Human resource systems as antecedents of hotel industry market orientation: An empirical study in the Canary Islands, Spain

This paper studies how the different dimensions determining the human resource management system (recruiting, training, evaluation and compensation) influence the market orientation of hotels. There is also an exploratory analysis of the differences in the human resource management systems according to the following hotel classification data: star rating, size, ownership, time-share offer, type of location, customer satisfaction and profitability.     

Algarve hotel price determinants: A hedonic pricing model

This study sought to assess customers' willingness to pay for a wide variety of characteristics and attributes of hotels in Portugal's Algarve region. After collecting nearly all the information available on TripAdvisor for hotels in this region, a hedonic pricing model was developed using a database of 9992 cases. The results suggest that – after standardisation – the most important variable shaping Algarve hotel room rates is the previous day's prices. When associated with a family-friendly hotel, star category and services have a greater value than beaches or golf courses do. Customers also appreciate some types of hotels, such as boutique, quaint or trendy hotels, but view others negatively, such as family-friendly or business hotels. Only the specific location of Falesia Beach adds value, although the Algarve is a desirable destination overall. Both destination and hotel managers can use the proposed method to analyse data for their region on customers' propensity to pay.     

A stochastic cost efficiency analysis of international tourist hotels in Taiwan

The one-stage stochastic frontier approach (SFA) is used in this study to simultaneously estimate cost efficiency scores and factors of cost inefficiency for 66 international tourist hotels in Taiwan during 1997–2006. An SFA model with three outputs and three inputs is defined. The three outputs are room revenue, food and beverage revenue, and other operation revenue while the three inputs are price of labor, price of other operation, and price of food and beverage. This model also takes into account five environmental variables, including dummy variable of the hotels located in non-metropolitan area, dummy variable of chain hotels, the number of tourist guides, the minimum distance from each hotel to Taoyuan international airport and the minimum distance from each hotel to Kaohsiung international airport. Empirical results show that international tourist hotels in Taiwan are on average operating at 91.15% cost efficiency. All nominal variables are transformed into real variables in 1997 prices by GDP deflators. Chain systems, tourist guides, and international transportation can significantly improve the cost efficiency of international tourist hotels in Taiwan.     

Use numbers not words! Communicating hotels’ cleaning programs for COVID-19 from the brand perspective

After hotels in many countries were forced to close in government-imposed lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic, there is an inherent need to communicate how they deal with the coronavirus to motivate guests to visit. However, lack of knowledge about how to persuasively communicate about hotels’ cleaning programs for COVID-19 can challenge the industry’s survival. We investigated how hotels that position their brand as a particular personality (sincere vs. exciting) could benefit from different communication styles (inclusion of numerical vs. verbal quantifiers) when presenting their COVID-19 cleaning procedures. Study 1 explored tourists’ central attitudinal responses toward hotels’ cleaning programs. Study 2 demonstrated that sincere hotel brands would benefit from using numerical and verbal quantifiers to communicate their cleaning policies, whereas exciting hotel brands would benefit only from numerical quantifiers. Our results invite hotel managers to use their brand personality positioning to influence tourists’ attitudes and intentions in a pandemic context.     

Assessing holiday satisfaction of Australian travellers in Vietnam: An application of the HOLSAT model

The hotel business model has been diversified in response to the various needs of consumers. Many previous studies focused on the alteration factors of the hotel business model from the consumer's point of view. Although it is one of the factors that affect alteration of the hotel business model, the manager's perspective is also an important alteration factor. This article emphasizes that it is necessary to consider not only the consumer side, but also the management side based on two approaches of the strategy theory: the positioning approach and the resource-based approach.

Surveys were conducted by mail in order to gather information regarding what managers in Japan consider to be important components of a hotel. As a result, “location” was found to be the most important component, followed by “annex facilities” and “deployment system”. Once the components were ordered according to their relative importance, a strong relationship was found between the managers' preferences and the characteristics of “syukuhakusyutai-type” hotels, which are ‘direct management’ (DM) hotels located usually in the city. In Japan, the number of “syukuhakusyutai-type” hotels has recently increased, therefore capturing the spotlight in the hotel industry. However, the results of this research are not compared with those of much previous research conducted on hotel choice attributes, because the measured variables differed significantly.     

