Get pampered by Starwood’s “Luxury Collection” on Indian shores

The growing class of effluent business and leisure travelers coming to India, has forced ITC to adopt a prudent strategic decision of converting its 7 Sheraton properties into the “Luxury Collection” tag. This would mean the ITC Welcomgroup would now be among the “Luxury” hosts of India to join the likes of Oberoi’s Vilas properties, Leela hotels and Taj Group’s forts turned royal palaces.

With the completion of contract with Sheraton (another Starwood Hotel brand), the deal between ITC and Starwood was signed in mid-April, and the management was quick to complete the transition from Sheraton to “Luxury Collection” (as on May 15, those 7 hotel properties cease to be Sheraton properties), as if everything was going backstage and only the formal announcement was to be made. The properties would be taken care of by ITC and its international marketing looked after by Starwood.

This assumes significance, on the wake of rising share of disposable income of travelers on hotel and food, and stiff competition for ITC in the pie of wallet from elite and exclusive customers, who have the Oberoi Hotels (ranked among Top 10 globally), probably a cut above the rest.

Inorder to cater to the “Luxury Collection” high standards, ITC would need a huge amount of capex, which would put pressure on ITC’s bottomline, which already has spilled a little blood on account of imposition of VAT on tobacco and investment in its rural retail initiative.

But travelers are not complaining as they get to experience the choicest comfort and luxury, till recently available only to select 70 hotels in the world, including the St. Regis hotels.