising for India’s hospitality sector as many hoteliers thought that the threat posed by COVID-19 was now in the rearview mirror. They reposed lots of hope on the remainder of the fiscal year, which signaled the much-needed business recovery.
However, then came yet another vicious cycle of restrictions due to Omicron variant of COVID-19, which started impacting the business from the start of January 2022. Travellers began cancelling their bookings and postponing their trips as caseloads started rising across the country and restaurants wore a deserted look.
While the ongoing pandemic situation is still very fluid, hoteliers are concerned about its duration and geographical spread coupled with the nature and extent of governmental restrictions.According to Neha Chhabra, General Manager, Courtyard by Marriott Bengaluru Hebbal,the business on books, and its very pace, has dropped significantly. Industry stakeholders are once again in a wait and watch mode as travel has now become a discretionary spend.
“From the way it looks presently, the current wave would wash off the prospects in the first quarter of 2022. If one presumes that this wave goes away by end of March 2022, and with the learning from first two waves, we could expect business returning back by Q2 onwards,” she noted.
LEARNING ON THE GO
The good aspect is that this time around, the panic over the pandemic is much more controlled in the industry. One can attribute it to the fact that most hoteliers are battle hardened after the first two waves. This has also given them the ability to develop a keen eye on any, and every, incoming revenue stream in addition to controlling costs and wastages across the board.
“By the 4th quarter of 2021, we had started returning to some kind of normalcy and had solid plans in place for 2022. As an international company that follows the January–December cycle, all our budgets were made keeping in mind the recovery speed in November and December,” Chhabra recalled.
However, come January and these expectations were totally derailed and once again, she and her team and trying to forecast to the best of their cumulative abilities. Currently, these projections are very fluid and changing day on day depending on the restrictions and unfolding cases.
However, Chhabra has decided that this is the perfect opportunity to prepare the blueprint for dynamic situations ahead. After all, when there is external disruption, it is time to focus on internal issues.
The HR team at Courtyard by Marriott Bengaluru Hebbal is utilising this time to train its people and give them their well-deserved leaves. Moreover, the management is undertaking overhaul of the product so that the property is ready once the restrictions are eased out.
ALL SET FOR AN UNCERTAIN FUTURE
After partial reopening of business last year after the lockdowns ceased, hoteliers are staring at further restrictions of operations as the country battles the third wave of the pandemic. Many hoteliers now feel that it is pertinent to have contingency plans that can deal with these undulating situations as well as the threat of imminent lockdowns.
Chhabra is one of them. “As General Managers we have now gone through these scenarios couple of times. As a result, we now have understood what levers to put in action and what not to employ; we have indeed learnt it the hard way,” she claimed.
Taking care of assets – be it the physical assets or teams – will be the pivot of all her decisions. With the night and weekend curfews in the city, Courtyard by Marriott Bengaluru Hebbal has looked at various avenues where it can reduce wastages including controlling the HLP expense, relooking the need and quantity of its buffets and putting in place staggered shift timings for the team.
In fact, Chhabra opined that talent drain is one of the biggest fears that the hospitality industry is staring down at. “With the imminent lockdowns, it is the staff who end up fearing for their future. This time around it is important that we reassure them and make them ready for the seasons to come,” she stated.
Nonetheless, Chhabra is upbeat about the prospects of the hospitality sector, which has been hurt significantly by the ongoing pandemic. The sector’s ability to react swiftly to these challenges and change track to move to explore new business streams gives her hope. After all, history has proven that hoteliers have battled other crises in the past and emerged victorious and wiser.
