The examination of experience economy at hotel special events: from the locals’ perspective

The economic downturn has inspired hotels to turn their attention to local residents to seek new revenue sources, and they are offering more of own special events to attract nearby residents to their venues. This study examines locals’ experiences at hotel special events, and evaluates their intention to purchase special event packages that include room nights. By employing Pine and Gilmore’s dimensions of experience economy, this study found that escapism experience and positive memory have strong impacts on locals’ purchase intention of hotel room nights in association with hotels’ special events. Based on the findings, this paper reports the potential of local customers to serve as revenue generators and concludes with practical implications for developing special event packages.</p

The impact of prior knowledge and educational experiences on event planners’ green intention

Environmental sustainability has become a matter of primary concern in the event andmeeting industry; this paper, therefore, investigates whether prior knowledge and educationalexperiences related to environmental sustainability are influential motivators in causing eventplanners to commit to engaging in ecologically-friendly behavior. The regression analysisshowed that the intention to implement green event practices is positively influenced by bothknowledge of green practices and educational experience in green practices. Particularly,educational experience was found to be a strong influential factor contributing to intention toengage in green or sustainable practices for event planners. This study not only highlightsacademic discussion on sustainability and green education, but also derives managerialimplications for the event and meeting industry based on the findings.</p

Colour histogram analysis on destination photography

Research on tourism photography heavily focuses on semantic content and context of photo-­taking, so that the existing literature shows dominant qualitative approaches. On the other hand, photographic content, such as color, is often overlooked in research on tourism photography. This paper adopts techniques for quantifying and analyzing colors of destination photography. It elaborates the newly adopted digital image processing technique and validates it as an alternative method for quantitative research of destination photography. Eventually, this paper proves that color is a valid research proxy of visual marketing survey of destinations, and it further provides future research agenda in the use of the newly introduced method for tourism photography research.</p

The influence of customer-contact service on hotel experience: guest satisfaction with front office experience in Washington, D.C. hotels

This study focuses on the services provided by the front office in hotels and guest satisfaction with these services. The role of front line employees in the hospitality environment, who have the most direct contact with hotel guests, is the subject of this research. The most heavily identified demanding, personalized services of the front office are analyzed by looking at higher satisfaction levels, and also higher service quality as a result of staff performance. Satisfaction levels at the front office are further discussed as the significant service experiences influence customers’ future behavioral intention.</p

Linking competence to strategies of educational institutions in hospitality and tourism

The value of core competence is found by examining strong linkage between resources. In addition, if a core competence has been identified in the structure of an organization, then an organization’s competitiveness is enhanced by the effective integration of internal resources. By applying the core competence concept from the business model to a university setting, this study examines the link between qualifications of academic staff – the most important internal resources of educational institutions – and the courses they teach. This study not only highlights the current status of internal resource management in educational institutions, but also derives managerial implications from these findings.</p

The influence of local community's empowerment on its perception towards community-based ecotourism in a protected area

The aim of this research was to investigate how a local community’s empowerment influences its perception of the impacts of community-based ecotourism (CBE) upon the people of Ban Na village in the Phou Khao Khouay National Protected Area of Laos. Qualitative data collected from in-depth interviews reveals that economic empowerment is the most significant dimension of empowerment to the development of CBE and influencing positive perceptions of the impact of CBE. Meanwhile, the social dimension of empowerment is the least important in the village. The study demonstrates that the empowered local community was more supportive of tourism development, and of equal chances for locals to have fair responsibilities for their work and to obtain comparable power over the decision-making process in the development of their jobs were driving force in enhancing living conditions and receiving substantial economic benefits from CBE participation.</p

An integral understanding of destination choice

Prevalent sociopsychological models examining tourists’ needs and motivationsaffecting destination choices are discussed by taking Plog’s (1974) psychographic profiles,Cohen’s (1979) tourist typology, and Peace’s (1988) travel career ladder. Meanwhile, thesethree models have only been tested independently, and while considering the complex natureof the modern tourism environment, a psychological factor-led tourists’ decision-makingprocess cannot precisely examine how tourists choose a certain type of destination. Thisstudy, therefore, argues that no single model can adequately explain tourists’ destinationselection process as well as travel behaviors and introduces a new integrated perspective ofexisting psychological models. Additional factors such as distance decay andsociodemographic elements are linked to the tourists’ destination decision-making process.</p

Tourist behaviour centred on place attachment: the effect of tourist involvement on place attachment and loyalty

To better understand tourists’ development of place attachment and its impact on loyalty, this study aims to develop a tourist behavioral model, with a mediating role of place attachment fitting a tourism-specific activity setting. It has been found that tourist involvement indirectly influences destination loyalty through place attachment. While the hypothesis that tourist involvement directly affects destination loyalty is not supported, the comparisons among the major source markets of Korea suggest that for most origin countries, attraction and place identity are the most significant dimensions of the antecedents of loyalty. For Chinese tourists, social bonding is found to be the most substantial dimension of place attachment. This study is the first attempt to incorporate place attachment as a mediator between tourist involvement and destination loyalty by using a second-order structural equation model.</p