NECESSITY IS THE MOTHER OF INVENTION

BY WENDY LONG

Here’s a crazy idea: Repurpose unoccupied space in hospitality as a hybrid between serviced apartments and hotel for mediumand long-term rental. Most hotels will no longer target out of town guests, which will most likely dwindle if business and leisure travel decreases.

People would want a turn-key project, with housekeeping and on-site concierge service for all deliveries and errands, an on-site business centers fitted with an upgraded technological infrastructure that will transform an existing hotel room into a modern home office.

Two adjacent rooms can be combined into a bigger suite and converted into a home-office away from home where one can gain some privacy and personal space without the huge upfront commitment of buying a bigger property. The repurposed pied-aterre can also be used as private storage for personal effects—again, going back to the idea of creating an own space, compartmentalizing a space, away from ‘home’.

I know I’ll be keen on such a product: A home away from home – but in my city – especially if it’s near a park or recreation space for exercise, etc. I think, going forward, people will like to be next to nature or outdoor space, instead of driving someplace for fresh air and open space.

Going forward, I foresee an excess of vertical space, be it in retail, office, and commercial real estate. Finding new uses for these spaces, especially hotel rooms and offices, will be crucial to survivability.

R Kelly famously sang ‘I believe I can fly’, so when can, and will, we start flying again?

There are two camps here.

My viewpoint is that, as with luxury goods, there will be a pent-up demand for travel, and people will take the first flight out when they can. Hence, airlines that are focused on the domestic market, including low-cost ones, may do well after the pandemic.

In Europe, people may be more inclined to support their own economies by traveling within their country or the continent.

Meanwhile, the other camp says fear will hold travelers back. Just ask yourself, how long did it take you to return to Japan after the Fukushima incident? It did take me a couple of years before I resumed traveling to Japan, but in the interim, I traveled as usual. When will you dare to fly to Italy? New York? Will you wait six months from the lifting for the restrictions?

There’s also a possibility of business travel dropping in volume as working from home becomes a viable option. Companies will be cutting cost, unemployment will rise, and travel will be seen as a luxury that even fewer can afford. The long-term profitability for premium carriers will be a Herculean challenge. What may emerge will be on two ends of the spectrum—more people traveling regionally on budget carriers on one end, and flying private on the other. The 0.01 per cent may feel it’s safer to fly private. That leaves everything else, under the radar, so to speak.

It seems globalization is reversing to ‘deglobalization’, and because of it, we recognize how interlinked the ecosystem is. When manufacturing is halted in one country, it affects production in another. The food supply chain is another example: the demand for flour surges, but mills could not produce fast enough because the farmers in another country are forced to stop work. You get the picture.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has voiced out that foreign companies should not own industries that serve national security interest. Will we see the return of nationalization? Of state ownership under the pretext of national security?

This global phenomenon has certainly laid bare the perils of heightened interdependence, and will definitely get everyone to start building on independence and self-sustainability. As a common threat, it has brought us closer, but it will, alas, drive us farther away from one another.