Strategic Financial and Sustainability Challenges for Kamat Hotels

Kamat Hotels encountered significant challenges following the global recession, impacting its expansion plans and financial stability. This has necessitated a strategic focus on cost-saving measures through the adoption of eco-friendly practices to reduce operational costs and enhance competitiveness. An ecotelling strategy could potentially attract more tourists by promoting sustainability, which aligns with current environmental trends. Moreover, this approach supports long-term financial health by optimizing resource use and reducing waste management expenses. The assignment examines how these strategies can help Kamat Hotels achieve sustainable development while maintaining a competitive advantage in the hospitality market.

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1. What are the challenges for Kamat Hotels in terms of financial aspects? Is the company
in a position to take up any aggressive expansion plans?
There was a major impact on the revenue and finance of Kamat hotels in the year 2008
when there was a large scale reduction in the number of tourists both from the domestic and from
the international level as well. Though there was the arrival of tourists it was only seasonal in
nature. The arrival of the tourists was cyclical in nature. From September 2008, there was an
economic slowdown on a Global level (Economictimes.indiatimes.com, 2018). The economic
setback was created when there was the Mumbai terrorist attack in November 2008. There was
also this prediction that the demand for the top notch branded hotels would increase sharply in
the coming years.
As the Kamat Hotel is now suffering from an economic setback, it will not be feasible for
them to undertake a huge expansion in other areas. So, it is prudent for them if they focus on the
promotion of the environmental sustainability services and try to develop themselves within their
local regions.
2. Can ‘ecoteling’ work as a competitive strategy for Kamat Hotels?
As far as the modern scenario is concerned, cooling can be a good competitive strategy
for the Kamat Hotels. This is because, in the modern day scenario, it is become really very
important to promote environmental sustainability. Right from the time of its initiation, Kamat
was quite particular about the role that it wants to play towards the conservation of energy and
towards the environment as a whole (Jones et al., 2016). This can really be a good strategy to

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give a strong competition to its competitors because most of the hotels had just boasted off about
their eco-friendly services but had not actually done anything for it. Kamat was the first hotel to
move in the direction of adopting eco-friendly practices. It is also evident from the fact that the
Orchid Hotel was also granted the ECOTEL certification for its considerable contribution
towards conserving of energy. It is evident from the fact that, Kamat hotels right from their days
of inception provided organic and eco-friendly food to the customers.
3. What steps need to be taken by Kamat Hotels if it plans to leverage upon the core
competency?
Kamat Hotels have to adopt several steps if they are to leverage upon making the core
competency like reducing the room rates and the other operational costs and providing eco-
friendly products like green and organic food (Fraj, Matute & Melero, 2015). It has to make sure
that all the employees are well aware of the causes behind implementing the eco-friendly
practices. So, it has to conduct regular seminars, workshops, and employee training sessions.
There have been several instances where the economic downturn has greatly affected the goals
and objectives of the hotel. As they were focusing on a large number of activities at the same
time, they could not manage timely payment of the staffs. They were focusing on increasing the
volume of business, so they had to interact with a large number of buyers and sellers.
4. Can ‘Building an environmentally sustainable hotel (ecotel)’ be regarded as the core
competency for Kamat Hotels (India) Ltd.? Substantiate your answer.
Yes, building an environmentally sustainable hotel (ecotel) can be regarded as the core
competency for Kamat Hotels because it will help them to successfully carry on their

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responsibility towards environmental sustainability (Gurav, 2015). This will also help in
increasing the total potential of the employees. They have constructed the Green Team that takes
care of all the environmental initiatives. There is one member taking care of each of the divisions
so that the entire operations of the hotel can be carried on in a proper way without any of the
resources being wasted. The heads or the representatives of each of the divisions take up the
initiatives for the promotion of the eco-friendly activities. Green Team makes sure that the
several eco-friendly activities are carried on regularly, like photography, wealth out of waste
competition and many more. The employees who are declared as the winners are also awarded
prizes so that there is always a proper motivation among the staffs.
5. What are the key drivers of sustainability through building a core competency in the
form of ‘The Orchid’ if it is regarded as a ‘core product’?
There are several factors that can act as the key drivers of competency in the context of
The Orchid being regarded as a core product. The Orchid Hotel is the first among the Indian
Hotels, to be granted as the ECOTEL certification because of its active participation in the
environmental conservation activities. It is really a plus point for the orchid hotels, as none of
their competitors were so active towards adopting the eco-friendly services, though they had
spoken about the same. On the other hand, the Orchid Hotel has been maintaining its
responsibility towards the environment right from the construction stage to the services that were
offered (Boella, 2017). The food that was offered to the customers was natural, organic and eco-
friendly in nature (Pirani & Arafat, 2014). The resources and raw materials that were used for the
construction of the infrastructure was also environment-friendly in nature like the bathroom

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fittings, flushes in toilets, installation of the R22 air conditioning in place of using the CFC
refrigerants etc, and show that Orchid Hotels have been very active towards promoting the
environmental sustainability. It is also beneficial for attracting a greater number of tourists
because usage of the eco-friendly devices will help in reducing the operations cost and will
surely pay off in the long run.
6. Which option will help ‘The Orchid’ achieve sustainable development? How can The
Orchid brand be used in a wider sense to take sustainable competitive advantage?
The best option that can be used by the Orchid Hotels is to carry on cost savings methods
within their operations. This will mainly be initiated through the use of cost-saving
infrastructural resources that will help in checking the high operations cost like the room tariffs.
In a highly competitive market, the price for energy, water, and waste disposal is huge. So, using
the eco-friendly devices will help in checking these unnecessary high costs and will also lower
the room tariffs. As a result of this, they will be able to attract a greater number of tourists. They
will be able to increase their efficiency and check waste management properly. This will also
help in giving a tough competition to the competitors (Graci and Kuehnel, 2018).

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References
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management science and allied areas (refereed), 8(2), 1-10.

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