So I took a weekend off to visit another city just for the heck of it, to figure out how inflation and COVID have impacted the travel industry. I am surprised.

So I took a weekend off to visit another city just for the heck of it, to figure out how inflation and COVID have impacted the travel industry. I am surprised. I flew to Mumbai on a low cost airline and stayed at a 5 star property. The rates and service levels are at per-COVID levels. The flight was packed, but expensive compared to pre-COVID levels. The hotel a totally different story. The crowds are marginally thinner. On a Monday morning what would otherwise be a bustling morning at one of the flagship hotels in SoBo, there are a handful of guests. Yet the service levels are top notch, food is fabulous. So I guess companies that are hard pressed to show profits at any expense are skimping on stuff to show profits but there are others who are not sacrificing service and quality levels for profits. Though the latter are far and few. My reading is that, sadly the skimping will continue for a long long time. Once companies discover a new path to profitability, it’s very hard for them to give up on that unless there are several market and demand forces which act against the skimping. For instance, volume. Once volume picks up, there will be no option to but get rid of the skimping in order to save time. But volume picking up is a huge if. I doubt the travel and leisure volumes will ever reach pre-pandemic levels.