COVID-19 Pandemic: Trends, Challenges, and Impacts on Hotel Sector

This report examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the hotel industry, focusing on key trends and challenges. The trends discussed include remote locations with fewer interactions, takeaway and online delivery services, increased focus on hygienic factors, digital communication, waste management, and the adoption of robotic staff. Challenges identified are the loss of customers and the high budget required to recover losses and implement effective strategies. The report also summarizes the principle impacts of these trends and issues, along with the ways the travel and tourism industry is managing these changes, such as offering transportation services, managing online orders carefully, timing sanitization appropriately, balancing human and robotic staff, and implementing innovative ideas to attract customers while adhering to safety regulations. The report concludes by emphasizing the need for hotels to adapt to these changes to ensure their survival and success in the post-pandemic world.

Tourism and Hospitality

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
Clarification of topic and selection of sub-sector.......................................................................3
Key trends in hotels in covid-19 pandemic.................................................................................3
Key challenges faced by hotels in covid- 19 pandemic..............................................................5
Summary.....................................................................................................................................5
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
References........................................................................................................................................9

Introduction
Hospitality industry is one of the fastest growing industry. In context of UK, there are
various kinds of hospitality businesses such as accommodation, food and beverages, travel and
transportation, entertainment and many others (Davahli and et. al., 2020). The following report
opted the topic of Covid 19 pandemic and its impact upon hospitality industry. Covid 19
pandemic is an ongoing global pandemic which is occur due to corona virus disease at the end of
2019. coronavirus is a disease which spread from one person to another. Hence, to break the
chain most of the nations restricted social gathering of their population and follow lock downs
which means population are required to stay at home for a particular period of time mentioned by
the government. This disease impacted bad upon every kind of businesses except pharmaceutical
businesses. The following report will cover key trends and challenges of this pandemic,
summary of the report will contain principle impacts of these trends and the ways tourism and
hospitality industry manage these impacts.
Main Body
Clarification of topic and selection of sub-sector
The following report opted the topic of “Covid 19 pandemic” because this is the most
trendy and ongoing global situation for various kinds of businesses. Here, the report will
specifically discuss about hotels and the trends of recovering from covid pandemic. Hotels and
restaurants are impacted worst by this pandemic. Due to lock down, people are required to stay at
home and refuses social gathering activities. In the year 2019, there are 9,930 hotels and similar
accommodations and in the year 2020, there are 9,955 hotels and similar accommodations in UK
which means 35 new hotels and accommodation services were introduced within one year (UK
Hotels in 2019 and 2020, (2021)). This shows that even in the situation of covid pandemic the
new hotels and accommodations are establishing because this sector of hospitality industry is
having high level of demand when the situation comes in control.
Key trends in hotels in covid-19 pandemic
Remote locations and fewer interactions- During this pandemic most of the hospitality
customers demands for minimizing their contact with other people and staff members of hotels.
This demand increases due to the pandemic and this will help to lower the risk of covid
pandemic. For fulfilling this customer demand trends, hotels prefer to have their locations where

their customers will enjoy open air, larger gardens and many others (Hospitality Trends in a
Post-COVID-19 World, (2021)). Hence, due to this most of the hotels are established at remote
areas where customers will find lower human interactions and natural environment to enjoy.
Takeaway and online delivery- Due to covid pandemic most of the restaurants who did
not opted online delivery of food also opted to use digital ways of performing their business
(Kaushal and Srivastava, 2021). Online deliveries for restaurants and hotels become more trendy
in covid pandemic due to government regulations of avoiding social gathering and lock down.
Focuses more upon hygienic factors- This is also trendy for various kinds of hotels and
restaurants in covid pandemic that they are required to focus more upon their hygienic factors
and attract their customers by creating a well marketing image that the specific hotel is clean and
more aware to break the chain of corona virus by continuously cleaning their hotel areas after
few hours.
Digital communication- Most of the hotels make sure that their customers will become
safe and secure from corona virus. Hence, they have opted various digital technology in their
hotels for communicating their customers well (Joshi and Gupta, 2021). Few of the hotels opted
voice controller at the reception area where guest will arrive and ask for their products and
services then the voice controller will respond appropriately to the question which is asked by
their customers.
Waste management in restaurants- Due to covid pandemic most of industries including
hospitality industry have to face losses. Now, when the government restrictions like lock down
and social distancing is slowly reducing to boost up the economy by promoting business areas to
perform their task with few restrictions. Most of the hotels and restaurants face losses and to
cover these losses they focuses to manage their waste appropriately and reuse them in such a way
which will help them to gain higher profit for both hotel as well as customers (Zopiatis,
Pericleous and Theofanous, 2021). For example, when vegetables is cut down to make any dish
in the restaurant then few part of vegetables which are left to make that dish will not be thrown
but it will restored in refrigerator for further use to make another food dishes. In accommodation
hotels, most of the hotels did not throw their towels and soaps of their hotel after one or few
usage of their customers but they wash it appropriately and reuse them. This will help them to
save their money and earn more profit to recover the loses which they had faced in covid
pandemic.

