The newly opened Dambulla Branch of Nations Trust Bank conducted a seminar for home- stay operators and interested entrepreneurs in the locality on how the homestay value propo- Dambulla homestay operators empowered by NTB sition could be developed and delivered to attract and retain customers and enhance the brand profile.
The seminar was conducted with the support of veteran The seminar for homestay operators in progress. hotelier and consultant, Aruna Jayakody in Dambulla to an audience of over 60 participants. Menaka Wavita, Vice Presi- dent – Branches (Emerging Region), Nations Trust Bank, elaborated the reasoning behind the Bank’s CSR initiative.
“With Lonely Planet and other global travel sites citing Sri Lanka as best for travel in 2019, there is room to attract more tourists to Dambulla and we felt that we could help build livelihoods of more people and make this economic opportu- nity more inclusive as well as sustainable by strengthening the capacity of entrepreneurial individuals of this community to offer quality homestay value propositions.”
Lional Gunasekara, President, Tourist Hotel Owner’s Association – Sigiriya, who attended the program, shared his views on the learning outcome. “This was a great opportunity for the small tourism sector operators to learn about different aspects of the homestay business. They were able to identify areas of improvement, where with little to no extra investment, they could achieve customer satisfaction and revenue from en- hanced guest experience. I thank Nations Trust for organizing a much-needed awareness ses- sion of this nature.” Ruwan Premarathna, Branch Manager, Nations Trust Bank, Dambulla reaffirmed that the Bank in Dambulla hopes to uplift the lives of community members through similar value adding educational programs in the future.
