Hospitality Industry

A Strategy for Hotels to Survive in the Pandemic Era

The globe was taken aback in early 2020 by the Coronavirus outbreak (Covid-19), which infected nearly all countries, including Indonesia. The Covid-19 epidemic has had a major impact on the hotel industry's DNA (Rivera, 2020). According to (Budiyanti, 2020), the Corona Virus outbreak has a significant effect on the tourism sector in 2019, with millions of tourists visiting the country and entering Indonesia. It can be said, that the last two years have become one of the biggest challenges for hoteliers or accommodation facilities in Indonesia to survive during a pandemic. Some companies were declared bankrupt because they were unable to survive. But not a few are still trying to survive by continuing the effort. Those who survive must devise new strategies to keep it running while meeting changing customer needs. Many crises and disasters have relatively short-term consequences on the hotel industry, although limited regional impacts; however, the impact of Covid-19 will be unparalleled when compared to past occurrences such as natural disasters or epidemics.

The national tourism industry has been affected by the coronavirus. It is, mirrored in the rise of the hotel, which has decided temporarily close. In the Covid-19 business climate, hospitality organizations are expected to make significant adjustments to their operations to ensure the health and safety of their staff and customers as well as increase customer willingness to patronize their business (Gössling, 2020). This epidemic will also high impact on the research agendas of hotel marketing and management specialists. Many studies have observed that overall cleanliness and neatness are fundamental variables in visitor lodging determination (Lockyer et al., 2005). Besides that, not many scientists have seldom tended to the cleanliness and disinfection of personal lodging areas (Park et al., 2019). As previously mentioned, lodging surfaces that get a lot of human contact are more inclined to be polluted by contact (Park et al., 2019) and become wellsprings of irresistible illness transmission like Coronavirus (Chen et al., 2020). Consequently, the hotel industry has supported staff specifically divisions like reservation, bookkeeping, and human resource to telecommute during a pandemic in light of a legitimate concern for wellbeing and cost reserve funds (Demir et al, 2021). 

Hence, there significant perspectives that impacted the administration and activities division were monetary, including cost-saving and valuing system, and addition administrations expected for hygiene and cleanliness. These parts possibly impact the lodging business' new administration framework. From various researchers' perspectives, the hospitality industry in Indonesia to survive the current pandemic era requires the right strategy, namely: First, Internet facilities are guaranteed. During the pandemic, the new normal digital services are an indispensable solution because of their ease and compatibility with remote access. Therefore, internet networks such as WLAN must be available in optimal quality. In addition to facilitating internal online services, optimal internet support can also support the activities of visitors who often rely on WiFi networks to ensure a stable internet network you can use the SDWAN Lintasarta Managed Service, which assists companies in providing network infrastructure, SDWAN devices, and professional experts, as well as monitoring and maintaining other devices to support supported SDWAN technology. Second, prioritize health protocols. This rule needs to be obeyed because it has been stipulated that if you want to travel, work, or vacation, you must wear a mask and keep your distance, especially staying at a hotel. This service can be used to detect faces or Facial Recognition which to improve regional safety from the spread of the Covid-19 virus. The combination, Thermal CCTV technology with IVA can be utilized by the hotel industry on room door access so that the room door will only open for people whose faces are recognized and have normal body temperatures. Third, promotion. Promotions can be done, by offering various packages such as staycations so people can work while on vacation. Another strategy by offering other packages, for example, Lintasarta SKOTA Wisata offers an application that allows companies to provide online customer registration facilities. Lintasarta SKOTA Wisata can also be adjusted to customer needs in terms of hotel facilities to electronic keys. All these, features are available in an easy-to-use app to minimize contact between visitors and hotel staff.

The Covid-19 outbreak has impacted hotel operations and may have driven some out of business globally. The factors mentioned above that could change hotel strategies must fully identify the benefits and cons for the hotel itself. Based on previous studies, it provides a theoretical contribution to the hotel industry, especially to Indonesia's hotel management and operations strategy. In addition, the findings obtained from this scale allow re-conceptualization of new standard terms, promotion implementation strategies, and so on.

References

Budiyanti. (2020). Dampak Virus Corona Terhadap Sektor Perdagangan Dan Pariwisata. Info Singkat XII, (4).

Chen et al. (2020). COVID-19 control in China during mass population movements at New Year. The Lancet, 395(10226), 746-766. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30421-9

Demir, M. D. (2021). Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the tourism industry: An evaluation from the hotel managers' perspective. Journal of Tourism Theory and Research, 7(1), 44-57. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.24288/jttr.857610

Gössling, S. S. (2020). Pandemics, tourism and global change: A rapid assessment of COVID-19. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 1–20. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2020.1758708

Lockyer et al. (2005). The perceived importance of price as one hotel selection dimension. Tourism Management, 26(4), 529-537.

Park et al. (2019). Does hotel cleanliness correlate with surfaces guests contact? International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 31(7), 2933-2950.

Rivera, M. A. (2020). Hitting the reset button for hospitality research in times of crisis: Covid19 and beyond. Int J Hosp Manag. doi:10.1016/j.ijhm.2020.102528