Post-Covid travellers will have budgets to seek out experiential properties | May - 2020


Husna Tara Prakash, owner of Glenburn Tea Estate, Darjeeling and Glenburn Penthouse, Kolkata, believes that small boutique and intimate properties like hers will see the rising sun first as it will be easy to assure hygiene and social distancing to guests

Sakshi Singh | ETHospitality | WorldMay 26, 2020, 13:47 IST

Darjeeling beckons thousands each year for a leisurely respite from the bustle of the madding crowd. With lockdown hitting tourism, the biggest industry in West Bengal’s Darjeeling region has been witnessing a major downfall. For Husna Tara Prakash, owner of Glenburn Tea Estate, Darjeeling and Glenburn Penthouse, Kolkata, the team was on track for an excellent end to the season. Sadly, she had to send a lot of guests home early, and cancel many as the virus spread outbroke and the lockdown was announced. “Our final guests left and both our hotels were shut by around 20th of March,” she said in an interaction with ETHospitalityWorld.

At Glenburn Tea Estate, the main clientele is international guests, which makes the busy months, October to March. “So the Summer is not all that busy from us, but we did take a big loss from mid-March to May when we still normally have a good number of visitors. Covid-19 has had a big impact on our revenue during March, which is normally our highest occupancy month, as well as April and May which bring in a fair amount of visitors,” Prakash said.


Women belonging to the tea-tribe community work at a tea garden

Glenburn Tea Estate of Darjeeling is a family run business with hundreds of acres of rolling tea gardens perched on a hill slope with two river streams passing through the estate. The estate offers all-inclusive and upscale homestay for tourists in plush bungalows amidst sprawling gardens with magnificent views of the valleys and mountain range including the Kanchenjunga and Sikkim hills.

July and August are normally very slow for the Glenburn Tea Estate even though these are beautiful months to witness Darjeeling monsoon when the hills are lush green and the clouds float into the beautiful valleys beneath the snow-clad mountains.

Prakash, however, believes that small boutique and intimate properties like hers will see the rising sun first as it will be easy to assure hygiene and social distancing to guests. A 1600 private estate, with a maximum occupancy of 16 guests, it can guarantee an acre per guest in terms of open space. There is also a huge number of Indian and expat guests in India right now that have had to give up their luxurious summer escapes to the west and other home countries. Prakash feels that these guests will now have the budgets and the desire to seek out high end and experiential properties like Glenburn within India.

“We are working closely with RARE India and on our social media platforms to lure the traveller back to the open spaces of Glenburn Tea Estate, and also to the intimate private residence-like feel that a hotel like The Glenburn Penthouse can offer the traveller who visits Calcutta either for leisure or business,” she added.

While the clouds of uncertainty hover above, Prakash is optimistic that travellers will return, and Darjeeling and Eastern India will eventually do well.

 

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