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eChai with Shital Bathia, CEO, Goverdhan Greens Resort, Dwarka

Our today's guest for eChai with an Entrepreneur is Shital Bathia, CEO , Goverdhan Greens Resort in Dwarka. Goverdhan Greens is an eco resort and agritainment complex planned at Holy pilgrimage spot Dwarka. 

Goverdhan Greens Resort is located in outskirts of holy city of Dwarka in Gujarat. Located 8 Kms ahead of holy Hindu pilgrimage Dwarka- presently the resort is located in 3 acres of Land and housing 17 Air-conditioned Rooms, Pure Veg. Multi cuisine Restaurant, with attached club house and swimming pool. Presently Phase 1 is over and operational while more 2 phases will be taken up by end of Dec 2015.The strategic concept of Goverdhan Greens  eco-resort is primarily based on philosophy of Reduce, Re-use and Re-cycle for the Resources. Goverdhan Greens is a total agritainment experience complex housing a resort, swimming pool, spa, hotel complex, organic farm, animal husbandry, Yoga centre, Alternate Therapy & Food Court. 

In his early days, full of energy jumped to bandwagon of Dot Coms, in 1998-99, he was among first few pioneers in Business to consumer e-commerce way back in 1999- just after indishop & rediff.com, indiancultureonline.com was the first venture he had created with vision to provide a platform to cultural diversity of India.

Sudden fall of Dotcoms' found him nowhere and had started his career back to Zero with a housekeeping agency in the city of Rajkot with name Cleaning Master in 2003. Business was steady and growing during early days, when it came to expansion, a major setback struck- it was stock market crash of Jan 2008- that had made all the corporate to cut the costs left, right & center! it was rather blessing in disguise proven for Mr. Bathia as he took this incident as one of the learning stepping stone and decided to pursue his dream of having a resort.

Here is the insightful and candid conversation with Shital Bathia. Join the conversation to ask any specific questions to Shital Bathia.

Early Years : When did it first strike you to begin this venture and why? Your Eureka Moment (the moment you decided to be an entrepreneur).

It was a long standing dream since day I was doing my MBA between 1995-97, I happen to prepare a Techno Economic Feasibility Study on a resort @ Jamnagar, that never came up. But it has planted seeds to my mind that why not @ Dwarka.

Cut to 2009- Vibrant Gujarat in the month of Jan 2009, Govt. declared that Tourism is going to be the thrust sector for the Government of Gujarat. I was asking for some data for some other investors to be for Dwarka, the data & number crunching rang the bell. It is time to jump in now.. Though I was not too sure about how long will it gonna take way back in 2009. But I did it, beyond even my own imagination.

Business Venture : What is your business model and what problems does it solve? What are market opportunities? How is it different from your competitors? How do you generate revenues ?

We had started with a resort that eventually going to be converted to Agritainment Complex. Business model is simple and proven one, prior to me at least 50+ hotels were operational @ Dwarka. Though with a mediocre specifications. Looking at simple demand & supply equations, I spotted our the opportunity, again with some specifications that no other local hotelier can even think of.

I have taken a bold risk to located myself in outskirts of Dwarka, and the risk has paid the reach dividend as we progress today, at end of Phase II of our expansion, we become the largest and the best property of Dwarka.

Revenue generation is not a rocket science in this business model and based on our scale and turnover, we are proud to be the largest tax payer in hospitality sector for entire District of Devbhoomi Dwarka.  

Sales : How did you make your first sale and how much time it took you from starting up to closing the first sale ? How long is your sales cycle ?

Honestly, I closed first sales even before actual opening up of the property and it took less than 30 minutes for me to close the first sale deal. We are fortunate to have sales happing on all 365 days of the year. Fortunately, our business thrives on efforts of 1000’s of Travel agents and business associates who sales on our behalf for a commission.

Company Culture : What kind of culture exists in your organization? How did you establish this tone and why did you institute this particular type of culture?  

In my opinion, Culture of any company evolves itself over a period of time, so I do not have any specific inputs on culture, but yes there are certain guiding principles that I have incorporated from Day 1- even prior to our operations at level of Project management. Very few basic principles such as…

1. Honesty in whatever we do.. even if we take surcharge on high season , it has to be published and there should not be any discrimination.

