So, walk-in customers don't have to go dry in the throat striking a bargain, instead they are offered the discounted rates straight off. The opening of the Grand Hyatt has effected changes in the marketing strategies of the city's five-stars. They are all thinking up ways to bring in business anew.

Discounted rates for guests were never a problem, but they were always under the table. Hotels have schemes for regular clients, especially corporate clients, and offer discounts ranging from 15 per cent to 60 per cent, depending on the business that the company generates for the hotel. Airline crew, for example, are given big discounts as the frequency of use is very high in their case. Travel agents bringing in groups of tourists are also offered discounts. But a walk-in customer usually ends up paying rack rates, unless he is savvy enough to squeeze a discount out of the front office staff.

It is the walk-in customer at which Grand Hyatt's strategy is aimed. After the hotel's 50 per cent discount period ends on December 31, 2000, it plans to introduce a rate for the day, depending on the occupancy in the hotel on that particular day.

"So a guest can get a discounted rate without haggling at the counter," says Ms Marina Bullivant, director of communication (Asia/Pacific), Grand Hyatt.

The hotel is also trying to differentiate itself from the rest by slotting itself as a super deluxe hotel; it terms itself a city resort, pointing to the several landscaped lawns and water bodies that surround it and the spa facilities that it proposes to add soon.

Delhi's other hotels are not unduly worried though. Mr Edwin Bucher, general manager of The Park Royal, feels his hotel is located sufficiently far from the Grand Hyatt to rule out the possibility of competition. The Grand Hyatt is looking to the new business district of Gurgaon and the embassy crowds of Chanakyapuri to supply its customers, while Park Royal banks on the corporates in and around Nehru Place, he points out.

Le Meridien is more forthright about the Grand Hyatt's opening. Though again, the Grand Hyatt is not a direct competitor (Le Meridien has more to fear from Hotel Nikko, the Japanese five-star that has opened on Bangla Sahib Road), Meridien staffers do fear a drop in occupancy levels.

"When something new opens, there is always a tendency to go there, but we have our own strategies to garner business," says a senior Meridien staffer.

Le Meridien plans to concentrate on improving its presence on global reservation networks and increasing its Net presence. "Last year, there was a growth of 7 per cent in the occupancy rates of hotels. This year, we have already crossed that figure in the first half of the year, and now with the tourist season beginning, things can only get better," the staffer says.