Robotic staff- Robotic staff will reduce the chances of corona disease from one person to
another. Here, hotels use robots instead of human power in their hotel to offer their products and
services to their customers. Hotel Sky in Africa is the first hotel which opted wholly robotic staff
where the normal robots will conduct all those activities which are conducted by manual staff
members such as clearing their doubts, carry the luggage of customers, showing them the
direction of their room, serving them food dishes and many others. The robots at this hotel can
carry 165 pounds of luggage (This hotel turns to robot staff amid pandemic in South Africa,
(2021)). This will help to gain customer loyalty and attention toward the hotel and make them
feel that the hotel is safe and secure in covid pandemic due to its robotic staff members.
Key challenges faced by hotels in covid- 19 pandemic
There are few of the key challenges which can affect hotels and restaurants due to covid
pandemic-
Loss of customers- Due to government rules and regulations such as social distancing
and lock down, almost every hotel and restaurants have to face loss of customers. Their
customers are not able to use their facilities and services well. Hence, loss of customers in
hospitality industry means loss of profit (Gursoy and Chi, 2020). Therefore, hotels and
restaurants have to face loss during the pandemic.
High budget to recover the loss and applying effective strategies- Most of the hotels
like Hotel Sky in Africa use robotic staff to mitigate the chances of spreading corona viruses
through their hotel. Adopting robotic staff and focuses on their maintenance occur huge
investment for the hotel. On the other hand, most of the hotels adopt digital ways to
communicate their customers. Few of the digital devices are voice controller, face recognition
devices for auto check-in and check-out of customers and various other digital devices which
require high budget for their instalment in the hotel.
Summary
Principle impacts of the key trends and the way of managing changes by travel and tourism
industry-
Remote locations and fewer interactions- This key trend will impact positive for
various hotels to attract mire customers during this pandemic (Huang and et. al., 2020). But it
also impact negative due to the distance of hotel from local residence. When the hotels shifted
from city area to remote area then the customers may refuse to use their services due to long

distance covered for travelling especially for local customers who belongs to same country. This
impact can be mitigated by using another services by hotels which is related to transportation.
Here, hotels can use their own vehicles and provide the option to customer whether they can opt
to travel their hotels by their own or they can use hotel transportation services by few additional
charges.
Takeaway and online delivery- This is another trend in covid pandemic where most of
the hotels and restaurants allow their customers to order their dishes through online and the
orders will be picked by customers when the dishes get ready else it will delivered to their home
in case of home deliveries. There is a positive impact of this trend as the customers are not
required to break the rule of lock down and social distancing in covid pandemic and enjoy their
dishes from their favourite restaurants and hotel in their home only. On the other hand, hotels
and restaurants may get confuse by receiving a huge amount of online orders and they may send
wrong delivery to wrong customer which can ruin their brand image in market (Chapman, Miller
and Salley, 2021). Hence, to mitigate this challenge they can provide a code to each dish which
is same as the customer's order. Giving numerical codes to items will help to mitigate the risk of
delivering wrong food dishes to wrong customers.
Focuses more upon hygienic factors- This is another trend in hospitality industry to
attract more customers during covid pandemic. Hygienic factors will attract more customers as
the clean and sanitized hotels and restaurants will reduce the chances of affecting by corona
virus. But on the other hand, when hotel rooms and dinning areas get cleaned and sanitized again
and again after few hours then it can disturb the customers which further become the reason for
their negative experience gained by the hotel. Hence, it is suggested that the rooms and dinning
area will be cleaned and sanitised at that point of time where the customers are not present in the
rooms and at the dinning area (Jain and Dhyanib, 2020). This will not impact bad on gaining
high customer experience. Secondly, conveying message to customers that their room is going to
clean or sanitize by housekeeping department when they are not present in the room will help to
gain high customer loyalty and trust that the hotel staff is informing them about any change in
their rooms. This will also help customers to take their luxurious items with them selves when
their room get cleaned.
Robotic staff- It is another key trend in covid pandemic which impacted positive on
hotels and restaurants by using robotic staff instead of manpower. This will help to attract more

