The Accor Group is known for its one-of-a-kind properties all over the world that have been ruling the hearts of travellers for a very long time. They allow you to indulge in some class apart experiences and ace in delivering unmatched services. Our team was a part of the latest Accor Showcase and spoke to Rohit Chopra, Director of National Sales – India & South Asia and Randhir Gupta, Senior Director of Sales – Leisure & Luxury, India and South Asia
The Accor group organised the Accor Showcase after long 3 years in Mumbai and Delhi in March. The showcase was a raging success where we witnessed clients from all over India interacting with hotel representatives to understand the property and the way forward for the year.
More than 60 hotel representations under one roof
The ACCOR showcase is the largest for the Outbound and Domestic market and it was important for the show to come back and help the hotels to interact with potential clients. The growth in the tourism sector post-pandemic has been phenomenal. No one expected the sector to bounce back so quickly creating such high demand. More than 400 potential clients visited the show in Mumbai and Delhi and experienced a brilliant response.
Rohit tells us about the journey of the show in the past few months, “The show has been super exciting as I was about to announce the show in November and December last year, but there was a Covid fear in China yet again. We had to understand the market and build around January and February which helped us roll down the things and get people here. We also had to give them confidence about the market which is on a constant upsurge.”
Almost 21 international hotels and 40 hotels from India participated in the show creating great business leads in Mumbai and Delhi. Numbers are good quality numbers and people are very positive about the business. The problem of supply and demand is a challenge for the industry. The supply is less and demand is more, the show acts as a helping agent to understand the expansion process and help the hotels in a major way.
“There is a growth of new destinations and at the same time, the partners are coming up with a lot of changes in the properties, along with the introduction of new ventures. The partners wanted to meet up with the right people, and whom to contact to drive the business further.” shares Randhir.
Debutants of Accor family
The Accor group has 55 hotels up and running and is expanding and venturing out with 3 more hotels in March. Rohit enlightened us about the new properties that will soon be joining the Accor family, “We are expecting by the end of this year, we will have one more raffle in Jaipur and one hotel in Jodhpur. There’s a couple of IBIS which are opening up in Thane is opening up this month and we just opened up a Novotel near the Mumbai International Airport.”
People need to know that the market is coming up with the right ADR and RGIs that the group is providing the best NOPs and all other aspects of revenue indicators are very good. Randhir shares his personal opinion and says, “The industry is going to rise constantly for the next two years resulting in a great influx in business. Our focus is to move with traditional brands in India, we are coming up with a property near the Mumbai Airport on the curve of T2 in Mumbai, which will have 670 rooms.”
They are also opening a Fairmont with 107 rooms along with another Fairmont in Lake City. Raffles and Fairmont are the two hotels that are expanding massively in India from the Accor group.
If we talk about the international market it varies from destination to destination, largely most of the hotels are in the Middle East and Far East. A big chunk of business from India is shifting towards those hotels. Almost 50per cent of the business received is from India resulting in a win-win for the hotels and the economy too. Vietnam is gradually picking up along with the Maldives and generating a lot of business from India. Internationally we are adding up to 40 to 45 hotels in the next six months.
Eye-opening numbers for domestic while rise in inbound
Domestic is doing quite well, and the results are rewarding for the hotels which are helping the partnerships to work well. “Domestic is the backbone for us while inbound has its strength. The high-end kind of business from the inbound is around 20per cent back and we hope that by the end of this, the scenario is going to be very different, it’s going to be 80per cent,” tells Rohit.
The real test will start now for the inbound market, where we’ll be able to see the real numbers in the coming year. Nobody thought the entire market would rise as it did. If we go back the last seven to nine months have been eye-opening for the tourism sector, the key feeder market for UAE is Southeast Asia. In Germany, Russia Saudi people are travelling which is keeping the business in rotation from all sides of the world.
Randhir shares, “The inbound might be back around 50 per cent, but most of the larger piece of businesses, is still away. It’s still away because you can see the major source markets like the US, the inflation is still giving them a tough time and the same story is with Europe. Comparatively Europe market is still in a better space.
The US is more of business travel and because of a lot of restrictions opening, visas are a big issue, where they are getting pending. But now they are coming up with solutions and helping the people. The prediction around the industry growth is still experiencing a shift, but one evident thing is the importance of domestic. Domestic is the bread and butter for a lot of economies.
