How this Homestay venture is using technology to make homestays accessible to the masses

CXOToday has engaged in an exclusive interview with Varun Arora, CEO and Co-Founder, Ekostay

Tell us about Ekostay, its business model and operations.

Ekostay is a homestay venture with a prominent presence in Maharashtra, North and South India. Ekostay has a presence in over 15+ cities, with almost 150+ properties under our umbrella. Ekostay has stayed true to its envisionment as an ideal holiday home to rejuvenate and create lasting memories with friends and family. It was founded in the year 2018, to offer personalized aesthetically done villas and home stays with a customer-centric approach. Our business model revolves around a mix of fixed rental model and revenue-sharing model. We only take up properties that give us the exclusive control to manage operations and are listed under the EKOSTAY banner. So, 75 % of our business model revolves around a fixed rental model where we lease a property and further sublease it to tourists for short stays wherein the other 25% works on a revenue-sharing model where we do an exclusive tie-up with a homeowner and split the profits as per a pre-decided fixed ratio.

What are the unique key points (USP) of your company?

Ekostay has created a niche for itself by creating homestays and villas for all budgets and needs, and that I believe is our unique selling proposition. We focus on hybrid models and rentals, so there’s an Ekostay property that can be experienced by everyone irrespective of the budget. Our villas are categorized as EKO Gold and EKO Luxe that include budget villas, luxury villas, party friendly villas, villas for corporate gatherings and offbeat villas. Ekostay promises luxury, privacy, comfort and opulence. A part of Ekostay’s unique strategy is that we provide standardized amenities like free Wi-Fi, barbeque provision, dedicated caretakers, regular inspections and dedicated host managers for every property.

How are you different from the existing competitors? Would you say you use tech to differentiate from your competitors and stay ahead of the curve?

I believe that competition co –exists in every business whether it’s on the nascent stage or established stage, and a healthy competitive environment helps you create a benchmark for your services. It helps a business evaluate its performance and work towards minimizing errors. Ekostay’s biggest competitive advantage is that we offer premium and holistic stays at budget prices.  The other advantage is that we exclusively manage the operations at our properties and focus hugely on client-servicing and adding hints of personalization to every experience. We strive to stay true to our promise of delivering impeccable customer service with uniqueness and comfort. Our guests can feel safe and connect with their dedicated host managers anytime to raise an issue. At Ekostay, we also create lasting relations with home owners by investing in renovation of properties to ease their financial load, which I believe makes us stand apart from our competitors. We have invested in building around 2 dozen swimming pools exclusively at our properties to enhance the living experience. We have a dedicated 24*7 client servicing team and 12*7 sales and accounts team to serve our clients unlike our competitors who operate like corporates and have a cut-off time of 10 AM to 7 PM. Technology is vital to survive the competition and achieve empowerment. How would you otherwise create uniformity in operations, ease in communications and basically streamline services? It basically increases ease in operations for the business as well as customers and potentially increases revenue generation and improved customer experiences. We at Ekostay, have currently incorporated SLACK that helps our team to integrate information and work as one unified group. It has transformed our work-based communication and made it more engaging and collaborative.

How are AI and ML going to transform the hospitality sector? Have you integrated or planning to integrate these technologies into your business model to be future ready?

So basically, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) are playing a pivotal role in hospitality management because of its unique ability to carry out functions that were primarily carried by humans. Its creating potential for business owners to save money, eliminate human errors and provide enhanced customer experiences. Digital assistance, voice activated services, travel experience enhancers, automatic data processing and virtual assistants are all a part of AI and ML. Yes, we definitely plan to integrate these technologies in our future business model to optimize existing business services and increase productivity and operational effectiveness.

What challenges are you facing in running your business?

As a homestay venture, Ekostay has its properties spread over diverse geographical landscapes experiencing low to heavy rainfalls every year. One major challenge is maintenance of our properties during heavy rain falls that create havoc in specific areas. The other challenges faced by a regular hospitality business are keeping abreast of the marketing trends and dynamics, countless operational challenges, keeping up to guest expectations and the growth of competition. We manage to stay ahead of our challenges because of a dedicated team at Ekostay, an eye for detail, focusing on ways to improve operational effectiveness and focusing on online reputations.

What are the traction details (achievements of the company)?

Ekostay has experienced exponential growth over a short span of 4 years despite the pandemic, which I believe is our greatest achievement. Considering the huge demand for our domestic homestays, we feel it’s the right time to expand our exclusive business operations internationally, which is yet again a huge achievement for the business. Ekostay has also been the recipient of the ‘Iconic Most Premium Staycation Getaway’ by MID-day. Every achievement boosts us to stay true to our calling and establish higher levels of trust amongst our audiences.

How do you look at expansion?

Ekostay has already achieved an exponential average growth of 250% since its inception in 2018. It has a vivaciously futuristic take on expansion to add 500 properties by 2025. The company is not only trying to penetrate in Mumbai as a hub for home stay potential but also exploring international destinations to spread its operations. We are looking to add at least 15 to 20 properties in each State of India in next few years.

What are your future plans and expansion plans?

Ekostay currently runs operations in Lonavla, Panchgani, Mahabaleshwar, Khandala, Karjat, Nashik, Igatpuri and North and South India and also beach destinations like Goa and Alibaug. The company now plans to achieve the figure of 500 properties under the Ekostay banner within the next 5 years. We plan to expand in the Nilgiri ranges and Jammu & Kashmir to come up with about a dozen of properties in the next few years. Ekostay also plans to expand internationally and is eyeing lucrative international markets such as Middle East, South East Asia, and USA. At Ekostay, we believe in acquiring properties of brick and mortar and renovating them to luxurious and comfortable home stays. The future seems bright with a consolidated expansion strategy.