How sustainable is sustainable hospitality research? A review of sustainable restaurant literature from 1991 to 2015

This research was designed to evaluate our current state of knowledge by systematically reviewing tourism and hospitality academic literature concerning sustainability in the restaurant sector by undertaking a systematic review and content analysis. The characteristics of 76 articles are listed in a comprehensive table, presenting research design and research variables, and the articles are examined for their approach to the sustainability concept as applied to the restaurant industry (i.e. the range of responsible practices addressed in each work). The findings indicate that the majority of the literature only engages with parts of sustainability, particularly ecological, rather than holistic sustainability. This matters because it may mean we fail in our attempts to achieve more sustainable restaurant operations.

This research suggests that tourism and hospitality studies need to re-engage with the evolving conceptualisation of sustainability to ensure that best practice responses to changing requirements are undertaken. The narrow focus on ecological aspects of sustainability featuring in restaurants does not acknowledge the full meaning of sustainability and therefore may constrain efforts to secure more sustainable futures. Illuminating such gaps in knowledge is important in order to strengthen our conceptual understandings, refine our practices and thereby secure more sustainable futures through tourism and hospitality.     

Marketing practice in small tourism and hospitality firms

There has been a paucity of research into the marketing practices and approaches of small tourism and hospitality firms, until the 1990s. This paper goes some way towards improving knowledge in this area by reporting the findings of the first national survey of small tourism and hospitality firms in the UK. Four key areas of marketing practice are highlighted: marketing planning, promotion methods, pricing methods and marketing research. The paper concludes that although a great deal of small hospitality and tourism firm marketing may be characterised as haphazard and unsophisticated, there is much to commend it in the UK. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Zero acquaintance benchmarking at travel destination websites: what is the first impression that national tourism organizations try to make?

This paper examines the marketing effectiveness of hospitality and tourism websites. An extensive review of literature on website effectiveness in hospitality and tourism revealed a total of 47 different instruments that have been used to evaluate hospitality and tourism websites. Using the grounded theory technique, a website evaluation tool called the online promotion evaluation instrument was developed with the aim of condensing the 47 existing tools into one benchmarked instrument with applicability across the various hospitality and tourism sectors. The developed online promotion evaluation instrument comprised three main features—aesthetics features (destination visualisation and Web design); informative features (uniqueness, monetary value and cultural promotion); and interactive features (e‐travel planners and online communities). The instrument was tested using a random sample of 25 National Tourism Organization websites worldwide. The results of the instrument development and testing process are presented in this paper with directions for future research in website evaluation. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Achieving Competitiveness in Greek Accommodation Establishments during Recession

The article examines the strategies that Greek hotels have implemented to strengthen their competitiveness during recession. The research is based on a nationwide e‐mail survey to hospitality managers/owners. The results reveal that the most important perceived competitiveness factor is cost reduction and implementation of actions against crisis, followed by innovation, human resource management and marketing. The study also proposes actions that can improve the competitiveness of accommodation establishments. The article helps fill the gaps in our understanding of how hospitality firms tackle competition during crises, and suggests managerial policies that can help hospitality firms to strengthen their positioning and competitiveness during crises. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A review of eye-tracking research in tourism

This study provides a review of eye-tracking as a technique for measurement of attention. The review discusses its theoretical basis, advantages and disadvantages, data collection procedures, analysis methods, and application in tourism and hospitality. Areas for further research in tourism and hospitality are provided based on a systematic review of tourism research using eye-tracking.     

Entrepreneurial orientation in family firms: the case of the hospitality industry

Research increasingly shows interest in the motives and characteristics of entrepreneurs in the tourism and hospitality industry. Small and medium-sized family firms dominate this industry. Learning from the concept of entrepreneurial orientation and family business research, this explorative study aims at analysing entrepreneurial behaviours and their effect on performance as perceived by owner-managers of hospitality family businesses. The authors conduct narrative in-depth interviews to understand the managers' meaning of entrepreneurship and performance, and discuss the results in the light of existing entrepreneurship literature. Results indicate that family firms in hospitality and tourism are peculiar, and their embeddedness in the destinations and regions outlines their entrepreneurial behaviour against Schumpeter's definition of growth-oriented entrepreneurship.     

Eating ants: understanding the terroir restaurant as a form of destination tourism

This paper explores the idea that there is a new form of restaurant that requires definition recognition that it fulfils a significant role in contemporary tourism. The adoption of foraged foods frequently reflects the historical and cultural foundations of place; in this respect, it is possible to adopt the French notion of ‘Terroir’ to conceptualize this new hospitality movement. The paper utilizes Noma in Denmark as a case study of this new gustatory movement and provides an exemplar of the terroir restaurant. The terroir restaurant provides a space in which the diner can consume tangible elements of both culture and landscape; often, this involves entry into a constructed visceral ‘sensescape’ where the dining experience becomes elevated to a higher level. The terroir restaurant provides the tourist with a gustatory concept and philosophy that move far beyond the notion of food as fuel, to one that is underpinned by a geographical and cultural aesthetic that reinforces the consumers ‘being in the world’ and their individual identities.     

