-By Shantanu Jain MORE than a million Indian tourists will arrive in Sentosa Island, Singapore this year, predicts Steven Chung, Senior Assistant Director, Sales at Sentosa Leisure Management Pvt Ltd, a subsidiary of the Sentosa Leisure Group. In an exclusive conversation with BW Hotelier, Chung, who was in India recently, told us that Sentosa -- with a hybrid of attractions and features and world-class family-oriented facilities, had an edge over other destinations in the world, especially when it came to the Indian tourist. ’The attractions in particular are always designed keeping in mind the needs of the Indian traveler. Often we create packages that cater to the Indian arrivals, meaning we factor in flight arrival times, dietary requirements and meal times ’ as we are aware dinner time for Indians is quite different from the rest of the world,’ he added. Because of the connection between Sentosa and the Indian traveler, the new Madame Tussauds in Sentosa has brought Indian personalities, including Sachin Tendulkar, Amitabh Bachchan and Mahatma Gandhi. ’This is an example of the level of attention we dedicate to our number one international market,’ he told us. Chung who in a previous interview in February last year; said that he was expecting more than a million guests from India; did not have an accurate picture of the collective figure of revenue generated from India and the number of tourists since Sentosa is made up of independent tenants in hospitality, entertainment and retail. He said that despite a drop in last year's peak due to the Indian elections and the continued weakening of the rupee against Singapore dollars, a healthy influx of Indian tourists all year round was witnessed. In an earlier interview with the Financial Express in New Delhi, Chung had been quoted saying 2013 saw 900,000 Indian tourists visiting Sentosa. 2014 also saw a rebranding and revamping of the Sentosa Merlion, with new family centric entertainment like Kidzania, Chung said. Shantanu Jain is a Junior Correspondent with BW Hotelier.
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-By Zia Shiekh OVER the last decade we have seen various industries merge together, with a classic example being the smart phone that has been the result of the coming together of telecom, IT and entertainment sectors, with these devices serving as much more than phones and having capabilities for Internet browsing, social media, camera, playing movies, gaming and increasingly ability to transact with 3G and 4G. We are now seeing the merger of a fresh set of industries with art, music, fashion, movies, food & beverage and hospitality coming together to form a new breed of chic and stylish lifestyle hotels that stand for much more than simply places to stay at or dine at. Much like an Armani watch that is a status symbol, though it’s utility or technology might not be any better than a Titan watch available at a small fraction of the price; these lifestyle hotels are increasingly about the power of positioning and branding rather than their actual utility. The trend actually started in global cities like New York, London, Paris, San Francisco, Rome and Los Angeles, which saw the mushrooming of such lifestyle hotels that made a statement, typically through their architectural or interior design elements; small sizes that enable highly personalised services; and celebrity restaurants with exotic cuisines. While these unique concepts initially primarily appealed to the creative folks (artists, designers, musicians, etc.), it soon became fashionable with top professionals, bankers, consultants, movie stars, fashion models, socialites and other celebrities. Suddenly, it was cool to stay and hang out at these boutique/ design hotels rather than the typical large-format 5-star deluxe properties that till then used to be the accommodation, dining and entertainment location for the cr-me-de-la-cr-me of society. While the boutique hotels might not have the huge spaces or plethora of facilities like huge lobbies, pools, spas, shopping plazas, etc. that larger 5-star hotels have as their standard offering, but these smaller hotels definitely offer experiences that the larger hotels can’t. Let’s start with design. Any frequent traveler knows that though there are various 5-star hotel brands, but there is little to distinguish one from another as far as their public areas or rooms are concerned. Most of them almost look the same. However, these new breeds of design hotels actually take pride in creating unique and distinctive design elements. Sometimes they can be over-the-top with extravagant designs while at other times, they can be bare and minimalist in their approach. Whatever the look might be, it is very difficult to ignore or overlook their designs. This obviously helps boutique hotels deliver experiences that are distinctive and memorable as no two hotels are the same. And then of course, there is the opportunity to create a level of personalisation that simply cannot be achieved in larger hotels. Whether it is private butler services or every staff member knowing the guests by their names (and often having intricate knowledge about their tastes and preferences), these tailored experiences win over the toughest of guests as they feel