With pandemic on the wane, hotels sold out for upcoming Indian wedding season

Vikramjit Singh, the president of Lemon Tree Hotels, believes this may be the best wedding season for the sector in many years

Two years of pandemic, the restrictions that followed and the intermittent lockdowns—they all changed the way Indian weddings were organised and celebrated. However, now that the World Health Organisation has declared an “end in sight” for Covid-19, the Indian weddings are going to have the pre-Covid pomp and flair to it.

It has already been set in motion as this wedding season, there is a steep rise in demand for luxury hotels, and according to hoteliers and hospitality industry bigwigs, there is a “pent-up demand following two years of Covid” has led to the “resurgence of big, fat Indian wedding festivities” and people would be hard-pressed to find open slots in several hotels “between October till February.”

Also Read: Only about 57,000 marriages registered in Delhi in last 3 years: Data

According to Rajiv Kapoor, the general manager of The Fairmont in Jaipur, bookings at the hotel are almost sold out from October to February, reported the Economic Times. Kapoor also said that even though their hotel is close to Delhi-NCR, they have been getting bookings from all over the country.

“Rates are up 35 per cent from the pre-Covid period and we will cross 100 weddings this year. Everything is back to normal and I believe luxury hotels such as ours will flourish in the next six months,” he added.

Similarly, Noor Mahal hotel in Haryana is sold out October 15, 2022 – March 23, 2023, according to Manbeer Choudhary, chairman of Jewels Group of Hotels, which runs the five-star hotel. “People are shedding their fears of non-auspicious dates and those who could not get venues on auspicious dates are picking those. They are also bringing their weddings forward to this month. We have 18 party venues and we will host about 8-10 functions daily,” he told the publication.

Vikramjit Singh, the president of Lemon Tree Hotels, as told in the report, believed this may be the best wedding season for the sector in many years. He said that even though they had received bookings at the beginning of this year, people were unsure as the third wave of the pandemic had just weaned off, with restrictions not fully lifted.

Wyndham, which has hotels across multiple cities, has 100 per cent bookings, as is the case with Raffles, in Udaipur.

Industry estimates, as reported by SME Futures in May, said the 2022 wedding trends showed that “Indians have started splurging” again on their weddings.