Driving factors of the hospitality industry cycle

This study applies a Markov regime-switching model to examine Taiwan's hospitality industry based on the gross domestic product data of the hospitality industry from 1982Q1 to 2012Q2. On understanding the characteristics of Taiwan's hospitality industry, the study performs Granger causality tests to identify the driving factors of Taiwan's hospitality industry cycle. Two regimes of the hospitality industry cycle – a high-growth regime (HGR) and a low-growth regime (LGR) – are detected. Specifically, the average growth rate of HGR (LGR) is 3.01% (2.17%) and the standard deviation of HGR (LGR) is 0.69% (0.19%). The probability of the hospitality industry staying in HGR (LGR) is 98.25% (97.52%) and the expected duration of HGR (LGR) is about 57 (40) quarters. Further, the inbound tourism market growth is found to be a significant driving factor that can cause the hospitality industry to remain in the HGR. Valuable information and policy implications are provided to guide hospitality business managers and tourism policy-makers.     

Return labour migration: an exploratory study of Polish migrant workers from the UK hospitality industry

Incoming labour migration represents an important research field, especially in the context of East-Central Europe, a key source region of labour migrants to the tourism and hospitality sectors of many Western economies, including the UK. Surprisingly, return labour migration from the UK to this region has not been systematically examined and yet there is increasing evidence of its significance, especially in light of Brexit. The labour migrant motivations to return and their re-integration experiences back home remain poorly understood. This study adopts a qualitative method of data collection and analysis to explore return migration of the Polish workforce from the UK hospitality sector. Homesickness and educational pursuits are identified as the key drivers. The UK employment experience enhances career prospects of former migrants and yet it largely benefits non-hospitality related sectors of the domestic economy. While the re-integration experiences of former migrants are generally positive and the majority are content with the decision to return, some consider an opportunity to re-migrate.     

Decline and turnaround: a literature review and proposed research agenda for the hotel sector

Tourism systems are composed of an inter-related and inter-dependent set of individual businesses, organisations and servicescapes. The hospitality industry, and more specifically the hotel sector, comprises many businesses that contribute significantly to the tourism system. Yet, the industry is renowned for business failures and poor financial returns. Increasing competition, globalisation, technology, social change and internal weaknesses are some of the reasons why tourism and hospitality businesses fail or perform significantly below expectations. When in a state of decline or poor performance, many businesses attempt a ‘turnaround’. Declining performance can have wide-ranging impacts not only on hotel businesses directly, but also upon those communities where local economies rely on tourism for jobs and economic prosperity. Consequently, an improved understanding of the processes of declining performance and turnarounds is particularly important to both researchers and practitioners. However, there has been limited research focused on turnarounds in the tourism industry, in general, and in the hotel industry, in particular. In this study we assess the literature on decline and turnarounds and propose an agenda for future research that will enhance our knowledge and inform ongoing debate on the process and impact of turnarounds in the hotel industry.     

Drivers and barriers of peer-to-peer accommodation stay – an exploratory study with American and Finnish travellers

The explosive growth of peer-to-peer (P2P) accommodation service presents a potential transformation in the competitive landscape of accommodation sector. This research explores the market characteristics and the factors that drive and hinder the use of P2P accommodation to better explain the phenomenon of collaborative consumption in the tourism and hospitality marketplace. Using responses from travellers residing in the United States and Finland, exploratory factor analyses revealed two factors that drive the use of P2P accommodation: social appeal (desire for community and sustainability) and economic appeal (cost savings). The barriers include issues of trust, efficacy and familiarity with the system, and cost. The empirical evidence from this study suggests several managerial implications for tourism and hospitality businesses and directions for future research.     

A review of website evaluation studies in the tourism and hospitality fields from 1996 to 2009

This paper reviews website evaluation studies in the tourism and hospitality fields published between January 1996 and September 2009. A website evaluation framework that includes evaluation by phases, evaluation by features, and evaluation by features and effectiveness is developed. The strengths and weaknesses of each method of evaluation are analyzed, and research gaps and future research directions are explored. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The impact of abusive supervision and co-worker support on hospitality and tourism student employees’ turnover intentions in Ecuador

Ram (2015. Hostility or hospitality? A review on violence, bullying and sexual harassment in the tourism and hospitality industry. Current Issues in Tourism. doi:10.1080/13683500.2015.1064364) posits that violence and harassment are areas of concern within the hospitality industry, and scholarly interest in abusive supervision in the workplace has grown since the last decade. This study extends Ram's (2015. Hostility or hospitality? A review on violence, bullying and sexual harassment in the tourism and hospitality industry. Current Issues in Tourism. doi:10.1080/13683500.2015.1064364) assertion by examining the effect of abusive supervision experiences on student employees’ turnover intentions in a hospitality and tourism context in a high power distance culture, Ecuador. The results showed that abusive supervision was positively related to turnover intentions, and its effect was stronger than co-worker support, with the abusive supervision–turnover intentions relationship being fully mediated by perceived organizational support (POS). In addition, co-worker emotional support was found to attenuate the negative effects of abusive supervision on POS. All in all, the findings highlight the roles of POS in explaining the relation between abusive supervision and turnover intentions and co-worker emotional support in buffering the negative effect of abusive supervision. The important role of culture is discussed.     

