When he joined the bathroom spaces business 15 years ago, Gaurav Malhotra was told that one should always wipe off the water deposit from faucets after every shower to ensure its longevity. A decade and half later, he still hasn’t gotten into this habit.
If someone who lives, breathes and talks about bathroom products inadvertently forgets this protocol, can one truly expect the housekeeping and maintenance staff in hotels to be more sentient?
As MD for India and Regional Key Accounts Asia at Hansgrohe India, Malhotra is, therefore, banking on the company’s pre-installation guidance service to make things easier. In addition to training 20 to 25 service technicians, housekeeping and maintenance staff, this session has easy-to-understand content about the product’s lifecycle, installation, maintenance and usage. “In the hospitality industry, our technicians are closely associated with each project in the initial years, after which things get easier for the client. We do not believe in just installing and moving away,” he stated.
This explains why for over a century, Hansgrohe has been focusing on sustainable products, which fuse form with functionality. While one often hears about seamless bathrooms, not many know about the different elements that come together to build one. The company, therefore, emphasises on education, and engagement, not just with its end-consumers but also key stakeholders about the overall process.
To continue this education, it recently launched the Hansgrohe Aquademie virtual tour, wherein end-users, trade partners, architects and interior designers can experience its AXOR and hansgrohe brands firsthand, albeit online. The platform offers information of the organisation’s key collections and product lines with immersive contents and videos.
MOVING WITH THE FLOW
The pandemic necessitated Hansgrohe’s shift to the Aquademie virtual platform. Till early last year, architects, interior designers and even end-consumers would visit its showrooms to experience its wide range of Axor and Hansgrohe products. Following the lockdown, however, it wanted to replicate this physical experience as far as possible.
“More than 37 shower systems are visible in the Aquademie tour and we have put them largely to show how we recommend them in a bathroom,” Malhotra explained. “So, users can experience how the product feels visually, along with the flow of water and even the spray’s movement from a functional grid.”
The company’s main objective behind building this digital platform was customer engagement, especially with architects, interior designers and trade partners. Hansgrohe used to organise a trade fair for this audience every two years, which could not take place last March following the pandemic. While it continued introducing new products since 2020, including the Pulsify shower range, it wanted to ensure that these associates were aware and engaged with these launches.
Pre-pandemic, it would send physical samples of new launches to its channel partners, technicians, sales teams, etc, and also organise physical trade meets. Since this move is negated in the current context, the company created easy-to-understand content on its virtual platform, helping an online visitor to experience each product without actually having it in their hand.
“In the past year or so, several customer support calls with our product development team took place online. There were times, when a technician from the head office would hold a product in his hand, take it off completely, while explaining things to another technician at the other end. We have tried to replicate this real-life scenario on the Aquademie tour platform,” Malhotra stated.
BUSINESS UNUSUAL
Interestingly, business has been surprising pleasant for the company despite the unfortunate environment, especially in the residential space. Many end-customers utilised their discretionary spend towards home improvement, especially bathrooms, and Malhotra does not expect any fiscal softness in this segment in the months to come.
The share of institutional business, which includes hospitality, to the company’s overall revenues has seen a contraction. This is not surprising since hardly any new constructions are taking place in the country, especially for large and luxurious properties.
“Considering the prevalent uncertainty, even renovations in the sector are muted. The revenue impact on the hospitality sector was compensated to some extent because of growth in other areas, like residential,” Malhotra noted.
Till institutional business comes back with a bang, Hansgrohe will continue to do what it is currently busy with – continuously updating and rebooting knowledge amongst its trade associates and end-customers in a relevant way, while simultaneously launching products that place comfort and functionality front and center.