酒店实习生工作满意度及其影响因素研究

酒店实习生作为酒店人员组成中的一个特殊部分,其工作满意度的高低对实习酒店和酒店行业来讲都有重要影响.但实习生的员工满意度与一般员工相比,有相同之处,也有不同之处.本文通过因子分析和分步多元回归分析,在控制了性别、学历、实习时间、酒店类型、实习部门、实习职位等变量的情况下,发现显著影响酒店实习生满意度的因素最主要的有三类:工作报酬、领导水平和培训机会.而被多数学者证明的对员工满意度有重要影响的"人际关系"对实习生的工作满意度没有显著影响.进一步分析表明,实习生的工作满意度及三类影响因素与其行业前景预期和留职意向显著相关.     

Management fees and hotel performance in the U.S.

A management company takes care of the day-to-day operations of a hotel and thus has a great amount of influence on the hotel's financial performance. Adopting models from O’Neill, Hanson, and Matilla (2008) and Hua, Morosan, and DeFranco (2015), a set of empirical models, with same-store data from 1471 hotels from 2011 through 2017, was used to test the impact of the total management fee and its subset of the base management fee and the incentive management fee on the hotels' rooms revenue and gross operating profit while controlling for potential confounding factors including chain scale and location.This is the first paper to empirically validate the value of a management contract for both the owners and the management company, including the positive and significant effects that base management and incentive management fees have on hotels’ room revenue and gross operating profit.     

Enhancing business performance of hotels: The role of innovation and customer orientation

Innovation management and customer orientation have been widely recognized as key factors in enhancing the business performance of hotels. Our research investigates the interplay between customer orientation, innovation, and business performance in the Alpine hospitality industry. The study contributes to current innovation research by jointly investigating hotel innovativeness and innovation behavior as two distinct dimensions of the innovation concept. Analyzing data from 203 hotel managers, this study shows that the effect of hotels’ customer orientation exceeds the effects of innovativeness and innovation behavior on financial and non financial business performance. Mediation analysis shows that innovation behavior partially mediates the effect of customer orientation on business performance. The results of the study provide hotel management with relevant insights into the customer orientation innovation performance chain.     

Can Response Management Benefit Hotels? Evidence from Hong Kong Hotels

With the growing influence of online reviews, more hotels are adopting online response management, but whether this works and benefits a hotel has rarely been studied. In this research, we study the impact of response management on hotel online ratings using data retrieved from TripAdvisor with a focus on Hong Kong hotels. We find that (1) high class hotels are more likely to adopt response management; (2) there is no significant difference among different hotel classes in terms of response rate; and (3) targeted response management has a significant positive effect on hotel ratings. In addition, Asian customers tend to give lower ratings than Western customers. We outline specific implications for hotel managers and their online management and offer suggestions for future research based on the empirical findings.     

Structural social capital and hotel performance: Is there a link?

This paper attempts to fill three gaps how to: (i) operationalize the concept of structural social capital (SSC) for hotels; (ii) compare the effectiveness of different SSC measures at collective level; (iii) observe the ability of SSC to influence organizational performance.Six hypotheses were tested using the Livigno (Italy) hotel sector (84 cases). The results suggest that SSC is the strongest positive determinant of hotel performance, compared with weaker and generally not significant relations linking occupancy and control variables (category, size, location). The work shows the multifaceted nature of SSC.The topological network structure appears to be the powerful lever to manage seasonality for both well and poorly located hotels. In fact the correlation between SSC and performance is higher in off-peak periods. Findings confirm that social capital is a valuable asset, able to impact on performance. We conclude by identifying some research gaps.     

