TravTalk India Online Magazine
The signs of revival are visible now and the industry seems to be ready to overcome the hurdles with full force to host events and level-up the game when it comes to M!CE. And as the year gradually progresses, M!CE travel is set to grow, predicted to completely bounce back by the fourth quarter of 2021 or early 2022.
Henna Adl Karim, Product Development Head, Flycreative Online
The revival for M!CE travel within India looks bleak and may continue to underperform till the end of this year. The dynamics of meetings has changed this year and growth of online-based meeting platforms has made it very comfortable and cost effective for corporates to conduct small to large-scale meetings without travelling. But, the sooner COVID vaccination starts giving positive results, there may be scope for M!CE to resume. Meanwhile, we have been catering to small wedding groups with 50-100 guests.
Kishan Biyani, Managing Director, Ark Travels
I feel M!CE will recover only in the last quarter of 2021 once destinations open up. We are purely an outbound operator, thus very little movement has begun as yet. We have done a few to Maldives. My opinion is that 2022 is when we can see a complete revival or bounceback for M!CE. As we are purely B2B wholesalers, all our bookings are through retail partners. We will have to wait for some more time and the last quarter of this year is when business will show more promise.
Bhavesh Oza, VP, International Market, Blue Star Air Travel Services
While I am optimistic about M!CE, it definitely won’t be anything like last year. Major industries in India like pharma, IT, FMCG, etc., did not see any slump in business, which means that their spending capacity is still high. Also, introduction of new products like Cordelia Cruises, which is about to start, have added to the M!CE offerings. India as a M!CE destination also has huge potential with more infrastructure being built and new hotels being opened, and better air connectivity to tier-II cities.
BA Rahim, Founder & Consultant, One Above
There is still a lot of uncertainty in the market with regard to outbound M!CE. M!CE will open up last quarter of this year, that too only for few short-haul destinations. Our report shows there is a steady enquiry generated for M!CE for Greece, Turkey, Malaysia, Singapore, Macau and Mauritius, but all for the third quarter. Dubai and Maldives have shown tremendous recovery. Surprisingly, there are good M!CE calls for Maldives. Year 2021 will be a bounce back year for M!CE.
SD Nandakumar, President & Country Head, B2B & Foreign Exchange, SOTC Travel
SOTC has successfully delivered an international M!CE group of 750 delegates to Dubai in January 2021, and has been receiving interest from corporates for M!CE tours to international destinations such as Dubai. Till now, SOTC MICE has witnessed an encouraging response for domestic destinations for a group of anywhere from 40-250 delegates. These domestic destinations include Delhi, Mumbai, Goa, Ooty, Bengaluru, Jodhpur, Jaipur, Kashmir and Hyderabad among others.
Rohit Bajpai, General Manager, Sheraton Grand Palace Indore
We can already see signs of revival as travel restrictions have been eased and domestic business travel has been slowly and steadily picking up since the New Year. We expect that with business travellers, occupancies should increase March-April 2021 onwards, as companies gradually lift their travel embargoes. Our hotel has started hosting functions and conducting M!CE events like AGMs, sales offsite meetings, product launches, etc.
Inputs by Hazel Jain
