Delivering safe events
Hilton Chennai’s approach has been to offer flexible event solutions in an optimum pricing band, thus encouraging clients to feel confident to restart events, says its GM Ruban Das.
Do you see corporates booking for this year?
At Hilton Chennai we are approaching 2021 as the year of road to recovery. While we are far away from a fully active M!CE segment till Q4 2021, we are definitely seeing an upswing when it comes to month on month actualisation in this segment which contributes to over 30% of our total revenues.
What about the weddings & social events segment?
Weddings and social events had started to take place early this year, though in a modified service design to suit the new normal, where less has become more. Our team of wedding specialists bring a strong understanding of social and religious wedding traditions. So we have been able to marry our EventReady with CleanStay solutions with customer aspirations effectively while accommodating evolving health related government advisories. Thus, wedding and socials events have continued to stay active as a segment followed by hybrid events and small-sized corporate day meetings.
How are you dealing with your corporate clients?
We have been in touch with our regular corporate client roster comprising of companies in manufacturing, SMEs, pharma, technology, BFIS and real estate segment to ascertain requirements and plans. Our approach has been to offer flexible event solutions in an optimum pricing band thus encouraging our clients to feel confident to restart physical and hybrid events, even in small scale to begin with, and to help them with business continuity.
How have you prepared your hotel for the future?
At Hilton, we quickly learnt that the M!CE segment had been permanently impacted by the pandemic; and, hence we launched the ‘Hilton EventReady with CleanStay' programme in July 2020, to address the evolving needs of this segment. The programme delivers event experiences that are clean, flexible, safe and socially responsible. EventReady with CleanStay' programme also provides curated solutions for every step of event planning. The process ensures that guests are able to get personalised experiences. This is supported by a detailed playbook & event checklist.
Another hallmark is the EventReady's extension, ‘Hilton EventReady Hybrid Solutions'. The new suite of offerings continue to evolve and adapt intelligently to new meeting needs of customers; thus, directing event planners to Hilton's Hybrid ready hotels while also providing them with planning resources -- including an expanded Hilton EventReady Playbook and flexible customer offers.
EventReady with CleanStay’ delivers event experiences that are flexible, safe and socially responsible