My wish for 2026 in hospitality
A New Year dawns on us, with nary a day to go as this article gets published. So, let me take this opportunity to wish everyone a Happy, Healthy, Prosperous and Better Performing New Year 2026. That last item is rather interesting, isn’t it? Yes, because it’s the main theme for this article. We need to Perform Better.
When I say Perform Better, I mean we need to up our game in terms of product and service quality offerings. Because let’s face it, we haven’t really recovered to the level of product and quality service that we had before Covid-19. Rather frequently, whenever we visit a hotel, restaurant or shop, my wife and I quip that “Mediocre Has Become the New Normal”. I briefly toyed with making that the title of this article, in fact.
How many times have you visited, say, a restaurant (even those in five star hotels) and found that the service was lamentable? Water glasses remaining un-refilled used plates piling up on the table, un-cleared (particularly at buffets) and a general attitude of apathy. Or, did you have to send multiple e-mails to a hotel to get a half-acceptable answer? A close family friend of ours from the UK who has visited Sri Lanka umpteen number of times experienced this at the famous Hotel by the Lake in Colombo. Mind you, he’s stayed at this hotel at least twenty times. So, this time in December, he decided to change to the hotel for Kings, and came away very impressed by their personalized service, in-room check-in experience, and the fact that he could easily order egg hoppers and ‘kiri hodi’ (yes, he’s a Britisher who loves Sri Lankan food) for dinner, despite hoppers being a breakfast item on the room service menu. This hotel went the extra mile when the previous one didn’t even attempt to start the engine!
Then, there are the countless vendors who you have to message or call multiple times to even get a response. It’s basically chasing them – to give them business. And this is where, unless it’s an essential item or difficult to find, I give up. I take my business elsewhere. I am an utter fan of “let my money do the talking, or walking” and will spend it elsewhere even if I feel mildly jilted by an establishment. Yes, I am fussy, but am I wrong in being so? After all, I don’t expect red carpet treatment, just regular, timely service and products of quality that befits their asking price.
An example of that is when recently I visited a popular laptop and accessories shop in Colombo 4, to purchase a gift for a friend. While there, I idly browsed their display of laptops because I was interested. A few years back, such an activity would have seen a salesperson enthusiastically following me around, inquiring into my needs, making helpful suggestions, offering model comparisons and even telling me about payment plans. Now, nobody seemed bothered to move from their cosy perches, and I left, having spent just a few thousand rupees rather than a couple of hundred thousand.
A few days later, my wife and I went to celebrate our anniversary at a nice steak restaurant. At first glance, things seemed fantastic. However, in retrospection, the service was what it should have been. It met the standards for average. The staff was attentive and helpful, but they didn’t pick up on the little things, like offer recommendations or promote dessert after the main meal. The main meal itself was excellent, but our iced teas weren’t really iced, and we had to send them back as a result. And that’s what made me realize, Mediocre Is the New Normal. So, when we experience what is basically the median standard, we thought of it as fantastic. The bar has been lowered – not raised.
This brings me to my wish for 2026. I wish that product quality and service standards will go back to their pre-2020 levels. It’s not rocket science after all. Because as a destination; we really need to do this. We need to strive to do better – not parrot out excuses as to why we can’t improve. Otherwise, that signature Sri Lankan hospitality will quickly disappear.
Ashraaq Wahab - Director of Marketing and Technical, Hospitality Sri Lanka, Automotive Journalist, Marketer, Photographer and Writer, who enjoys penning his thoughts, insights and Ideas on a variety of topics
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