Tourism and hospitality internships: influences on student career aspirations

Research shows that students will often change their career choices relating to the tourism and hospitality industries following work experiences. This qualitative study investigates how participation in one specific type of work experience, an internship, impacts on student participants' career choices and goals. While most respondents did indeed change their career aspirations following the internship, these changes reflected a shift within the industry rather than a shift against entering the industry. Many participants indicated they had switched their goals away from pursuing a career in hospitality in favour for developing a career in tourism, while the reverse was not apparent.     

Travel stimulated by international students in Australia

The international student (IS) market in Australia has been a growing export economy. Because of the traditional definition of tourism being that of ‘a leisure activity outside a usual work scope area for a period of less than a year’, tourism research on IS has been minimal. This research investigates the tourism demand stimulated by IS in Australia. Besides tourism statistics, the research involved 23 IS in focus groups who provided responses of their tourism activities while in Australia. The research illustrates that such IS are significant contributors to tourism by visiting places of interest, purchasing souvenirs, casual work in hospitality and visits by friends and relatives. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Developing a Country‐wide Tourist Loyalty Scheme: A Barren Landscape

Loyalty programs, popular in today's competitive business environment, have been capturing the attention of the tourism industry since the mid 80's. While many segments of the industry have successfully utilized loyalty programs, the development of a country‐wide loyalty scheme still poses major challenges. Reflecting the findings of an extensive mixed methods research, the paper set out to empirically investigate tourists' willingness to participate in a country‐wide loyalty scheme, define the incentives they expect from such a scheme, and, explore the perceptions of hospitality stakeholders towards this potential development. Findings are of interest to both academic scholars and industry stakeholders. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Employee Turnover Intention Among Newcomers in Travel Industry

The continual high turnover rate in the tourism and hospitality industry is the most problematic managerial topic. Using a sample of 304 travel agency employees, this research aims to identify differences in turnover antecedents between newcomers from graduate school or other industries and newcomers from the same industry. The results suggest several differences in both newcomer groups. Supervisor support is an antecedent for veterans, whereas personnel management, prospects and job‐related factors are only significant for neophytes. External causes were revealed as the most significant antecedents in both groups, whereas co‐worker support was not significant for turnover intention in either group. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hostility or hospitality? A review on violence,bullying and sexual harassment in the tourism and hospitality industry

The present work reviews the current knowledge about violence, bullying and sexual harassment in the tourism and hospitality industry. It indicates the high prevalence of these aggressive behaviours, and identifies structural reasons, insufficient managerial skills and/or common beliefs as their causes. The negative impacts of bullying, violence and sexual harassment on employees include intentions to leave and psychological upset. These personal negative feelings and attitudes contribute to negative organizational performance indicators, such as high staff turnover rate and low profitability. In addition, the high prevalence of violence creates a negative image for the tourism and hospitality industry in general. The review shows that intervention plans are scattered in aims and time frames, focus mainly on managerial policies, and almost completely overlook immediate actions as well as guest violence. Given its importance, the low number of appropriate intervention tools, policies and agendas clearly suggests the urgent need for more research. The final section of the work provides an overview of three core themes that can potentially contribute to the development of an effective intervention agenda, namely, corporate social responsibility, social media and comparisons to other sectors.     

Exploring the relationship between visitor attractions and events: definitions and management factors

The growing definitional debate on the terms ‘visitor attractions’ and ‘events’ highlights the need to compare their key determinants and management factors. The article elaborates on this definitional debate, by exploring existing definitions and developing an illustration of a continuum between visitor attractions and events. This is followed by a comparison of the management factors and key criteria in the effective management of visitor attractions and events. The findings indicate that while there are many similarities between the sectors, aspects such as spatio-temporality and levels of integration with the visitor attraction nucleus are identified as factors that differentiate them. In conclusion, the article determines that events should be examined separately from the visitor attraction sector due to their differing perspectives, measures, and management needs.     

Elite hotels: painting a self‐portrait

Commercial hospitality provision arose from a general process of modernisation, the gradual breakdown of the importance of kinship and social obligation relative to a common duty of care for those travelling away from home, and the process of urbanisation. Consequently market demand evolved for the provision of accommodation, food and beverage for those persons temporarily removed from their domestic environment. What is argued in this paper is that the original function of commercial hospitality bears scant resemblance to sophisticated potentialities for socio‐economic self‐expression, which manifest themselves in the form of the elite hotel sector. The manner in which contemporary consumption of elite hotels revolves around the notion of self, with multiple identities and group affiliations is explored. Conclusions focus on the elite hotel sector as a means of defining self‐identities and the management implications therein for the provision of commercial hospitality in elite hotels. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.