COVIC-19 Impact

The analysis of this paralysis.

The halt in activity that occurred in the middle of the golf season and with a significant demand on the books has caused an absolute turnaround in the planning of the year, causing all the business plans for 2020 to be blown up and quickly mutating into a scenario of “war economy” in order to move forward.

“In the medium term we will recover, but along the way we will see closures, staffing adjustments, ownership changes and many other serious consequences to everything that happens today. An extreme transformation of the scenario that will affect the companies in the sector, all their players without distinction and in scale, the working and management methods, a great impact, a great tsunami full of changes and hopefully also of opportunities”. (RGarayar)

The consequences of the Covid-19 effect will drag on for quite some time. Right now we are in the first chapter; to face and overcome successfully the health crisis, to stop the blow, to reduce the advance of infections and to limit the mortality as much as possible. There are many more chapters of this book ahead of us that will be quite hard for everyone and will require time, capacity, ingenuity, flexibility, judgment and institutional support to overcome them.
An unprecedented joint effort to tackle a global crisis that is also unprecedented.
In the face of the unexpected contraction in demand, the first reaction was one of conservative logic, adjusting and limiting hotel services and anticipating holidays for some of the staff. Subsequently, and after the announcement and publication of the government decree that made official the progressive closure of hotels within a time limit of one week, the ERTES were precipitated by force majeure in the whole sector. “In our case it affected 90% of the staff. With the closures and since then the GAT team got down to work and we are in the process of redoing the business plans for 2020 and renegotiating conditions with lessors and suppliers”. (RGarayar)
No doubt there will be a before and after of Covid-19. The intensity and amount of the final impact will depend on the duration of the general blockade and the subsequent economic consequences, but it is clear that the Covid effect will last us several years, affecting all sectors and the entire market in general, both national and international.
“And although it is early to draw conclusions from the situation and transmute them into knowledge and learning, this black swan, its tremendous impact on the waterline of the welfare state, health and social and economic stability, will make us rethink business models and makes it necessary to create preventive formulas of all kinds to try to avoid fragility in our businesses”.
The year 2020 is already “annus horribilis” for our generation, not in vain in less than a week “we dropped the world”, first with a social drama and then with consequences still impossible to consider but with a very complex perspective for the whole year 2020. The impact will not be measurable until we have certainties within the VUCA scenario. A real paradox.
“I think the turning point will be the summer season, whether or not we can open our hotels for this important time and under what conditions. The potential limitations on the movement of people with border closures, the particular situation of companies and means of transport and, of course, the economic capacity of our potential clients, are the fundamental vectors to study in order to be able to venture into the next steps” (RGarayar)
This crisis makes us see and understand in a resounding and unmitigated way, the importance of the phenomenon of globalization in our business; something that happens 15,000km away and ends up affecting us directly within a few days. We depend on each other in a direct or indirect way, a fact like this propitiates all kinds of changes and adaptations in post of the sustainability and the viability of the businesses and the companies… of the countries. It also leaves a furrow, an indelible mark on the minds and behaviours of people, individuals and societies. Will it change the way we travel?
“In the short term YES, in the medium term I don’t think there will be a substantial change. I see a greater impact from the post-virus economic crisis than the change in the model of travel, although it is certain that potential clients will continue to follow the trend of experience, giving greater value to the environment and sustainability, and seeking more responsible tourism. Customers will no longer look for products or services based solely on attributes such as price or functionality, but there are very important emotional factors that already determine their behavior”. (RGarayar)