Market Research Assignment -1

TAJ Chain of Hotels

Management Decision Problem:

The covid-19 pandemic has drastically impacted all sectors, sending the economies in a downward
spiral. However, the tourism and hospitality sector is one of the more severely hit due to the pandemic
and the lockdown initiated to curb the rising number of cases. As per the research done, around 60 %
of the operators believe that it will take approximately 15-24 months for the revenues to reach the pre-
covid-levels. Furthermore, due to the initiated lockdown, around 53 percent of the operators had to
shut down more than 80 percent of their properties, leading to massive layoffs. As per government
guidelines, more than sixty percent of operators had to give up more than ten percent of their
properties as quarantine facilities. Some of them also offered rooms for the Vande Bharat mission.

Taj Group of Hotels is one of the market leaders in the travel and tourism industry of India. The travel
and tourism industry accounts for around 9.2 percent of the country's GDP and employs 8.1% of the
population, with the total contribution to the GDP amounting to nearly 28 billion dollars.The tourism
and hospitality sector faced losses never seen before in almost a hundred years. The Taj group of
hotels met a loss of around Rs 3.8 billion in the September quarter instead of a profit of around Rs 1.4
billion during the same period last year, a seventy-three percent plunge in revenue. Such a massive
loss eclipsed the thirty-six percent cost in savings due to the properties' non-functioning. Furthermore,
apart from the massive revenue losses, the hotels would suffer extended losses due to only up to 30
percent occupancy till the start of 2021, as reported by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).
There was also around 80-85 percent loss in revenues due to lack of events, room reservations, and
restricted travel. As predicted by the analysts, they had expected the revenue streams to be only
affected until October, but that was not the case.

However, all is not bleak for the Taj chain of hotels. The CII-Hotelivate research stated that the
hospitality industry, including both branded and non -branded hotels, would incur a loss of around
19.31 billion dollars. However, branded hotel chains are expected to witness better recovery in terms
of occupancy (32%) over unbranded hotels (27%) owing to consumer confidence in safety measures
adopted by more prominent properties.With all kinds of industries struggling to keep up with a 'new
normal' that seems to change every day, leading Indian hospitality chain Taj chain of Hotels is
sticking to its ideology of 'Responsible Luxury' to navigate the uncertainties of a post-COVID world.

Parveen Chander, Area Director of Taj Hotels stated in an interview that the Taj Group of Hotels
would be providing PPE kits to all staff and guests and would be sanitising and fogging all areas and
touch points very frequently. The stringent program specifications were meant to reassure guests by
visibly stringent cleanliness and disinfection processes which would reassure every one of the
benchmarked clinically hygienic standards thus offering guests' unparalleled comfort with a peace of
mind. To control the footfall, the Taj group had also done away with its lavish buffets, and also
reduced the restaurant capacity by 50 percent to make sure that proper distancing norms could be
maintained. However, keeping in line with their legacy of keeping providing top-notch service to the
customers the IHCL has announced the launch of Qmin, a mobile app that has a repertoire of culinary
experiences with delivery of its best dishes from its iconic restaurants a part of the first phase of
services that are being rolled out.

Market Research Problem:

The main aim of our market research is to understand how the hospitality industry especially the Taj
Group of Hotels has been affected by Covid-19 pandemic and the lockdown initiated in response to
that, and the steps that they can take or have taken to ensure its return to normalcy at the earliest.
Brief Literature Review:

