Hotel’s affordable meals bit

Kota Kinabalu: The Palace Hotel here carried out their corporate social responsibility (CSR) during the Covid-19 pandemic by offering affordable priced meals for city dwellers.

Its General Manager, Chloe Loo said during the whole of February, they set up food stalls at the hotel’s parking area to sell selected choice of items at a standard price of RM5.

“Since events and dine-in activities were not allowed during the Movement Control Order (MCO), our food and beverage (F&B) section was heavily affected. We decided to do something otherwise our F & B team will be left idle,” said Chloe.

Looking at the people who lose their jobs and the shift in spending power to cost saving had spurred the hotel to initiate the CSR to help the community and employees, she said during a meeting with Sabah Publishing House Marketing Manager Dexter Yeh. 

During the one-month period, they discovered that ayam penyet was the most sellable item besides beef rendang, ayam merah, traditional cakes and sandwich, she said. 

“Our customers are mixed of new and existing patrons including nearby office workers and friends. Some even bought 10 packs for the whole family. And the response was overwhelming as everything was sold out every day before closing at 5pm,” said Chloe.

Although the hotel industry was struggling to survive, she said the Palace Hotel was still serving guests from the essential services amid the pandemic. 

She is confident the ailing tourism industry will gradually recover as now we have the vaccines and under the Recovery MCO.

Since dine-in is now allowed, regular patrons could be seen starting to flock into the hotel’s restaurant to enjoy their favourite meals and ambience.