Tata group hospitality firm Indian Hotels Company (IHCL) is aiming to open properties under amã Stays & Trails, one of its high margin new businesses, in every state of the country in the next three to five years to tap into the potential of India’s growing homestay market.
The hospitality major plans to grow properties under amã, a premium homestay brand, to around 500 in the next three to five years from the current 82 properties, strengthening the footprint of the brand. It is India’s first branded homestay portfolio.
“We have 82 amãs now. We have plans to grow it to almost 500 over the next three to five years, and hopefully have a presence in all states,” said Puneet Chhatwal, MD and CEO at IHCL to FE.
Launched in February 2019, amã, the company’s latest offering in the homestay and experiential stays segment caters to a fresh customer segment and helps it capture a new emerging market. The properties are a group of heritage bungalows, guesthouses and villas at different off-beat locations across the country.
Chhatwal said the growth of the homestay brand was ‘slow’ for the first few years due to the pandemic, but hopefully, now there will be fast growth. The brand had announced crossing the milestone of 50 bungalows in September 2021.
For IHCL, amã Stays & Trails, Ginger and Qmin are new-age brands, while Taj, Vivanta and SeleQtions are traditional brands. “We have two businesses — traditional and new. Traditionals are Taj, Vivanta and SeleQtions. The new businesses are more digital, more simple and high margins may be low topline. These are — ama, Qmin and Ginger. It is just the way the country is going, we need more brands like that,” Chhatwal explained.
On Ginger Hotels, Chhatwal said the company has a total portfolio of 86 hotels under this brand, of which 56 are operational. “This year will be the best year for openings of Ginger. We are planning to open 7-10 Ginger Hotels,” he said.
Notably, commenting on IHCL’s performance during FY22, Chhatwal last month said the company reported a 192% increase in Ebitda in the fourth quarter as compared to the same quarter previous year, despite Covid third wave’s impact in January 2022. “Business outlook is positive with April and May trending ahead of 2019. Our industry-leading pipeline along with scaling up of high margin new business like Ginger, amã Stays & Trails and Qmin will provide further impetus,” he added.
The company reported a revenue of `955 crore in Q4FY22, an increase of 52% over Q4FY21. “We believe IHCL is well poised to benefit from the expected recovery in the hotel business cycle from H1FY23 (Apr’22) and are enthused by the company’s efforts to leverage its existing brand equity to focus on new business segments, focus on cost optimisation, asset-light management contract model to expand room portfolio, and net cash balance sheet post Rs 4,000 crore of an equity fundraise through rights and QIP issue in H2FY22,” ICICI Securities said in its note, adding key risks are fresh Covid-19 waves globally and in India impacting demand and rise in costs denting margins.