O'Nest Home Stay

Mithil Pitre is a college-trained novice hotelier who runs a six room resort in his backyard in Devruk, Maharashtra. Devruk is a lovely village 320 km south of Mumbai on the NH17 with nothing to its name other than being the administrative center of the Sangameshwar taluka. The sea is 60 km away.

People like Mithil must be encouraged because it takes true entrepreneurial gumption to start a resort close to the back of beyond. Tourism is a novelty here. As an industry, we need a lot more of Mithil’s type to make this business work because we are maturing as a country and people are looking for alternatives. Providing alternatives is one of the main reasons UGC sites such as holidayiq.com have profitability within reach. It is how I found Mithil’s O’ Nest resort.

The O’ Nest launched last year on October 2 with just two rooms, sleeping a grand total of four. One room is attached to the main house, the other is a renovated out house. The food was and is still home-cooked, but the response was so encouraging that Mithil’s father bankrolled the construction of the four new rooms, the open walled restaurant and landscaping the large family backyard. Most of the work, but the financial pressure on the 24 year old man is beginning to tell. To the trained eye, there are important areas which require serious attention, yet the fledgling signs are there which requires encouragement.

Here is someone, not from a business family, who went to Mumbai to study hospitality management so that he could return home to start his business. He could so easily have opted to join a city five-star hotel like 98% of most hospitality students want to do. Or stayed back in the UK where he went for his internship. Instead, his O’ Nest has broken new ground in Devruk and employs six locals. The reluctant family is coming around as is the village since the O’Nest has brought in almost 1,000 paying visitors. Far from being an outright success, the O’ Nest is on a knife’s edge and we hope it pulls through. Either way, having tasted the rush of business, Mithil is unlikely to be held back for long.

Which is why the 2% like Mithil must not be discouraged even as they stumble. Indian hospitality sorely needs true entrepreneurial thinking and drive to build from the ground up. The present me-too approach is not too impressive. Such radical thinking inevitably sets the future ground rules. Imagine the change as 2% grows to 15%. There is precedence to this. Hospitality entrepreneurship today is at the same stage environment efforts were 12 years ago. And look where that is today.

In an emerging India, tremendous opportunity obviously exists. But as an industry, we need to make our own opportunity. And actively support and encourage the Mithil Pitres who dare to innovate.
Have a good week.