comfortable (like a home away from home) at these boutique hotels that treat them as individuals and respect each guests’ unique requirements. It was only a matter of time before boutique/ design hotels expanded beyond their initial design and personalisation USPs. They started becoming places where the rich and famous like to hang out at. Beginning with swanky lounge bars and celebrity restaurants with eclectic cuisines, they then also started evolving into art galleries, private member clubs, fashion destinations with ramp walks and much more, limited only by the imagination of their owners/ operators. So while the chain hotels stuck to their routine and spent their time perfecting their SOPs, these new breed of hotels used innovation and experimentation has their main tools to differentiate and win over customers. And the market lapped them up, excited about new hospitality experiences that were increasingly becoming lifestyle statements. Thus were born ’lifestyle hotels’; if you stayed in one, you have truly ’arrived’. India is now finally catching on the concept of lifestyle hotels with the launch of chains such as Svenska Design Hotels from Sweden based on straight-line minimalist Scandinavian design concepts (currently two properties are operational in Mumbai and Bangalore, with another eight in various stages of development) and Soho House (highly exclusive private member clubs with various properties across the world and now launching in Mumbai in 2015). Surely, the future of hospitality is here and the big boys beware because once you have stayed at a lifestyle hotel, you are going to be pampered so much and spoilt silly that it will become difficult, if not impossible, to accept anything less elsewhere. Zia Shiekh, Chief Executive Officer, Svenska Design Hotels
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[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="130"] Nitesh Gandhi, General Manager, Trident Gurgaon[/caption] By Sourish Bhattacharyya THE food and beverage revenue of the Trident Gurgaon had been growing at Rs 1.5 crore to Rs 2 crore year on year. This fiscal, it’s a steeper line out there on the growth graph ’ the jump has been of Rs 3 crore, and there are still three months left of FY2014-15. The reason? A smart move by the 11-year-old hotel’s general manager, Nitesh Gandhi, who has worked his way up since his green years at Cilantro, the 24-hour restaurant, when the luxury hotel had just opened its doors in 2004. It all started with an inquiry from a major international client a year ago for an al fresco upper crust party for 700 people. Till then, the hotel, which celebrated its tenth anniversary with a big bash last year, wasn’t able to entertain such inquiries because it had limited banqueting space to offer. But the client was too important for the Trident to be asked to look for another venue. Gandhi therefore undertook a recce of the property and discovered that it had a vast under-utilised parking lot that could, on occasions, be turned into an al fresco banqueting venue. The parking lot, in fact, has two little tree-shaded green islands ’ one ideal for a bar and the other, for a marriage mandap. Significantly, the approach to this parking lot is past the water body at the hotel’s main square, which presents a spectacular sight in the evening when it is lit up by flaming torches. The corporate party was a huge success and it paved the way for the hotel to sell the space for what Gandhi calls ’uber luxury weddings’. Typically, a wedding reception in this league is for 500 to 700 people and the hotel charges Rs 7,000 per guest. Unsurprisingly, F&B revenues today contribute 55-60 per cent of the hotel’s earnings. The hotel’s two restaurants ’ Cilantro and the Indian fine-dining destination, Saffron ’ have also given Gandhi an additional reason to look happier. Their earnings, year to date, are up by 20 per cent, which means they have bucked what is known locally as the Cyber Hub effect. In other words, unlike other Gurgaon and South-West Delhi restaurants, they’ve shown a revenue growth despite the phenomenal success of the Cyber City ’restaurant mall’. ’Food is one of the top three reasons why corporate travelers choose to stay at a particular hotel,’ says Gandhi, offering a rationale for his F&B focus. The hotel, he says, has earned Rs 850 crore in the past 11 years and earned a gross operating profit of Rs 450 crore. ’Each room at the Trident has been sold 3,300 times in these 11 years,’ Gandhi adds with an air of self-satisfaction. Food therefore is the new goal post for the Trident. Few people understand food as well as Gandhi, who’s been primarily an F&B ops person, and his target, set by The Oberoi Group’s President, Kapil Chopra, is to ’bring luxury back to Indian cuisine’. As a first move, Gandhi got Izzat Hussain, a brilliant chef, unani doctor and descendant of Awadh’s last royal family, to showcase his cuisine at Saffron. Throughout 2015, Hussain will be coming back to the Trident to share his secrets with Saffron’s chefs. With such inputs, Saffron will definitely find a place at the top of the must-visit restaurants of Delhi-NCR. For Gandhi, it means the cash registers ringing a bit louder than usual. Sourish Bhattacharyya is the Consulting Editor of BW.
