New Delhi: Top five-star chains across the country are delivering food to homes from their in-house restaurants, in a bid to create an alternative revenue stream.
At Indian Hotels Company's Taj hotels in five cities and Delhi's Hyatt Regency, restaurant takeaways and deliveries are open for business respectively.
The Oberoi Bengaluru started home delivery on April 1, as did Park Hyatt Hyderabad.
The Park Hotels across Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Navi Mumbai, and Delhi, too, has begun reaching out to customers through social media.
Andaz hotel in Delhi started deliveries within a 15 km radius.
Hotels continue to dish out popular but select dishes from their restaurants in the wake of the Covid-19 virus outbreak prompted the ongoing 21-day nationwide lockdown.
Last month, ET reported that revenues of branded Indian hotels are expected to be 10-15% lower in February. Following the lockdown, however, as India's largest cities shut, revenues are likely to see a sharper dip.
"It has been difficult for our guests to utilise hotel services as dining operations of all restaurants have been closed due to government guidelines. We are receiving orders from our regular customers and are managing deliveries on our own," said Julian Ayers, general manager, Hyatt Regency Delhi.
The hotel is also in the process of partnering with third-party aggregators to increase its delivery radius.
A recent report by hospitality consultancy HVS suggests that hotels must focus on diversifying revenue through non-core functions like gyms, restaurants and spas.
The report titled 'Covid-19: Impact on the Indian Hotels Sector' says hotels must provide services that have traditionally not been part of their core offerings, such as food delivery through online platforms or leasing of kitchens for cloud-kitchen requirements.
Overall room occupancy in the branded hotels segment is expected to decline 16.7-20.5 percentage points in 2020, compared to the previous year, the report pointed out.
The next quarter will be worse, according to the report. Hotels will be unable to drive rates and may even be compelled to attract business at deep discounts.
The Oberoi group's Bengaluru property, when contacted by ET, said that it had exhausted their delivery slots, and were taking advance orders. An official query sent to the group remained unanswered till press time Sunday.
The Park's offerings starts at Rs 250. The hotel group, in an unusual move for five-star properties in the country, has partnered with food delivery majors Swiggy and Zomato deliver food.
“We are getting reasonably good response in Navi Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Kolkata. We are getting almost 10 to 15 orders in a day and that is gradually rising,” a spokesperson for the group said.
“From our kitchen to your home,” read a Taj Palace New Delhi brochure offering select dishes from in-house restaurants Capital Kitchen and Spicy Duck on takeaway basis only. Yellow Brick Road Kitchen at the Ambassador in New Delhi is also offering select dishes on takeaway.
"We have been receiving several calls from our regulars asking if we could deliver to their homes. Currently, the hotel is still operational with limited in-house guests and we have our kitchens open to ensure they are as comfortable as possible," said a spokesperson of the Park Hyatt in Hyderabad.
However, the hotel said it would not go into bulk deliveries.
"Currently, we are managing with our internal logistics. The objective is to reach out to our loyal and regular guests and not go into bulk deliveries through third-party aggregators," the spokesperson added.
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