South Strategy

The Phoenix rises

Abhishek Kamani, director, Phoenix Group Global, is confident that the industry would fight back sooner than later. By Dinkar Farwaha

Despite the slowdown in the market, Abhishek Kamani feels that South India is a favourite destination on the tourist map. "South India is no longer a mere tourist or a holiday destination. Over the last few years, it has emerged as a favourite destination for the business traveller, which has definitely changed the face of the hospitality industry in southern India," he says.

The Phoenix way

Talking about the company's newly launched property in Bengaluru, Zuri Whitefield, Kamani says, "We have been operational for just over two months but have been able to achieve an occupancy of 30 per cent and an ARR of around Rs 8,000. We are hopeful of touching the 45- 50 per cent mark soon (occupancy wise) and reaching an ARR of Rs 9,000," he discloses. He aims to achieve the growth by "focusing on the domestic market (as he feels the melt down has hit the international market in a stronger way)" and "carrying out very targeted marketing activities with database marketing and also web based marketing activities." The domestic key source markets for the company are Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Hyderabad, Gujarat and Pune. "Our new website, which has been carefully designed to support SEM and SEO focused marketing tools, is about to be launched," he informs.

Zuri Whitefield Bengaluru

Zuri Kumarakom

Kamani sheds light on the purchase decision of the company, "We have centralised our purchase department as it allows us to work on volume based cost reduction. This would immediately affect our bottom line." The company has streamlined all purchase and has merged the requirement of units as far as possible for the units daily requirements as well. It turns to the international market to equip its hotels. "This is very beneficial to us as EPCG benefits can be utilised by us," he mentions.

Speaking about the company's HR strategy during the current difficult times, Kamani explains, "We have very transparent HR policies. Even in this turbulent time we adhere to not take stringent measures like cut salary or fire people. Rather we have inducted new people, as per our requirements." According to him, the company strongly believes that stringent measures would have a negative impact on the staff morale, which would ultimately backfire on the group.

The way forward

Kamani is of the belief that both premium and mid-market segments have tremendous potential in the country. When asked about the next region/city on the hospitality map in India, he replies, "I would say that the Gujarat market seems very lucrative."

While Kamani feels that different associations and government departments, who are working to boost tourism, are doing good in their respective spheres, he is of the view that there is a lot of scope to boost the industry further. "Instead of working separately, if the entire group can work as a cohesive unit then the outcome would be far better," is his advice to the associations.

He is confident that the industry would fight back sooner than later. "We can already see an improvement and are quite confident that the situation will improve and stability will soon be attained. In fact we are quite positive about this and looking forward to it," he concludes.