Entrepreneurial Opportunities for Hotel Management Graduates

Entrepreneurial Opportunities for Hotel Management Graduates- Have you ever dreamed of running your own business? If so, hospitality may be the right field for you. The job profiles in a hotel industry consist of a patchwork of hotels, restaurants, and resorts, the great majority of which are operated by individuals or families, or maybe a small group of investors.

Everything from the customer shift to virtual and mobile booking, to changing travel habits, to new industry players are bringing novel challenges and numerous business opportunities for entrepreneurs in the field of hospitality. While hotel operators created rigid bureaucratic systems, entrepreneurs have the chance to push creative ideas to advance the industry and gain attention from consumers. The hospitality industry particularly lends itself to entrepreneurship. Understanding the local market is the key to success and requires an entrepreneurial mindset in order to succeed. Let us, first of all, learn about how some big hotel brands proved their mere existence.

Entrepreneurs and the great chains

One may think that, since nowadays, the hotel industry is dominated by big chains, like Marriott Hilton and Accor Hotels, there is no room for new entrepreneurs. It should be noted these great hotel companies trace their origins to entrepreneurs. For instance, besides the basic hospitality skills like preparing and serving food and beverage and managing hotel accommodation, hoteliers need to understand something about architecture, construction, legal and regulatory aspects, IT, marketing, social media, human resources management, accounting, finance, etc. Even the best choice of internship from the brand hotels can polish some of these skills in aspiring entrepreneurs.

• McDonald, the biggest restaurant chain

McDonalds, which is now the biggest restaurant chain in the world, was initially developed by Ray Kroc, a milkshake machine salesman. While the McDonalds brothers launched the first drive-in restaurant, it was Kroc, who, after observing the long queues in the brothers’ establishment, saw the potential for leveraging the format into a massive worldwide network through offering franchises. In fact, his first franchisees were his golfing buddies.

• Marriott Hilton

Marriott business was a stand selling root beer (an American soft drink) in downtown Washington DC. J.Willard Marriott and his wife, Alice Sheets Marriott, opened their nine-stool root beer stand in 1927, which subsequently grew into the Hot Shoppes Restaurant chain that evolved into today’s Marriott International hotel company, the biggest hotel company in the world. For the next 85 years (until 2012), Marriott was run by either J Willard or his son, Bill Marriott, even though Hot Shoppes was introduced into the stock market in 1953.

• Conrad Hilton took a chance on hotels

While hard work and determination are crucial, entrepreneurial success also depends on being in the right place at the right time. This is what happened in the case of Conrad Hilton. He got onto the hotel business almost by accident. In 1919, he was on his way to buy a bank in Cisco, Texas, but ended up purchasing a local hotel, the Mobley, instead. What gave him the idea to buy the property? Having arrived in Cisco, the 31-year-old Hilton stayed at the rather featureless Mobley Hotel. The young entrepreneur immediately noticed the queue of people lined up, hoping to get a room. But there were no more available rooms and the owner was so tired of running the property that he did not want to expand. Thus, customers had to be turned away and shunted off to sleep in other hotels. The owner just wanted to retire, so was glad to turn over the hotel to Hilton at an attractive price.

• Airbnb

Well there is always a room for new players in the market. All you need to have is the right set of strategies and a smart working brain. Society is constantly evolving and the careers in the hospitality sector are along with it. New concepts can take over and disrupt markets in a very short period of time. The multi-billion dollar firm, Airbnb was founded by two design school graduates, Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia, who were just desperate to pay the monthly rent.

Read here- Top 5 Hospitality Management Courses Offered by Five Star Hotels in India

These are the few entrepreneurial opportunities for hotel management graduates, the candidates can avail for themselves:

1. Hotels

People, especially tourists or who are traveling a lot due to their office work or any meetings, will always need somewhere to sleep, and often the big hotel chains are expensive. Meanwhile, a building with some history, a proper fried breakfast and an owner who not only knows the area but the people who live there, could be a far more enticing prospect for the visitor. You need to be prepared for your evenings to no longer be your own and that you’ll have to put in a lot of hard work.

2. Coffee Shop

There is a reason that coffee shops or cafes seem to be ubiquitous: people like them! (Ok, you can recall, Friends, the famous Central Perk). You can give your coffee shop a historical or a dim light look depending on what works for your cafe. Yes, you will have to keep experimenting. Create homemade cakes, buns and breakfasts, and pair these feasts with fresh hot drinks, to entice both visitors and locals alike. Memorabilia and a stylish décor will enhance the experience, and these venues can also be used to host networking events and live music/arts as is evidential nowadays.

3. Food Franchise

It is perhaps every foodie’s dream to own a restaurant. Even many of us opt for hotel management courses with a view that someday in future they will open a restaurant. An easy way to do this is to buy the franchise rights to international brands. An advantage of bringing in a well-known franchise is that the branding work is already taken care of by the MNC and they have set processes in place that a new franchisee only has to follow.

4. Pub or Nightclub

Owning or running a pub or club is an exciting way to earn a living. There are also many ways to stand out from the crowd, with the choice of a menu of local specialities giving you a point of difference to attract customers to a pub. Clubs can make a name for themselves through their live music too – with special DJs able to pull in the crowd of a pub in big numbers.

5. Travel Agency

Starting a business in the travel and tourism industry offers enormous appeal. If you are an experienced traveller with contacts in other countries forming your own travel agency you might be able to create your own specific, niche tours abroad. Perhaps your contacts will visit multiple regions and countries, and enjoy the fact that it’s a local travel agent delivering their bookings.

6. Contract Catering

Here a catering company is hired by a company or organisation to provide catering services every day or on a very regular basis. The range is huge. A lot of large businesses will use a contract caterer to provide food to their staff. Schools and universities use them for their students. Attractions like museums, galleries and sports venues have a contract caterer to run their restaurant or café.

7. Event Management

It is one of the most profitable entrepreneurial opportunities. The number of companies or individuals organizing and hosting events has been growing rapidly. It varies from large-scale international events to small time private events. Event managers organize events such as product launching, theme parties, birthday parties, wedding celebrations, exhibitions, workshops, corporate seminars, company conferences, musical concerts, road shows, celebrity promotions, film awards, fashion, celebrity shows etc.

Hence, an ideal recipe for success in business has not been invented yet, but the magic ingredients have been known for a long time. Most strategists and analysts reduce those to these key traits: curiosity, action, strategy, to be achieved by those who want to do business and profit.

Also read- 10 Reason to choose a career in hospitality