Multivariate models of hotel occupancy performance and their implications for hotel marketing

Multivariate models are developed to explain the differential occupancy performance of a sample of 279 English hotels. Following a procedure established in an earlier paper, hotels are first differentiated on the basis of their overall occupancy performance, seasonality, long‐term trend and length of season. Regression models are specified and calibrated to relate each of these dimensions of occupancy performance to the location and other characteristics of the hotels. The four models produce the expected positions of hotels in ‘occupancy performance space’, against which their observed positions can be compared. The application of the models in hotel marketing is discussed and demonstrated. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The impact of sharing accommodation on the hotel occupancy rate in the kingdom of Swaziland

This paper examines the relationship and impact of sharing accommodation on the hotel occupancy rate (HOR) from a developing country perspective. Using panel data on the monthly HOR and the number of Airbnb room occupancy rate for the periods 2012–2016 and 2015–2016, respectively, the study applies a hierarchical regression model to respond to the research questions. The Pearson correlation test reveals a positive relationship between the HOR and Airbnb room occupancy rate, thus indicating that an increase in the hotel room occupancy rate moves in tandem with a rise in the Airbnb room occupancy rate. Further test revealed that increase in the Airbnb room occupancy rate coincided with an increase in the hotel room occupancy rate. In addition, the Airbnb platform was found to appeals to a different tourist market profile than does that of hotels, and that, therefore, the two products may be viewed as non-competitors. Furthermore, inconsistencies in regulatory provisions, in terms of which hotels are required to undergo various legal procedures as opposed to such platforms, are evident. The study recommends that the Swaziland Government should undertake stakeholder consultations aimed at developing regulations to manage and monitor sharing accommodation platform participants that will incorporate its innovative and diverse dimensions. The study is important as it provides insights into tourism destination managers on the impact of the sharing economy from a developing country perspective where empirically based research that could be useful in policy formulation is scant.     

An integration of the multi-component DEA and GAR models to the measurement of hotel performance

The aim of this paper is to identify how well each hotel performs in each of its room and food and beverage divisions. To this end, this paper develops a multi-component data envelopment analysis/global assurance region (MDEA/GAR) model to fully gauge hotel performance where each hotel has its specific inputs and outputs for both divisions as well as shared inputs and common outputs between the two divisions. The application shows how the MDEA/GAR model can incorporate preferable hotels among the efficient ones with higher profit earning ratios when evaluating hotel performance. The results show that members of international chain-managed hotels perform significantly better than local chain-managed and independently managed hotels.     

Driving holistic innovation to heighten hotel customer loyalty

Innovative offerings facilitate hotels to expand the segment of loyal customers, who display stronger re-patronage intention and recommendation willingness. Innovation performance is essential for enhancing hotel management performance. According to the holistic innovation paradigm, successful innovation should be holistic in nature and comprise novel, utilitarian and experiential value dimensions. Empirical findings also attest to the conduciveness of holistic innovation to heightening customer loyalty. However, the antecedents and outcome of holistic innovation are still unclear in the hotel context. The current study validates a theoretical framework via surveys administered on the chief executive officers and customers of 112 five-star hotels. As the research result suggests, ambidextrous innovation orientation and value co-creation capabilities are primary drivers of holistic innovation. In turn, the three value dimensions of holistic innovation relate positively to customer loyalty with variant effect sizes. The research result contributes to hotel management both academically and practically.     

铁路多元经营饭店业存在问题及对策研究

改善铁路多元经营饭店业经营现状,实行集团化规模经营是《铁路多元经营十一五规划》的目标。分析导致铁路多元经营饭店业入住率低、经营绩效差的根本原因,从其目标市场需求的角度出发,结合现有饭店资质情况进行产品重新定位,提出发展铁路经济型连锁酒店的对策。     

Intellectual Capital and Business Performance: What Structural Relationships Do They Have in Upper‐Upscale Hotels?

The purpose of this study is to investigate the structural relationships among intellectual capital (INCAP) dimensions and business performance (BUPER) in upper‐upscale hotels. This study classified INCAP into three dimensions: human capital (HUCAP), organizational capital (ORCAP) and customer capital (CUCAP). This study applied a structural equation modeling to investigate the proposed model and hypotheses. The results showed that HUCAP affects ORCAP and CUCAP and that ORCAP influences CUCAP. INCAP dimensions, with the exception of HUCAP, directly affect BUPER; however, HUCAP indirectly affects BUPER via ORCAP and CUCAP. This study helps upper‐upscale hotel managers identify relevant INCAP dimensions and their indicators to enhance BUPER. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Examining hotel salespeople's new membership programme sales performance

Promoting new membership programmes can be a rewarding, yet challenging task for hotels. However, high-performance sales teams can improve consumer perceptions of new membership programmes in the market and allow hotels to remain competitive. Few studies have explored how hotel sales personnel approach the task of selling new membership programmes, and studies examining the moderating influence of market orientation are also rare. The current study contributes to the hospitality sales management literature by using the goal orientation theory to examine the new membership programmes sales performance of 168 salespeople. ‘Market orientation' was included as a variable that could moderate salespeople's performance. The results show that learning goal orientation and performance-prove goal orientation positively influence salespeople's performance, but performance-avoid goal orientation negatively influences sales performance. Furthermore, hotels' levels of market orientation (high or low) can moderate the relationship between goal orientation and sales performance.     