customers by reducing the impact of human interactions. On the other hand, it will impact
negative upon producing high investment for using robotic staff and reducing employment rate
for the nation. Hence, the hotels are required to adopt the combination of both human staff as
well as robotic staff in their hotels for controlling the cost and tasks within the hotel.
Principle impacts of the key issues and the way of managing changes by travel and tourism
industry-
Loss of customers- Due to pandemic situation most of the hotels losses their customers
due to government rules and regulations like lock down and social distancing. This impact
negative upon hospitality companies to earn their expected amount of profit (Chen, 2021). This
can be managed by using innovative ideas and concepts to attract customers again toward their
services and gain higher profit. In context of of most of the hotels and restaurants, they can
accept booking for limited number of customers to avoid social gathering and focus more upon
the factors of cleanliness and hygienic aspects. Promoting more to convey the changes which is
taken by hotels to protect their customers from corona virus will help to gain the trust of their
customers again.
High budget to recover the loss and applying effective strategies- This is another key
challenge of covid pandemic which require higher budget for adopting effective strategies to
mitigate the risk of corona virus like adopting robotic staff. This will impact negative as the
hotels and restaurants have to invest high. Therefore, they can make a fixed budget for adopting
changes and they can measure that they will adopt changes within that fixed budget. Focusing on
strategies will also help them to adopt effective strategies. Here, they are required to conduct
marketing research and analyse what all strategies are adopting by their competitors to gain
success in covid pandemic (Verma and Saini, 2020). This will help them to make effective
strategies to gain competitive advantage.

Conclusion
From the above information it is concluded that hospitality industry is getting negative
impact by covid pandemic. There are various new trends and challenges opted by hotels and
restaurants in covid situation to mitigate its risk and few of the trends are choosing remote
location for the hotels, adopting robotic staff, focuses on more hygienic factors and many others.
On the other hands, adopting these trends may occur few of the challenges such as high budget,
loss of control and many others. Strategies can be made to mitigate the negative impacts of key
trends in the hospitality industry due to covid pandemic.

References
Books and journals
Chapman, C.M., Miller, D.S. and Salley, G., 2021. Social disruption of the tourism and
hospitality industries: implications for post-COVID-19 pandemic recovery. Worldwide
Hospitality and Tourism Themes.
Chen, M.H., 2021. Well-being and career change intention: COVID-19’s impact on unemployed
and furloughed hospitality workers. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality
Management.
Davahli, M.R. and et. al., 2020. The hospitality industry in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic:
Current topics and research methods. International Journal of Environmental Research
and Public Health, 17(20), p.7366.
Gursoy, D. and Chi, C.G., 2020. Effects of COVID-19 pandemic on hospitality industry: Review
of the current situations and a research agenda. Journal of Hospitality Marketing &
Management, 29(5), pp.527-529.
Huang, A. and et. al., 2020. Understanding the impact of COVID-19 intervention policies on the
hospitality labor market. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 91,
p.102660.
Jain, K.R. and Dhyanib, A., 2020. Covid-19 Impact on the Indian Economy: A Review of
Uttarakhand's Travel, Tourism and Hospitality Sector. INTERNATIONAL
JOURNALOF TRADE & COMMERCE-IIARTC, p.13.
Joshi, V.A. and Gupta, I., 2021. Assessing the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on hospitality
and tourism education in India and preparing for the new normal. Worldwide
Hospitality and Tourism Themes.
Kaushal, V. and Srivastava, S., 2021. Hospitality and tourism industry amid COVID-19
pandemic: Perspectives on challenges and learnings from India. International Journal of
Hospitality Management, 92, p.102707.
Verma, V. and Saini, A., 2020. Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on Hospitality Sector and it’s
revival post vaccine: AReview. Journal of Business and Social Science Review, 1(7),
pp.53-64.
Zopiatis, A., Pericleous, K. and Theofanous, Y., 2021. COVID-19 and hospitality and tourism
research: An integrative review. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 48,
pp.275-279.
Online-
UK Hotels in 2019 and 2020, 2021 [online]. available through
<https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/
ukhotelsin2019and2020>
Hospitality Trends in a Post-COVID-19 World, 2021 [online]. available through
<https://www.hospitalitynet.org/opinion/4106012.html>
COVID-19: The great hospitality reset, 2020 [online]. available through
<https://hospitalityinsights.ehl.edu/great-hospitality-reset>

This hotel turns to robot staff amid pandemic in South Africa, 2021 [online]. available through
<https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/travel/travel-news/this-hotel-turns-to-robot-staff-amid-
pandemic-in-south-africa/as81971359.cms>