2. Human Dignity- Right from General Manager to Security personal, every human has basic right to be treated fair and with Dignity.

3. Customer is ultimate Queen!- I always force my team to ask this question unlimited times a day,, why are we here? For Profit? For Job ? for what??? My answer is FOR CUSTOMERS.

As this was the biggest Team I have ever handled till date, I have heavily bet upon the professionalism, and even as of date our General Manager is the front face of Goverdhan, we are there to facilitate his job in terms of advisory role.  

Partnerships : What are your views about finding the right Co-Founder ? How did you find your business partner? According to you who is the ideal business partner?

Partnerships are like marriages, as no one say for sure whether Arrange Marriage is better than Love Marriage. In the same fashion no one can decide at beginning that whether the partner or co-founder is going to be the best fit for the organisation in times to come. Whether small of large [Financially], a partner deserves to be the most trusted person. Through Transparent dealing in whatever we do, makes a great partnership in my opinion.

In my case, my partners happens to be the extended Family members of mine, and the best part of our partnership is .. they’ve shown unlimited trust on me and given me full support & authority to execute and manage without any interruptions. On reciprocation basis, I have also shown generous responsibilities and always focused my efforts on Shareholders’ value creation.

Hiring - How did you hire your first employee ? And in general what's your hiring policy ? How important have good employees been to your success?

Being an entrepreneur, one has to be a gambler to a certain extent and I was gambler in recruitment, I have shown full faith in my General Manager, and he has delivered. I cannot imagine what could have had happen if he had failed to deliver! But life is full of surprises and I believe in taking one step after other.

Normally, my GM recruits, fixes the terms and remunerations etc. so more or less he handles all these painful process. As far as I am concern, I am very much believer of Human Capital. Human is the most important Capital into any of the businesses, more so in Hospitality Business. I owe my success to a great extent to my Team.  

Learning : How did you handle your disappointments and failures?

Disappointment is the integral part of any project or business management, and at the time you never realized why such thing happens? But once the you have been through that disappointment, you start connecting the Dots.. Every event good or bad has tremendous learning value and especially more value from the disappointments. Being a businessman one need to look at the gain and loss arising out of any transaction and hence I always treat the disappointment as loss of opportunity and gain of experience.

Vision: What's your vision for your venture. What do you want to accomplish in your life ? What are your future aspirations?

In reality, baggers have no choice, so whenever you are trying something, you are not too sure whether whatever you are trying shall be happening exactly the way you envisaged. So having a vision and working upon it sounds good in such interviews and documentation but in reality, it was first accumulation of small successes and experience followed by such documentation of Vision and Mission etc.

However, having said that, I would also admit that being a local resident of Dwarka and widely travelled person, it was always pinching me not having any quality accommodation or resorts type facilities in Dwarka, despite of having huge potential in my opinion.

As I was convinced about the market potential, I have taken the plunge and fortunately it has paid off the risk. Having Landed up here, opens up the mind on so many fronts and that’s how the dots are getting connected. For e.g. when I was thinking of Hotel, the first thing struck to mind is the openness and Lush green Surroundings.. that made the decision in favour of moving in outskirts. Though market pandits termed it as Disasters in waiting.

As far as future aspiration goes, I do have vision to add quality experiences at whatever small way I could at different locations across India. But I am too sure not to expand heavily- as I am firm believer of Theory of Karma.

Work-Life Balance : How do you find a balance between work family and social life?

Difficult but then my response is, Being an extraordinary person, the limitations of ordinary person cannot be of mine, and hence finding out ways to keep the balance. It is more difficult during the project phase as normally I am working all 24 hrs, even during the sleep during the project implementation. Once it is been done, I do have good team to take care of it and hence I am relaxed and Free to spend as much time as I wish with the Family.

Hospitality is a profession that enables you to connect with huge customer base especially at locations like Dwarka, that makes my social life even interesting as I am fond of making new relations.

Risks : Which was the boldest decision you ever made to have this venture work?

2 Major or BOLD decisions…

Moving outside mainland Dwarka to outskirts

Placed unlimited Trust on my Team that they’ll deliver better than my expectations.. and till date They Have!

Here are some amazing photos from Shital Bathia's entrepreneurial journey.