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By Bikramjit Ray ONE of the country’s iconic hotel brands, The Leela Palaces, Hotels and Resorts, and the company that controls it (Hotel Leelaventure Limited, henceforth mentioned as The Leela Group), have been struggling with debt for quite some time, but the industry grapevine is abuzz with whispers that the luxury chain is selling two significant assets to turn around its fortunes. The Leela Group, which sold its Kovalam property in 2011 for Rs 500 crore, is in the process of selling two other hotels in its portfolio. If rumours are to be believed, the two hotels are the Leela Palace Chennai and The Leela Goa. No one within the group was willing to speak when contacted by BW Hotelier, citing a non-disclosure clause, but we have heard that negotiations are on and due diligence is being done for both properties. The company’s objective is to wipe out a considerable amount of the debt which the Leela group is struggling under, even with rising revenues. According to an ICICI Securities Ltd report dated June 5, 2014, the group’s total debt stood at Rs 4,976 crore in FY14. The Leela Group’s annual interest commitment is said to be over Rs 500 crore, while its estimated turnover is Rs 822 crore, so the going it still very tough. A significant reduction of debt is desperately needed, the report states. The Leela Group got into a high debt situation after opening its luxury hotels first in Chanakyapuri, New Delhi, and then on the Adyar Seaface in Chennai. The two hotels set the group back by Rs 2,900 crore. The high capex in these two properties ’ averaging Rs 5 crore per room ’ coupled with moderate market growth has led to heavy losses over the last two years. The group’s combined net loss, according to ICICI Securities, now stands at Rs 875 crore. To pare its debt, the company first sold its Kovalam property, but it did not help much. In 2013, the group executed an agreement for sale with Reliance Industries for the Chennai IT Park. The deal was pegged at Rs 170.17 crore. If the sale of the Chennai and Goa hotels go through as planned, there is hope that The Leela Group will eventually get back into the black. Bikramjit Ray is the Executive Editor of BW Hotelier.
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By Archit Gupta In the hurly burly high stress world of business travel a good night’s sleep is of paramount importance. Hotels and hotel chains are always striving to make the slumber experience of the guest as comfortable as possible. The most important thing when it comes to sleep is what you sleep on and in this field; the hospitality industry has made giant strides. When you enter a modern hotel room, there are a number of trends in the bed and bedding segment of the hotel industry in the international market. These include, electric beds which can be adjusted to increase comfort’ which is very popular with high-end suites in luxury properties. Mattresses with Eurotop or PillowTop construction are another growing trend in the bedding segment. These add more comfort cushioning layers and end the hassle of flipping and turning the mattress every few months as they are one side usable. This reduces the load on the housekeeping department as well. Finally, the pillow menu is an offering which has spread in the industry across the subcontinent as well and is just another customization hotel’s offer for a restful stay. As far as lifespan of a hotel bed and mattress is concerned, it should easily last 8 to 10 years, though internationally due to hygiene issues, the trend is to replace mattresses every five years. The choice of mattresses in India has also seen a massive increase in recent years, with the entry of big international brands entering even the retail market. This has led to not only better product specifications, but better construction and international quality beds and mattresses which we at King Koil, also happen to follow. ’We are the only brand in the world which is spread over 85 countries, making us the world’s most popular premium mattress. The core strength of our brand is the penetration of the hospitality market in most countries we are present in. If we talk of the Asia Pacific region, we have the most premium and extensive client list containing almost all of the top hotel chains. ’In recent past, we have supplied King Koil bedding products to hotel properties operated by Starwood, IHG, ITC Hotels, Carlson Rezidor, Golden Tulip, Accor, Taj and Best Western. Archit Gupta is Managing Director of King Koil.
