ITC’s hotels division, which was hived off into a separate company only last year, has achieved a major milestone, with its ubiquitous ‘Welcomhotel’ brand signing up its 50th hotel, in the pilgrim town of Shirdi in Maharashtra.
The new addition is thanks to ITC Hotel’s tie-up with Sandy Resorts, which was building up the 73-room Shirdi property. Sandy’s other major property in Bhubaneshwar also ends up with a Welcomhotel branding. ITC, which had moved into top gear in new property additions, now has 30 operating hotels and 21 in the pipeline.
“This is indeed a special moment for us. Welcomhotel by ITC Hotels has seen an impressive growth trajectory, expanding steadily in both business and leisure markets at different locations across hills, plains and the sea,” said ITC Hotels MD Anil Chadha, “We endeavour to continue this journey at Shirdi and Bhubaneshwar, delivering on the brand’s promise of offering immersive and enriching guest experiences.”
Of course, it fits right in with the rush to snap up smaller hotel chains and/or launch new properties that most of the biggies of the hospitality world – both Indian and International brands operating domestically- have been up to in recent years. Tata’s Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCl), which runs the Taj group of hotels, is on a breakneck speed race to hit 1,000 hotels before the decade runs out—the project internally billed as ‘Accelerate 2030’.
Not to be outdone, the Marriott group, the world’s biggest hotel chain, also has grandiose visions for India and its growth potential. By the end of last year, Marriott had notched up more than 200 hotels across India, with another 150 on the anvil. ITC itself is looking at crossing a target of 200 hotels by 2030, while the Oberoi, which was conventionally a slow-and-steady kind of premium hotels operator, has gathered up frenetic pace in recent years – the group had for long focused on developing premium business hotels (like Delhi’s The Oberoi or Mumbai’s Trident) or plush luxury resorts (like Agra’s Amarvilas facing the Taj Mahal) which could be counted on one’s fingers. But in recent years, the numbers have skyrocketed, with a recent estimate hovering around 32.
The reason why there is such a mad rush is simple. The model of business and upscale hotels in India had long depended on a predictable mix of international arrivals, both for business and tourism. However, the Covid-19 pandemic and its sporadic lockdowns and related restrictions upended this cosy system. Foreign visits came down to a trickle. On top of it, Indians, once they got free from lockdown restrictions, began travelling around in a big way. Two related factors also helped – the social media pervasiveness, which made experiential travel big, as well as the religious revival, which made spiritual tourism suddenly move up the value chain from busloads of budget believers to upwardly mobile youth getting spiritual, with all the modern life trappings of a comfortable hotel stay, warm beds and evening entertainment.
The cumulative effect of all this has been a massive travel boom, this time spurred by Indians themselves, with hotels reworking their ‘club sandwich’ model in favour of paneer tikkas and evening aartis being organised inside tony hotel premises. One estimate has it that domestic tourists now make up more than 90 per cent of India’s hotel occupancy, with average room rate (ARR) going up and demand far outstripping supply. No wonder hotel chains are in a mad scramble to score a piece of this sumptuous pie!