Branding destinations versus branding hotels in a gaming destination—Examining the nature and significance of co-branding effects in the case study of Macao

This paper considers destinations and hotels operating within a gaming destination as co-branded experiential choice products. Specifically, it examines the overall and individual effects of visitors’ perceived brand equity of a gaming destination and their perceived brand equity of various hotels, including ‘flagship’ or branded hotels, in terms of influencing their reaction to a hypothetical brand loyalty scenario in which their intended and preferred hotel was unable to provide accommodation thus forcing them to either: (1) choose an alternate hotel in the destination and continue with the visit, (2) cancel the trip and choose another destination to visit, or (3) insist on staying at the preferred hotel but postpone the trip at another period. The study's expectation is that visitors’ response to such a hypothetical scenario is moderated by the relative influence of their perceived brand equity for the destination and for hotels. The emergent gaming destination of Macao is used as a case study for this purpose. The study's findings indicate that visitors’ overall destination brand equity perceptions—rather than hotel brand equity perceptions—is robustly significant when it comes to influencing visitors’ response to the brand loyalty scenario. Results of the study indicate several relevant implications for destination management organizations (DMOs) seeking to enhance their destination-branding efforts and for hotel operators, especially internationally branded hotel chains.     

The effects of beach characteristics and location with respect to hotel prices

This paper measures the effects of beach characteristics and hotel location with respect to the beach on sun-and-beach hotel prices by using a well-established hedonic perspective. The paper’s main results are that, after controlling for the relevant variables, location in front of a beach increases the price of a room in costal hotels of Catalonia by a figure between 13 and 17%, and that a Blue Flag increases the price by around 11.5%. The effects on hotels’ prices of other beach characteristics (such as beach length, width, sand type or beach services) are also estimated. With these estimates, the paper ranks beaches according to their characteristics and provides a setting to assess different policies regarding beaches from the point of view of hotels, such as regeneration, maintenance or achieving a Blue Flag award.     

Modelling growth and revenue for Swedish hotel establishments

This paper provides first estimates of the determinants of output growth of Swedish hotels based on establishment data. Growth of overnight stays is modelled as a function of initial size, age, type of accommodation, location and hotel prices measured as average revenues per guest nights. The empirical model accounts for potential endogeneity of hotel prices through the two-stage least absolute deviation model (2SLAD) and the instrumental variable quantile regression method. 2SLAD estimates show a positive and significant relationship between hotel prices and subsequent growth. The relationship is nonlinear with a decreasing impact as the price level increases. Growth of establishments is significantly higher for smaller and younger hotels. An important result is that city hotels, in comparison to tourist and other hotels – which are mainly located outside urban areas (in the mountains and at the sea) – exhibit significantly higher growth rates with a gap between 2.2 and 3.4 percentage points. Furthermore, the positive impact of hotel prices on growth is larger for high-growth establishments. Accommodation prices significantly decrease with the number of local competitors with a non-linear form and increase with size. City hotels and accommodation in the capital city have the highest revenues per guest night.     

The relationship between CRM, RM, and business performance: A study of the hotel industry in Taiwan

This study aims to investigate the implementation of customer relationship management (CRM) and its effect on relationship marketing (RM) and business performance, through an analysis of the hotel industry in Taiwan. A survey on hotels, including general and tourist hotels, and bed and breakfasts (B&Bs) was conducted, and a total of 560 questionnaires were returned. The results showed that implementing CRM has a significant and positive influence on the RM effect, positively affecting business performance for both hotels and B&Bs. However, a comparison of the influential paths of relationship models between hotels and B&Bs showed that, for hotels, the Internet service and customer support functions of the CRM strategy are the main sources of influence on the RM effect and business performance, whereas for B&Bs, the marketing support function of the CRM strategy alone influences the RM effect and business performance. To achieve higher performance, the different types of hotel enterprises should understand their main advantage before implementing key CRM strategies.     

Revisiting the hotel capitalization rate

Based on empirical analyses of US hotels, this study finds that hotel capitalization rate is a complex combination of macroeconomic and asset-class specific variables beyond the cost of capital, capital structure and growth rate. In particular, investors in hotel real estate base their cap rate measures on the performance of corresponding REITs. Incorporating asset specific trends improves the explanatory power of the capitalization rate model. A significantly persistent cap rate across consecutive-periods experiences an offsetting autoregressive effect in a year. Unusual increases in rents lead to investor scrutiny. Regulatory environment significantly impacts the capitalization rate after controlling for the overall economic activity in a market.     