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NOVEMBER 2014, the latest month for which the widely quoted benchmarking service STR Global has just released data, was particularly good for Mumbai, which saw the second highest average hotel occupancy rate (81.2 per cent, up by 15.9 per cent year over year) in the increasingly busy Asia Pacific region, which is dominated by heavy hitters Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul, Tokyo, Osaka, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Melbourne and Sydney. Mumbai hotels also notched up the second highest RevPAR (revenue per available room), the industry yardstick for a hotel's financial performance. The citywide average RevPAR, reported to be Rs 6,370.92, was up by 17 per cent year over year. The regional average, incidentally, was 72.2 per cent occupancy (down by 0.4 per cent) and a RevPAR of US$83.48 (a dip of 3.4 per cent). Mumbai hotels therefore performed way above the Asia Pacific average. Interestingly, the India's nationwide averages, according to STR Global, were also significantly lower than Mumbai's: 67.7 per cent occupancy (up by 6.9 per cent); average daily rate of Rs 6,137.44 (down by 2.7 per cent); and RevPAR of Rs 4,116.76 (up by 4 per cent). Hanoi, Vietnam, recorded the highest occupancy increases (82.9 per cent, up by 16 per cent year over year), whereas Jakarta fell 9 per cent in occupancy to 71.3 per cent, reporting the largest decrease in that metric. Besides Mumbai, five markets experienced double-digit RevPAR increases. These were: Osaka (+25.7 per cent to JPY13,564.72); Auckland (+11.7 per cent to NZD146.04); Taipei (+11.7 per cent to TWD5,183.20); Shanghai (+11.2 per cent to CNY530.82); and Hanoi (+11.1 per cent to VND1,968,215.43). Seoul (minus-8 per cent to KRW165,287.86) and Phuket (minus-7.4 per cent to THB2,995.11) reported the largest RevPAR decreases. Putting the data in perspective, Elizabeth Wrinkle, Managing Director, STR Global, said: "In the first 11 months, China was able to increase occupancy by 2 per cent to 66.2 per cent year to date; however, the market is still struggling with rate, resulting in a 1 per cent RevPAR decline (when reported in local currency). Japan has remained flat from an occupancy perspective; however, rate still grows, due to ongoing government economic policies, most significantly the weakness of the Yen." Pointing to Thailand, Wrinkle said: "As a result of last spring's military action resulting in uncertainty in the minds of tourists, Thailand has seen demand declines of 11.3 per cent in November year to date, which has negatively impacted occupancy (minus-12.9 per cent). In spite of declining demand and occupancy, the country grew rates, when reported in local currency, by 2.9 per cent. Sourish Bhattacharyya is the Consulting Editor of BW Hotelier.