Author Title Source Findings

Hussain, S., Expectations of Journal of Considering the crisis's unpredictability, further studies can be
Shah, F.A. & Indian guests Tourism, carried out to understand better guests' willingness to stay in the
Kareem, S. from Hotel Hospitality & hotel after the pandemic. It will help practitioners and
(2020) Preparedness in Culinary Arts, academicians to predict future health crisis mitigation strategies.
COVID-19 12(3), 31-51 As propounded by Rivera et al. (2016), expansion of tourism and
contentment are directly proportional. Tourism activities should
be resumed to bring back normalcy in society. In previous
occurrences, tourism is like before in a rough time frame of one
to two years once the COVID-19 pandemic is over. Excess
globalisation has brought in vulnerability to our systems, leading
to different disasters. Therefore, this is an apt time to practice
localisation (Everingham & Chassagne, 2020; Higgins-Desbiolles,
2020).
Ishfaq Ahmad A study on the IJARIIE-ISSN(O)- Total occupancy in the branded hotels segment is projected to
Bhat1 , impact of COVID- 2395-4396 fall by 16.7 - 20.5 percentage points in 2019 to 2020, while ADR
Musadiq 19 pandemic on is projected to decline by 7% to 8% for the year. As a result,
Rehman Indian hotel RevPAR will witness a significant decline from 31% to 36.2%. The
Beigh2 Industry report stated that 47% of operators expect their hotels to reopen
Vol-6 Issue-5 for operation within 2 weeks of the removal of the lockdown ban
2020 by the respective state governments. While 33% of them expect
to open within a week. Meanwhile, 67% of the operators
surveyed confirmed that they were being approached by hotel
owners for financial assistance or relief, for example,
management fees, fixed system fees, etc. The country's travel
and hospitality industry, affected and battered by the COVID-19
epidemic, is losing Rs 5-trillion in revenue next year, while 35-40
million jobs, both direct and indirect, are endangered.
Thashneem T. The Effect of Journal of Dental Amidst Covid-19, the tourism and hospitality industry have been
Bhanu1and COVID-19 & Oro-facial facing immense loss due to no foreign arrivals, no air travel, less
Prasanna Lockdown on Research Vol. 16 demand and booking of hotel rooms. The meetings, weddings,
Kumar J.P.2 Indian Tourism Issue 02 Aug. conferences and other events were cancelled and added up to
and Hospitality 2020 the loss of revenue. During lockdown hotels in Bengaluru have
Industry namely, Hilton, Accor and Sheraton delivered food from their
restaurants through Swiggy and Zomato in a way to balance the
loss of revenue. Meanwhile laundry services were provided by
hotels like Novotel and Sheraton Grande in Bengaluru. Despite
all this, it would take a little longer time for travel to get back to
normal pattern. It the intervention from the Government that
would help the tourism and hospitality industry upliftment. The
crisis has proved the weakness of the industry which emphasis
future research to create frameworks which would help to
overcome the economic situation during a pandemic.
Dr.R.KANNAN GLOBAL COVID- Mukt Shabd The previous SARS outbreak also placed a strong negative impact
, Ph.D 19 PANDEMIC Journal ISSN NO: on hospitality and tourism education in Hong Kong. The past
AND ITS IMPACT 2347-3150 SARS episode additionally positioned a solid negative effect on
ON HOTEL neighbourliness and the travel industry training in Hong Kong.
INDUSTRY IN Such instructive impacts were felt from Mainland China; Hong
GATHERING Kong, Singapore to even Canada. In India's setting the travel
MOMENTUM OF industry and neighbourliness industry has been picking up force
TOURISTS IN from recent years now, which has brought about a significant
INDIA - A push to training in the travel industry and hospitality. It must be
PERSPECTIVE noted that unlike before, current pandemic has resulted in
OUTLOOK plenty of data that can help decision makers across sectors and
may assist in salvaging the lost momentum Current review
attempted to synthesize major researches that affected the
tourism and hospitality industry, while it is also important to
note that a very few studies were found to have been directed
with respect to SARS flare-up in the background of
 neighbourliness and the travel industry training.
Objectives:

1. To bring out the clear-cut picture of the COVID-19 Pandemic effects on Hospitality &
Tourism sector and its sequences.
2. To analyse the causes and consequences of the outbreak of COVID-19 in India on Hotel and
Tourism Industries.
3. To understand the impact on all the tourism stakeholders by understanding the drivers, their
actions and reactions to the pandemic.
4. To apprehend Inter-sectorial and Inter-industrial variations of output a clear-cut picture of the
present condition of the hospitality sector and its ill consequences.
5. To suggest some safety measures required for immediate relief & survival of the industry
6. To suggest strategies for the implementation of the remedies to lead crisis-enabled
transformations for the TAJ hotels.
7. To narrate the problems and difficulties involved in implementing suggestive measures to
bring back the normalcy of the sector from the COVID-19 Pandemic effects.
8. To identify and analyse the factors affecting consumer behaviour towards hotel industry
during COVID-19
9. To suggest correct policy options and policy initiatives to be followed in future for its
revamping Strategy.
10. To analysis the Government initiatives to boost the sector post crisis

Research questions:

1. What are the real causes and its impact of COVID-19 in the global level and how it
hampers India’s Hospitality sector?
2. How to overcome the difficulties and the problems unnecessarily created in this sector
under the post COVID period?
3. On what angle government help and policy initiatives are needed?
4. How to avoid a future general downward trend of the developmental activities in this
arena?
5. How to project and predetermined the future trend in avoiding the risk and
uncertainties which will be met in future?
6. Based on the current situation, for how long can one assess the influence of COVID-
19 outbreak to continue on the TAJ hotel’s operating performance?
7. How do one assess the influence of COVID-19 outbreak on hotel market
performance, compared to other unforeseen situations e.g., SARS 2003, Global
Financial Crisis 2008, Mumbai Terror Attacks 2008?
8. Considering the influence of COVID-19 outbreak, for TAJ hotel, what could be the
expected percentage growth/decline in Occupancy in H1-21 (Jan-Jun) vs H1-20 &
H1-19?
9. Considering the influence of COVID-19 outbreak, for TAJ hotel, what could be the
expected percentage growth/decline in Total Revenue in H1-21 (Jan-Jun) vs H1-20 &
H1-19?
10. Considering the influence of COVID-19 outbreak, for TAJ hotel, what could be
expected percentage growth/decline in Total F&B Revenue in H1-21 (Jan-Jun) vs H1-
20 & H1-19?
5. Research Design
Approach

To gain insight for developing an approach to the problem, we will use Exploratory Research
Design.