Is there a future for hotel financial controllers?

Evidence suggests that organisations can benefit from outsourcing part or all of their accounting function but for hotels, however, this may not be appropriate, given the complexity and variety of the operating and non-operating departments. A recent research project concludes that outsourcing is unpopular, due to issues of management control, but that centralisation of accounting functions may be appropriate providing that control remains within the unit. Two types of financial management are emerging—very standardised systems in highly branded hotels, and fully self-accounting systems for independent hotels. Hence, the type of hotel financial controller may, or may not, be highly skilled and qualified, with implications for their future education and development.     

A social media analysis of the contribution of destinations to client satisfaction with hotels

To what extent do the ratings of hotels in social media depend on the hotels themselves and to what extent do they depend on the destination of the hotel? That is, if we were able to place a hotel with the same characteristics and services at two different destinations, would both have the same rating or would they differ? By using multilevel regression analysis, we have quantified the extent to which differences in client satisfaction with hotels can be attributed to the destination in which the hotels are located. We have measured this through ratings provided through social media outlets. Data downloaded from TripAdvisor from a sample of 7173 hotels were used. After controlling for specific variables, an 11.38% of the variance could be attributed to the destination. Thus, both hotels and destination management organizations (DMOs) are involved in client satisfaction and must work jointly to secure it.     

Cost Efficiency and the Choice of Operation Type: Evidence from Taiwan's International Tourist Hotels

This study investigated the endogenous relationship between the differences in cost efficiency and hotel owners' choices of either remaining an independently operated establishment or joining an international chain. We applied observations of 72 international tourist hotels in Taiwan from 1997 to 2008 to a simultaneous equations model with qualitative and limited dependent variables. The study results suggest that joining international chains significantly improves cost efficiency. We also found that net gains from improving both cost efficiency and hotel location are the two foremost determinants for an owner's decision to join an international hotel chain.     

What is happening to flexible workers in the supply chain partnerships between hotel housekeeping departments and their partner employment agencies?

The primary aims of this paper are two-fold: first, to consider the potential which exists for hotel management to establish a firm relationship with employment agencies to contribute to the deployment of right numbers and skills at the right place; and second, to assess whether both the hotels and employment agencies treat the flexible workers as a resource, or as a cost. The findings, based on 84 qualitative interviews, indicate that: there is a solid economic rationale that is likely to bind the incidence of flexible working practices to the wider recruitment strategies of the hotels; that the flexible firm models do not provide a full account of supply chain relationship between hotels and their partner agencies; and that the current management approach to labour flexibility conforms to a ‘hard’ version of HRM in that labour is treated as a variable cost. The findings suggest that flexible workers are highly likely disadvantaged in terms of access to training, career development, remuneration and other work-related practices than core employees. Overall, the data reveals that both dimensions of cost and, to a lesser extent, quality of the workforce provided by the employment agencies are central to the interests of the hotel management, thereby forming the backdrop to their decisions on whether to maintain these supply chain relationship with their partner agencies. Finally, the implications of these findings are discussed.     

Climate change adaptation in Cambodia's coastal hotel sector: An analysis of adaptation measures and hotel characteristics

After decades of profound challenges Cambodia has seen twenty years of stability and a flourishing tourism industry, however, it has also been identified as highly vulnerable to climate change thus putting the country's long-desired economic development at risk. Sustainable Development Goal 13 ‘Climate Action’ is critical for the continued economic success of Cambodia's vulnerable coastal tourism sector, but little is known about the hotel sector's adaptation responses and the differences between key hotel characteristics such as star rating, size, ownership and length of operation. This article examines the adaptation actions by 50 Cambodian coastal hotels by distinguishing between five adaptation categories. Subsequently, the analysis is deepened through a comparative analysis of key hotel characteristics. Although adaptation measures varied considerably between hotels they were more comprehensive and numerous than expected. Furthermore, patterns emerged that saw large hotels apply high levels of adaptation while budget and Khmer-owned hotels reported limited adaptation measures.