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THE JOB of the General Manager, or GM, in a five-star hotel has become much more difficult now. When I was a young hotelier, the GM would follow the European tradition of always regarding the customer was king and leaving no stone unturned to keep him happy. The GM used to be a man with a sense of style and was known for his back-slapping conviviality with his guests. The story is very different now. It all started after Indian flagship brands turned towards the US model of hoteliering. They brought in the investors and almost overnight, a lot of importance was given to the return on investments by shareholders. It became the job of a good GM to marry the demands of the customers and those of the shareholders if his hotel was to be labelled a successful business. When the hotel was run under the brand of the owner, sometimes as a single unit, larger risks were often taken. There was more importance given to the style of running the hotel and the amount of satisfaction it brought to both guests and owners. But there is more to the GM's job today than just keeping the shareholders happy. You have to keep the customers happy, make sure the stakeholders who are investors in your hotel are satisfied, and be mindful of a variety of matters, from the environmental impact of the property, to keeping abreast of cutting-edge technology and making sure elements such as health and safety, sleep quality and hygiene (especially if the hotel is in a far-flung location) are constantly taken care of. All this of course is dependent to a great extent on the GM's own desire for personal improvement and upward mobility. In most cases, a GM would want to be in charge of a luxury hotel in a metro. If that were not the case, they would have to adjust their own demands on life and upward mobility with the environment in which they were working, especially if they were posted in a developing market. It gets a little disconnected because the people you begin to work with, who surround you, both at work and in social circles, are of a very different calibre. One other very important aspect of managing a hotel is retaining employees. The hotel business is multi-faceted and people are always moving in and out, creating their own personal relationships and assessments. There is always poaching taking place. Work-life balance needs to be created for the employees to stay on with the hotel because this is a 24-hour industry. Inside the hotel, you would have to take people from the shop floor and help them in interacting successfully with guests who are sometimes icons. The challenge is to get them to interact successfully. The management challenge is to stay on top of it all; it is like being in charge of several businesses at the same time. Today GMs have to be on top of the knowledge chain, from business knowledge, to domain knowledge. They must have a caring attitude towards social as well as environmental issues and be aware of the laws that apply to running the business, over and above what I've mentioned. The GMs no longer are just style icons known for their sharp suits and perfectly folded pocket handkerchiefs. Yes, they need to have a high style quotient, especially when they're interacting with the customers, but above all, their backbone needs to be made of steel, in order for them to bear all the additional responsibilities of running a hotel in the 21st century. It no longer is a roll-up-your-sleeves-and-get-into-the-act kind of business it used to be when I started. S.S.H. 'Habib' Rehman became the Managing Director of the erstwhile ITC Hotels Limited in 1994 and Executive Director of ITC Limited in 1997. He headed the company's hotels, travel and tourism, and food businesses for 12 years before retiring. In 2012, he was re-appointed to the ITC board as an independent non-executive director. His memoir, From Borders to Boardroom, has just been published by Roli Books. As told to Bikramjit Ray.
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THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY IN THE COUNTRY, to use current terminology, should be an expression of 'Make in India'. It should draw from the consciousness of India. It should reflect the Indian personality. It should address Indian issues. It should be vernacular India. It should be original. And this must translate into its architecture, the way people behave, the dress they wear, the food that is served. It should be an Indian value system. It cannot and should not be a copy of something somewhere else in the world. I think this is our biggest challenge. It comes from our colonial past when we thought -- and we continue to think-that anything foreign in better. Even our regulatory codes must accept the Indian reality. We have the ability to be the best in our class worldwide. If we are catering to visitors who wish to see the country, they would quite naturally want to experience India, the destination, in all its manifestations. Hotels, I believe, need to orient themselves to be as local as possible, yet to subscribe to the highest industry standards. When it comes to fulfilling ecological and environmental responsibilities, they must start by including the local community