1. Pre- Study Phase

Books, scholarly articles, and any other sources relevant to the above-mentioned area
of research will be studied and surveyed. This will form our secondary research and provide
useful insights and data that will help our team in the sampling plan.

2. First phase

Research on Hotel industry quality as an antecedent to enhance the growth of the same.

 The above 2 phases will take around 3 months to complete.

3. Second Phase - Qualitative Approach

We will start our process by visiting tier 1 and 2 cities to understand our target customer base.
For this purpose, we will divide in groups of two. One group will visit the tier 1 cities and the
other will visit the tier 2 cities, atleast 5-6 times.

Our team will also visit Taj Hotels and interact with the staff and people employed with the
same to get their perspective.

We will conduct in-depth and focus group interviews of the tourists, travellers and hotel staff
to understand the issues. Also, we will conduct e-mail interviews and survey polls to have a
better understanding.

We will adopt a qualitative content analysis both manually and using NVIVO software or
data analytics techniques using Python and R.

This will enable us to get a broad overview of the issues and help us framing structured
questionnaire for mass data collection.
The data from these methods will be analysed in detail and inference from the same will be
made.
The factors affecting the success of the case and their patterns will form the hypothesis for
the next phase.

4. Third Phase

Quantitative Approach

Descriptive techniques will be used for the second phase. For this, the below techniques will
be used
  Surveys
 Questionnaire
Based upon our collection of data, the hypothesis will be tested i.e if there is a statistically
significant relationship between each factors and success.
Inferences shall be drawn upon analysis.

5. Data Analysis & Findings

Final factors affecting the success of the case will be reviewed. Based on the same,
conclusions and implications will be drawn. We will use structural equations modelling using
AMOS, PLS-SEM to analyse the data. We will present the results of this data analysis after
one year.

6. Identification of the solutions to the issues

7. Formulation of implementation strategies

In the second year we will conduct a root-cause analysis and will identify the possible
managerial and policy level solutions.

8. Pilot testing of the Implementation strategy

In the next three months, we can implement the suggested strategies in collaboration with
ITC Ltd. For this we will select a sample city, say Delhi/Mumbai.

9. Implementation of the strategy

In the next 4 months thereafter, we can implement the suggested strategies in collaboration
with ITC Ltd. in all the target cities.

b. Sampling Plan

1. Sampling Unit – Choosing the correct population to be sampled

The following attributes will be considered for selecting our sampling frame:
1. Age: 25 – 60 years
2. Location: Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities
Agra, Ahmedabad, Bhopal, Bangalore, Chennai, Chandigarh, Coimbatore,
Delhi-NCR, Goa, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Indore, Jaipur, Kochi, Kolkata,
Lucknow, Ludhiana, Mumbai, Patna, Pune, Ranchi, Shimla, Surat, Vizag, Odisha
3. Hotelier type: Families, Newly married couples, Business professionals and
Millenials
4. Nationality: Indian, U.S.A, U.K, SriLanka

2. Sample Size – Number of members in the population

 E-mail Interviews : 20 - 30
 Focus groups : 8 – 10
 Survey/Polls : 100 – 200
 3. Sampling Procedure – Method to select the members of population

As our 2nd phase is Qualitative research, the first sampling procedure we will adopt is
Judgemental/Purposive sampling.
Our team will employ 5 trained researchers to collect the data. The researcher will
have some kind of judgement.
Sample members will be chosen only on the basis of the researcher’s knowledge and
judgment. Thus, we will have high chances that the results obtained will be accurate
with a minimum margin of error.

For our 3rd phase, i.e, Quantitative research, the sampling procedure adopted will be
Stratified Sampling.
More precisely, we will use Proportionate Stratified Sampling.
The total population will be divided into strata to complete the process. The sub-
groups will be age, location, hotelier type and nationality. Thus, these groups are
different and there will be no overlapping of data.
After this, we will randomly select the sample proportionally.

c. Instruments and Data Collection:

i) Qualitative Research Instruments and Data Collection:

 In-depth interviews:
In-depth interviews would provide us the opportunity to delve deeply into
understanding as to what has exactly hindered the sales and revenue of Taj Group of
Hotels and what should be the strategy employed to revive it. Our research project
would involve a fairly small number of these interviews (typically 20-30) and would
target on the precise characteristics and information.

