Hit by pandemic, Okha-based hospitality industry owners hopeful of return of happy days

theokhlatimes

Okha-based hospitality industry owners hopeful of return of happy days

The hospitality industry has been hit by the pandemic but owners, including one based in Okhla, area hopeful of the return of happy days as they are implementing all government issues directives to win residents’ confident back.

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However, people are still staying away from the markets. The case in point is New Friends’ Colony Community Centre which wore a deserted look on Tuesday.

“As you are aware about how this pandemic COVID19 has created around the world I wanted to throw some light on our hospitality industry. Currently our battle is of an existential crisis. We pull 15 hour shifts of hard labour – cutting, cleaning, chopping, cooking, serving but it is still a very fragile business,” said Syed Akram Ali, director NFC-based Shades-Café-Istro.

Here are a few points that he highlighted in a write-up:

  • Many restaurants have closed or are up for sale in Delhi. We have a few examples in our mall and NFC community centre.
  • 95% customers have lost their faith in dine in restaurants and are now scared to enter a restaurant or café.
  • In the hospitality business you can’t take away human interaction out of the equation unlike the current work from home trend.
  • However safe or hygienic we are, the customers are scared to enter a restaurant and take off their mask to eat.
  • The spending power / disposable income of the people have drooped down more than 70 %
  • The footfall in the mall has dropped down to at least 95% and same is the case for the NFC community centre.
  • The government has advised restaurants to work only on a 50% capacity.
  • Our non-alcohol restaurant works on a profit margin of only around 10-15% in good months.
  • Restaurants have very high fixed costs which makes it a high-risk business. 2 or 3 consecutive bad days spoil the entire month’s average.
  • Food aggregators work on a 28 -30% commission of a sale.
  • Delivery option is viable for low rent capped businesses. In our case there is no margin left if we are dependent only on these platforms seeing the current trend.

He pointed out about safety measures being taken by NFC outlets:

1 Book a table before coming

2 Temperature check with thermometer gun

3 Satisation on entry

4 Deep cleaning of furniture before and after every table.

5 Daily sanitisation with sodium hypochlorite

6 Mandatory hourly hand wash of staff

7 Hourly temperature check-up of staff

8 Hair cap, gloves and masks for all staff is mandatory.

9 Non contact service

10 UV sterilisation of all cutlery.