and adopting local ethos. For example, if you are in Kerala, it would be strange, and environmentally offensive, to bring marble from Rajasthan to embellish hotels. The challenge is to provide to all international visitors an experience of India in India. Using Allen Toffler's enduring chapter title from The Third Wave, 'Gandhi with Satellites', I would emphasise the need for our industry to be as inclusive. Adopt almost village-like qualities on the one hand, while at the same time employ top-of-the-line, cutting-edge technology. Take the case of the Mars mission. It was successful at the first shot at the least cost. It was a case of disruptive innovation. Such disruptive innovations should be seen in hotels across the country. It hardly makes any sense to try and be what we are not. Make in India, Make for India. Such a transformation will give the hotel industry a unique identity, a personality, and differentiate it from hotels in other countries. Only then will the world not measure us according to standards set elsewhere. We have to see the ability of hotels to adapt themselves to different environments and different contexts. Be it at the mega city, at the international airport, or in small towns and in rural environments. This is what we have set out to achieve at CGH Earth. Drawing sustenance from our non-negotiable core value of caring for the environment and the local community, what CGH Earth offers are experiential holiday products. We are now situated in peninsular India, our 16 properties being spread across Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry. We believe that in the space we are in, we have considerable competitive leadership. Now we believe the time has come for us to cross the Vindyas and be seen all across India. Our plan is now to go forcefully forward and make our presence felt in newer locations, away from established destinations, without deviating from our brand position. In Kerala, we'll establish ourselves in the north. I don't want to go into the specifics, but we have started work in several locations. We have hotels in the pipeline in Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu and Hampi, Karnataka. We are bullish about our plans for the future. Jose Dominic is the Managing Director and CEO of CGH Earth The article first appeared in the inaugural edition of BW Hotelier, JAN-FEB 2015.
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BENGALURU ranks 16th among 50 cities across the world where a global agency tested hotels for the quality of their WiFi connectivity and the number of them that offer the service for free. It is also the only Indian city to make it to the list, where the Top 3 are Stockholm, Budapest and Tokyo. Berlin and Munich are just above Bengaluru at Nos. 14 and 15 respectively, and Seattle, Rome and Barcelona follow it in the global rankings just released by www.hotelwifitest.com. The ranking are limited to 50 countries that are in Hotel WiFi Test's most-tested category. Not getting free WiFi connectivity has become a sore point with travellers across categories because it is seen by them as an entitlement because of the high prices they other pay both for their rooms and food and beverages. Keeping the sentiment in mind, a quick look at the Hotel WiFi Test global rankings reveals that Istanbul and Stockholm are the most generous cities in this regard - 91.5 per cent of Istanbul hotels offer complimentary WiFi; the percentage is 89.5 in Stockholm and 87.9 in Barcelona. Among the much-travelled cities, Dubai is the stingiest, with only 40.9 per cent of its hotels extending this courtesy. Tokyo is a distant second from the bottom with 51.2 per cent and Washington, D.C. and Las Vegas follow with 58 per cent and 59.1 per cent of their hotels offering WiFi services for free. The global rankings also throw up interesting regional snapshots. Asia, for instance, is at the top for hotel WiFi quality (49.5 per cent), but at the bottom for the percentage of hotels offering free in-room WiFi (61.2 per cent). South Korea is the leader in hotel WiFi quality (92 per cent) by a healthy margin in 7.1 percentage points to the No. 2, Japan. Even though Sweden is only No. 7 in the country ranking, Stockholm is No. 1 among cities. The definitions following by the study are: A hotel, according to www.hotelwifitest.com, judged as having adequate WiFi must provide an expected download speed of at least 3 Mbps (the Netflix recommendation for SD-quality streaming) and an upload speed of 500 kbps (the Skype recommendation for high-quality, non-HD video calling). "This type of ranking is easy to understand, and it makes perfect sense from a practical standpoint. For most travellers, having super-fast and consistently stable WiFi is a great bonus, but their first priority is ensuring that basic quality expectations for Internet access are met," the study points out. The free WiFi percentage is calculated as a ratio of hotels that offer free in-room WiFi to all hotels for which the WiFi price structure and availability is known. Hotel WiFi is a synonym for in-room WiFi; hotels that offer free WiFi only in public areas are not counted among the ones offering free WiFi. Sourish Bhattacharyya is the Consulting Editor of BW Hotelier.