Environmental Management Practices of Hotels in Malaysia: Stakeholder Perspective

This article described the level of hotel participation in environmental management practices (EMPs) in Malaysia. It aimed to identify the level of stakeholder influence on EMP participation and whether EMPs contribute to overall hotel performance. To achieve these objectives, stakeholder theory was selected as the theoretical basis to explicate the proposed hypotheses. The analysis showed that stakeholder influence and the level of participation in EMPs among Malaysian hotels are only at a moderate stage. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Long-run causality between customer satisfaction and financial performance: the case of Marriott

Prior research that examines the relationship between customer satisfaction and financial performance (FP) in the hotel sector assumes that changes in customer satisfaction lead to changes in the FP of hotels. This research note aims to bridge the gap by looking into the possibility that FP of hotels may lead to increase in customer satisfaction with the annual data of Marriott from 1995 to 2016. To study the existence of long-run interactions between customer satisfaction and FP with firm size that is proxied by number of employees as the control variable under small sample size condition, the presence of cointegration among these variables with different appropriate dependent variable is investigated with the bounds testing approach. The obtained results suggest that there is a positive long-run causality from FP to customer satisfaction, and customer satisfaction has no effect on FP in the long-run. This study also finds that firm size has no impact on customer satisfaction. Explanation on each of these findings is provided in the conclusion. The selected sample and availability of data limit the generalisability of the findings of this study. Different hotel brands, measurements and analysis techniques will further the understanding in this field.     

Critical issues of globalisation in the international hotel industry

Competition in the international hotel industry is increasingly global as hotels seek new ways to grow and customers have more alternatives to choose from. Globalisation could lead to bland hotel images where hotels are similar wherever they are located. They could lose their local uniqueness and authenticity. This paper presents strategies for international hotel companies to operate in the globalised market. The main issues of globalisation in the international hotel industry are also discussed and ways to optimise the implementation of operating strategies given.     

Different Shades of Green: Environmental Management in Hotels in Accra

This paper assesses the environmental management practices of different categories of hotels in Accra, Ghana. Managers of 200 hotels were surveyed, employing the stratified random sampling method. Results of the study indicate significant differences in the extent of environmental management of the hotels suggesting that the better the quality of a hotel, the better the environmental management performance. Suggestions are made towards improvement in waste management and voluntary environmental programmes in small and medium hotels that did not perform well in those areas of environmental management Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Estimating efficiency and its determinants in the hotel sector using a profit function

Inefficiency in the hotel sector is normally estimated through cost and scale efficiencies. This paper estimates hotel profit efficiency and its determinants employing a stochastic frontier profit function and the inefficiency effects function. The key advantage of this methodology is its ability to estimate efficiency for each hotel and the factors that explain differences in efficiency in a single-stage sampling procedure. The sample consists of 231 hotels in Spain in the period 2008–2012. Empirical evidence shows that the average level of profit efficiency is 45.85% and that age, labour productivity and location are determinants of this efficiency. Policy implications for the improvement of less efficient hotels are noted.     

Efficiency and productivity growth in hotel industry

This paper analyses the relative efficiency and productivity of a representative sample of Portuguese hotels by using the directional distance function and the Luenberger productivity indicator. The key advantage of this approach is that both input contraction and output expansion are considered. The model generates hotel efficiency scores, ranking the hotels in the sample. We conclude that both inputs and outputs play a major role in hotel efficiency. Therefore, we suggest an alteration of management procedures in order to enable efficiency to be increased, based on an effective enhanced‐incentive policy and taking into account the small hotel characteristics of the sample. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How does demand uncertainty affect food and beverage capacity in the hotel industry?

This study investigates the effect of demand uncertainty on hotels’ food and beverage (F&B) capacity using the operation data of international tourist hotels in Taiwan. The empirical results of this study show that demand uncertainty leads to an increase in F&B capacity. Moreover, the magnitude of this effect increasingly strengthens for hotels with larger F&B scales. Our results together with other studies on room capacity collectively indicate that hotels’ overcapacity problem resulting from demand uncertainty considerably varies with hotel scales and between different hotel sectors.     

