Domestic weddings on the cards

“We conducted a sentiment survey and realised that one of the businesses that is on everybody’s books is weddings. Those bookings are still there and a lot of them continue to come. There are many international weddings which have been cancelled because of COVID, but those weddings need to take place and they will now take place in hotels. However, the numbers will be far reduced. Hence, weddings which were supposed to have 300-500 people, will now have 100 people. There will be guidelines for the banquets. Indian hotels are going to be equally competitive on weddings because that’s the business they want. Lastly, instead of inviting 500 people together, people might have 4-5 functions of 100 people each. That could be a nice corollary to that, and more functions could mean more business,” and when we all settle down, our P&L look similar to what it was pre-COVID. And, if not, there is not a huge debt.”

Puri shares that many hotels have already started working with technology or proximity software. “With our loyalty programme, we wanted to recognise our platinum guests in and around the lobby, allowing us to go ahead and personalise their stay more. In terms of policing in hotels, they need to understand the health condition of a customer and see if social distancing is being maintained. Technology would begin to take this over as well. Not only will the guests be thermally scanned and checked while entering a hotel, but there would be technology that would also allow hotels to recognise a guest’s health condition, like what the Aarogya Setu App is doing. How technology is going to play out in this new normal is

– Mandeep Lamba

"The reduction of wedding size might become a strain on friendships and relationships, as there will be some people not being invited. We are going to see big social changes in terms of relationship dynamics. One of the concerns with the industry is the amount of capex that will be deployed now to meet the new norms. Whether one is installing thermo-scanners or doing things with technology, I hope that firstly the industry is making sure that such a capex becomes part of the P&L. I think the final new normal would be that weddings will come back in full swing and distances will become smaller again between people, and it will again become a habit,”

– Dilip Puri

“I don’t think weddings are moving out of India as of now. Today, having 10 weddings coming out of Delhi or North India and going to Thailand is very difficult because the consumer behaviour has still not evolved or finalised as to where they want to go. The sooner our industry starts taking steps in the right direction, the more confidence it will give our consumers to stay within India. The biggest fear today is not just about travelling, but what if one is travelling and gets stuck at the destination because of a lockdown over there or the requirement of quarantine in a location with 500 people. This is going to evolve with time,”

– Jatin Khanna

going to be a very significant factor in how hotels operate in the future, whether they are new

hotels, existing hotels or hotels under renovation,” he adds.

Impact of low inbound numbers

Lamba claims that they have around 11-12 million inbound travellers and around 26 million outbound, which is almost 2.5 times the former. Hence, he says, “We should look at converting