Kerala - Kochi   

Cutting costs to stay afloat

KOCHI: The cost-cutting spree by corporate firms and budget tourists following the global recession has eaten into the earnings of hotels, home stays and tour operators. On their part, hotels have voluntary imposed cost-cutting measures to save for a lean day.

Corporate firms trimming incentive tours and even business trips of their employees have come as a major blow to business-class hotels and tour operators. “Meetings have made way to teleconferencing, and that too not from a hotel conference hall but from their offices,” said the manager of a prominent hotel in Kochi. People who used to throw lavish parties at star hotels for birthdays and special events, think twice now. Many tourists who reserved hotel rooms to view the Kochi stopover of the Volvo race have cancelled the bookings. The media spotlight on the Volvo Ocean Race and the December-January peak tourist season not withstanding, hotels, home stays and tour operators are feeling the heat of global recession. The arrival of both foreign and domestic tourists has fallen by 15 to 25 per cent as compared to the same period last year.

Many hotels have frozen recruitments and have cut down on the use of electricity and water. Blank sides of printed paper is used for intra-office communication and there are less number of advertisements through the media. Already, tempo, taxi and auto drivers are finding the going tough because people have either cancelled or postponed their travel. “We would be hard hit early next year,” said E. M. Najeeb, the president of the Confederation of Tourism Industry of Kerala.

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