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LUMINARIES from the tourism and hospitality industries mooted the idea of creating a tourism promotion council assist and advise the Government of Rajasthan's Tourism Department at a BW Hotelier Roundtable at the ITC Rajputana in Jaipur this past weekend. The gathering discussed the present situation of hotel occupancies and tourist arrivals in the state and the problems that needed to be addressed. The idea of forming the council, to act like a "think tank for tourism", was discussed among those present, who were also a part of the newly formed and soon to be registered Federation of Travel and Hospitality, Rajasthan (FTHR). The discussion started with Bhim Singh, who founded Rajasthan Tours in 1959, going down memory lane. "I remember tourism in post-Independence Jaipur really began in the 1950s, when the city had only one hotel, in front of the railway station, called Kesar-e-Hind," he reminisced. The establishment was run by a Muslim gentleman who used to be the manager, cook and waiter, and also operated the pick-up and drop facility for guests to and from the railway station. Much progress has been made since then. "I think there is an imbalance between the glut of rooms and tourist arrivals in Jaipur," said Randhir Vikram Singh, Joint Managing Director of Hotel Castle Mandawa. "A lot of people who are not professional hoteliers but are involved in the real estate or in the alcohol business park their money in hotels, drawing a number of chain hotels from across the world to start operating out of Jaipur," Singh said. This has led to an explosion of hotel room numbers in the city. There is also an imbalance of trained manpower and the number of rooms available in the city. There are more problems as well. Jaipur airport hasn't really developed as an international terminal. You only have four international flights coming in daily from the Middle East. You have no European airline coming into Jaipur. Everyone lands in Delhi and uses travel agents there to come into the state. Rajasthan is actually losing out in the bargain, Randhir Vikram Singh informed us. The hotels too are now betting against each other, trying to fill up rooms. The ARRs compare poorly with South India, for instance. "What sells for $250 a night there, can be got in Rajasthan for $30," Randhir Vikram Singh said. But there is always the brighter side. "When we used to have our meetings a decade ago, we used to talk only about the shortage of rooms, I remember the room requirement in the starred category then used to be a mere 3,000," Gyan Prakash, ex-director of FICCI, Rajasthan, said. The shortfall doesn't exist anymore. "The present government is very proactive on tourism, so the situation is looking good," he said. One of the great contributors to tourism revenue in Rajasthan is the domestic traffic, he added, saying that this really helps shorten the off-season, which confronts you if you are dependent entirely on the international market. "The biggest challenge today is to push marketing initiatives in Europe and the US to help bring in more international tourists into the state," said Kuldeep Singh Chandela, Managing Director, Spice Court Restaurant. When we speak to tourists from those countries, we discover that there is hardly any marketing effort for Rajasthan as a destination in those markets, he said. "We should have more extensive campaigns and the official delegations should include more tour and travel operators as well as hoteliers, not just government officials," he said. There is no longer a dearth of rooms in Jaipur, Chandela emphasised. What was needed, though, was a regular flow of tourists "so that we can fill up the rooms". Mohan Singh, Managing Director, Rajasthan Tours, raised the issue of air connectivity, saying Rajasthan was better off in this regard between 1984 and 2004. "We are missing the connectivity among tourist centres within the state. Jaipur, Udaipur and Jodhpur are not connected, which hampers the way we can package Rajasthan," Singh said. "Rajasthan is the most mature tourism market in India, yet growth has been lopsided. Moreover, a mere 20 per cent of the industry is organised," Sunil Gupta, General Manager, ITC Rajputana, and President, Hotel and Restaurant Association of Rajasthan. What the sector needs, he said, is a structured approach, structured marketing, structured selling and structured functioning. The widespread concern over saturation of the rooms market came across in the discussion. It may take a couple of years for the market to stabilise and even as it heads in that direction, the industry is getting focused on bringing in many more tourists from all over the world and, more importantly, within India. Bikramjit Ray is the Executive Editor of BW Hotelier.
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