The Emperor’s New Clothes
The hospitality industry will soon witness guests marking the final differentiation between real luxury and the China market version, writes Anurag Yadav.
Real estate lives and breathes at the very core of aspirations in India. Especially amongst the fast-growing middle class and the equal speed of the higher segment’s consolidation and growth, houses, residences and homes are considered the most important manifestation of success, wealth and power.
For the large numbers of domestic travellers, which includes a huge percentage of business travellers, hotels form the alternative to this aspiration need, if only momentarily and accidentally. This is quite relevant because business travel accounts for a large number of guests in the better class of hotels in the country, and Indian travellers form a sizeable chunk of the guests.
The Luxury Tag
In all hotels, today’s guests and travellers are looking for relaxation, rejuvenation and luxury combined with functionality. The Indian consumer is now well-travelled and is quite familiar with luxury brands. The Indian market is also updated to global trends in terms of product availability and the quality of brands and product quality. The washroom has risen high in any guest’s priority as far as ratings are concerned. Travellers form opinions about any property merely by appraising the fittings, fixtures, design and ambience of hotel washrooms.
No wonder then that all hotels try to embellish their washrooms with modern fixtures. This is an intelligent option as not only do the smart fixtures, accessories and sanitary ware add value to the hotel but they are also energy efficient, water saving and excel in fine design and aesthetic appeal.
Therefore, it is a sorry state to witness the fact that the Indian market also has pretenders to quality. The pretension is solely banking on the gullibility of the guest and his or her ambiguity or indifference to quality. The issue for the high-end consumer, and even the aspirant who might not afford the luxury at his home, is not so much about the price as it is about value. The luxury segment of washroom products and the companies that produce them are capable of delivering value for money at their high price points. It is unwise to assume that the guest does not discern the difference. While India is in need of a classification of hotels based on service and not mere tangible slots and markers, the shortcuts to luxury resorted to by some properties is a glaring gap in their promise of delivery of a quality hospitality experience.
Design Decisions
As the hotel guest becomes the deciding factor in the reputation, popularity and ultimately, financial success of a hotel, the industry is also in need to change the way some properties try to shortchange things in the final design.
The best of designs, presented at the drawing board stage, grow into a more pragmatic and hardnosed operation as the properties develop. The interiors are the last stage of a hotel under construction and the urge to take the fastest flight to China is strong amongst many hoteliers who want the ambience of perfect design at a compromised cost.
This, strangely and surprisingly, also includes some high-end properties, although it is most common with stand-alone and owner-driven hotels. It is puerile to label the cutting corners as pennies pinching as there are equally good designs available in the Chinese markets which, incidentally, is not merely about poor quality products. There is a distinct high-end quality as well, but the concept of luxury is something that has to be defined once and for all for those who come up with convenient answers at convenient times.
Brand Statement
What differentiates excellence and refinement from ‘good looking’ and ‘great’ is the branding value, which shifts the diamonds from the diamonties. This practice, though muted and subtle in the metros, comes into full play in the non-metro cities and towns across the nation. The idea that guests in tier-II cities might not be so discriminating is a fallacy that will be exposed sooner rather than later.
There is a higher middle-income group at the direct consumer level that is getting ready for the high-end market. An unparalleled growth in infrastructure is just around the corner and despite the surfeit of good hotels; luxury will retain its unique position. Why just luxury, the overall consumer market is undergoing a change. New construction will lead the change. Experts opine that just the faucet market can grow three-fold in the coming years in the high segment.
It is these consumers who will check in at these hotels and there are larger numbers of hotel guests who know the difference between Germany, Italy and Guangzhou. Perceptions develop fast and alter slowly. The hotel industry, if it looks at volumes, will also have to be more careful with quality, if it has to remain competitive in the national and international scene. That the difference between the two is narrowing is equally relevant to this. However, that will be another story.
[The article was first published in the November – December 2014 issue of Washrooms and Beyond magazine.]