Our in-depth interviews would be structured around a discussion guide. We would

ask questions and then listen carefully to capture responses – and would sometimes
ask follow-up questions to gain additional clarity and insight. In-depth interviews
would help us to get under the surface and probe for more thoughtful answers and
nuanced responses to our questions. It would also help us to identify the range of
questions and responses that we should include in our Quantitative Survey.

Our in-depth interviews would also be complemented with Behavioural

Observation to get a richer understanding of why people do what they do.
We would focus on covering key topics within 30 minutes as it is difficult to keep
people engaged in an interview for more than that.
Our target audience for in-depth interviews would predominantly be Hotel Staff (in
most cases, the Managers) and the regular customers of Taj Group of Hotels.

 Focus Groups:
 Our Focus Groups would be much like in-depth interviews expect that they would
involve small groups (usually 8-10 individuals)

Through Focus Groups, we would have the benefit of not just hearing one
individual’s views but also listen to and observe the group’s interactions and draw
valuable insights from them.

Our Focus Groups would tend to be relatively longer, running 60-90 minutes, on
average. Our focus would be on building an insightful group dynamic during the
discussion.

Our Focus Groups would usually comprise of families who have been loyal to Taj
Group of Hotels, families who used to regularly visit Taj and have not done so in
the past 1-2 years and the Hotel Management and Staff Members.

ii) Quantitative Research Instruments and Data Collection:

 Surveys/Questionnaires:
We would predominantly use surveys to collect primary quantitative data.
Individuals would be asked to give responses to a questionnaire.

We propose to conduct surveys in all of the below mentioned formats:

 Telephonic
 Online
 E-mail
 In-person

Survey questions and responses would be clearly worded and unambiguous. Our
survey forms would typically contain close-ended questions (structured questions)
with discrete set of answers such as yes/no, multiple choice, a scale rating, or
‘select all to apply’.

The surveys would be created such that it strikes the right balance between covering
enough information to gain useful data and making the questionaries short enough
that it doesn’t take more than 5-10 minutes to answer.

Our sample size would be 30-40 respondents from each of the Tier 1 and Tier 2
cities.

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

Data
In-depth Surveys/Questionnaire
Collection Focus Groups
interviews s
8-10 individuals per Focus Group
Sample Size 20-30 individuals 500-800 respondents
5-8 such Focus Groups
Duration within 30 minutes 60-90 minutes 5-10 minutes
Target Hotel Families of regular customers Residents of Tier 1 and
Audience Management Families who used to regularly visit Tier 2 cities
 Taj and have not done so in the
Regular Customers past 1-2 years
Hotel Management & Staff

d. Analytical Tools (tentative)

 Tableau:

Tableau is a data visualization tool that would help us to see and understand our market
research data pictorially, using analytics, visualization and business intelligence.

 R Studio:

R Studio would help us with a range of statistical tools that would help us in turning our data
into insights that drive action. It will help us to find relationships in data, the strength of
those relationships and would run right statistical tests and visualizations.

 NVIVO Software

NVIVO Software would help us to discover more from our Quantitative and mixed methods
data. It will help us uncover richer insights and produce clearly articulated, defensible
findings backed by rigorous evidence.
 Budget:

Item wise break-up of the budget Proposed (Revenue only):

Total
amount for 1
Sl. No. Activity Head Rate (Rs.) Justification
year (Rs. in
lakh)

A. Data Analyst 400000.00 per Lump Sum. Honorarium to the technical experts 8.00
(two) Analyst per to be engaged in different phases of the study.
year

B. Programme Management:
Marketing Analyst 30000.00 per Full time involvement for the entire study period 3.60
(one) month (to be recruited against advertisement)

Software expense 8000.00 Licensed version of standard NVIVO, Tableau 9.60

Per month creator and R studio billed annually.

Field researchers 20000.00 per Full time involvement for the entire study period. 12.00
(five) month Post graduate from Social Science background
will be deployed for this purpose

Consumer Analyst 30000.00 3.60

(One) Per month

Travel expense 2000000.00 This includes travelling cost of the study team, 8.00
per quarter including lodging and food, administrative
expenses, and other sustenance support to be
provided at the field level for survey, focus group
interviews etc.

Office expenses 35000.00 per Paper & stationeries, Printing and photocopying 4.20
and contingencies month of interview formats, computer stationaries etc.

Report generation 25000.00 per Printing of report, publications and conducting 0.25
and dissemination year dissemination workshops with the State level
policy makers and others, as necessary

Miscellaneous 10000.00 per Lump sum 1.20

month

Sub-Total (A + B): 50.45

 Total
amount for 1
Sl. No. Activity Head Rate (Rs.) Justification
year (Rs. in
lakh)

Institutional 7.57
overhead (15%)

Grand Total: 58.02