An analysis of demand uncertainty in the hotel market

This study proposes a two-step approach to investigate the impact of certain environmental variables on demand uncertainty within the hotel sector. Adopting a simultaneous-equation model and using the operation data of international tourist hotels in Taiwan, this study shows that chained hotels face less demand uncertainty than independent hotels. Additionally, hotels that are more distant from the airport or located in metropolitan areas face a significantly higher degree of demand uncertainty.     

The economic return on education for hotel managers

This paper estimates econometrically the economic return on education among Portuguese hotels managers, based on a survey carried out in 2003. A Mincerian human capital model is estimated. The main findings indicate that the rate of return is in the range 12–15%, signifying that Portuguese hotel managers are better paid than the average population. The results also indicate that in this sector, the return on education does not depend on the number of employees in the hotels in which the individual works, nor on the region where the hotel is situated. Gender has an impact in this labour market. Being a foreign manager has a positive impact on earnings, as is also the case for partners in the hotel company. The research draws the attention of hotel managers to the need to acquire human capital to enable them to perform their tasks effectively in a globalised world. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Impact of all-inclusive packages on hotel efficiency

In the last decade, all-inclusive packages have had an extraordinary boom in one of the most popular sun and beach tourism destinations in Europe, the Canary Islands. This fact reinvigorated the debate on potential benefits and negative effects on the local economy. However, there is no empirical evidence of the impact that all-inclusive packages may have on the efficiency in the hotel industry. This study assessed the effects of all-inclusive packages on cost and profit efficiency using the stochastic frontier approach and the model proposed by Battese and Coelli [(1995). A model for technical inefficiency effects in a stochastic frontier production function for panel data. Empirical Economics, 20(2), 325–332] in a sample composed of 102 hotels of the Canary Islands from 2008 to 2014. The empirical results revealed that the hotels that offered all-inclusive packages exhibited lower efficiency levels than those hotels that did not provide this service. These results have important implications for both public policies and hotel management.     

An environment-adjusted dynamic efficiency analysis of international tourist hotels in Taiwan

The paper is the first study to combine four-stage approach and dynamic data envelopment analysis (DEA) to investigate the efficiencies of 45 international tourist hotels in Taiwan during 2002–2011. Using the four-stage approach of Fried et al. [1999. Incorporating the operating environment into a nonparametric measure of technical efficiency. Journal of Productivity Analysis, 12(3), 249–267] and the dynamic DEA model by Tone and Tsutsui [2010. Dynamic DEA: A slacks-based measure approach. Omega, 38(3), 145–156], the study considers the effects of the external operating environments and carry-over activities between two consecutive terms, and calculates managerial efficiency of international tourism hotels in Taiwan. The empirical results show that dynamic DEA provides more stable pure managerial efficiencies than traditional DEA, reflecting the continuity of the links between terms. Then the study employs Tobit regression to estimate the effects of location, management style, and occupancy rate on input slacks. The location in resort area leads to less slacks of employee and room. The chain system helps reduce slacks in room and area of meal department. The slack of employee and room gets lower while occupancy rate gets higher. After controlling the three external environment variables, the efficiency scores of 28 hotels increase, 9 hotels fall, and other 8 hotels still sustain on the efficient frontier.     

Modelling roles of task‐technology fit and self‐efficacy in hotel employees' usage behaviours of hotel information systems

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between hotel information system (HIS) users' personal perceptions and beliefs of the given system and their daily routine usage intention via the technology acceptance model (TAM), considering the two external variables (motivational variables) of the model — ‘task‐technology fit’ (extrinsic motivation; system feature) and ‘self‐efficacy’ (intrinsic motivation; personal feature). Data were collected from hotel employees of 13 upscale hotels in Jeju, South Korea, and path analysis was utilised to test structural model and hypotheses. The results provided empirical support for an extended TAM, and verified its robustness in predicting hotel employees' intention to use a HIS. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Post-2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup: oversupply and location of luxury hotel rooms in Cape Town

An excess of hotel rooms in cities preparing to host a mega-event such as the FIFA Soccer World Cup is not a new occurrence. Between 2007 and 2010 the number of five-star hotel rooms in Cape Town increased by 50% and four-star hotel rooms by 20%. A spatial database of three-, four- and five-star hotels was compiled for the hotel sector of Cape Town. This paper reveals the global–local nexus of luxury hotel development in Cape Town (South Africa) and three different contexts in which the oversupply of hotel rooms must be understood. First is South Africa as a developing country engaged in hosting a hallmark event and engrossed in concomitant inflated tourism-related expectations. Second is the vulnerability of Cape Town's hotel sector with its overdependence on long-haul holiday tourists from a narrow northern-hemisphere market experiencing the worst economic recession since the 1930s. Third is the favourable economic trends in South Africa from 1999 to 2007 that have trapped hotel developers in a ‘fallacy of composition’.