Marketing and Sustainability in the Hospitality Industry

A special issue of Tourism and Hospitality (ISSN 2673-5768).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 September 2023) | Viewed by 14146

Special Issue Editors


E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Marketing, Department of Business Administration of Food and Agricultural Enterprises, University of Patras, 26504 Patra, Greece
Interests: marketing communications; marketing and sustainability; tourism image; consumer behavior

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Marketing, Department of Business Administration of Food and Agricultural Enterprises, University of Patras, 26504 Patra, Greece
Interests: consumer behavior; marketing and sustainability/food waste; tourism marketing

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

While the hospitality industry recovers from the coronavirus pandemic, hotels, and the wider hospitality sector, are increasingly more concerned about sustainability now as customers are shifting their perceptions of travel. Sustainability is widely regarded as the key to a successful business in the 21st century. 

According to Booking.com’s 2019 Sustainable Travel Report, 70% of global travelers say they would be more likely to book an accommodation knowing it was eco-friendly, and 55% of global travelers report being more determined to make sustainable travel choices compared to last year (https://hospitalityinsights.ehl.edu). Sustainable development and sustainability in general have to be in the epicenter of the hospitality firm’s culture, marketing strategy and practices. 

Within UN 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, the tourism sector and the hospitality indusrty have been related to the SDG’s with targets in Goals 8, 12 and 14 on inclusive and sustainable economic growth, sustainable consumption and production (SCP) and the sustainable use of oceans and marine resources, respectively. In this context, sustainable hospitality businesses are those that significantly reduce their environmental impact through green marketing best-practices in maintenance/operations, services, logistics, products, and supplies [for example: sustainable food systems, hotel energy solutions, impacts of technology, water and food waste management, green hotel design, certification and ecolabelling systems etc.]. 

Sustainability has been an integral part of the marketing and corporate agenda of a hospitality firm. Regardless the type of accommodation, from hotels chains to camping, businesses have to be competitive and have to realize that sustainability initiatives will be at parity with cost. Moreover, sustainability in the hospitality needs a twofold approach. Hospita;ity firms have to incorporate sustainability within their marketing culture and operational practices and at the same time to promote sustainability to their customers as a broader social and behavioral approach. 

The aim of the Special Issue is to discuss the main current topics relative to marketing and sustainability in the context of the hospitality industry. The Special Issue will be the vehicle of expressing different approaches of research findings, revealing new research areas, conceptual developments, and addressing articles with practical application concerning sustainability themes within a hospitality marketing perspective. 

Purposively, the Special Issue encourages papers that focus on applied marketing strategies and practices related to sustainability in the hospitality industry based on (but not limited to) the following themes: 

  • Sustainable hospitality and tourist/customer experience
  • Marketing research challenges in a sustainable hospitality context
  • Designing sustainable hospitality tourist offers
  • Hospitality product/service development and sustainability issues
  • Responsible marketing and branding in the hospitality industry
  • Hospitality and sustainable food marketing
  • Food waste in hospitality
  • Sustainability management systems in hospitality
  • Accurate hospitality marketing communications
  • Sustainable practices and materials in hospitality industry
  • Sustainable food and beverage management
  • Accessibility in hospitality
  • Certification processes and ecolabels in hospitality industry.

Dr. Vasiliki Boukouvala
Dr. Prokopis Theodoridis
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Tourism and Hospitality is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • marketing
  • hospitality
  • sustainability
  • sustainable development
  • tourist behavior

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

24 pages, 7066 KiB  
Article
Toward Regenerative Hospitality Business Models: The Case of “Hortel”
by Luca Caruso
Tour. Hosp. 2023, 4(4), 618-641; https://doi.org/10.3390/tourhosp4040038 - 18 Dec 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 3028
Abstract
Due to the ecologically unfavorable state of the living world, any formal commitment made by the accommodation sector for the practical implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategies needs to be followed up by a credible plan, courageous action, and an attentive monitoring [...] Read more.
Due to the ecologically unfavorable state of the living world, any formal commitment made by the accommodation sector for the practical implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategies needs to be followed up by a credible plan, courageous action, and an attentive monitoring and reporting phase. Only in this way can high-end hotels in cities emerge as regenerative sustainability (RS) hubs and better amalgamate whole life-cycle thinking and economic performance in their day-to-day activities. This paper provides a detailed literature review of the ongoing transformation of the hospitality sector toward the RS paradigm, which is a concept that underpins Hortel’s business model. Hortel is then contextualized as the first example of an eco-innovative turnkey business-to-business (B2B) service for a high-end hotel with an annexed restaurant. Hortel implemented nature-based solutions adapted to the hospitality sector in order to contribute to local urban biodiversity and bring hotel clients closer to nature through biophilic tactics. Services like Hortel can support, with today’s resources and competences, hotels that are putting at the core of their business model planetary health and societal well-being. It also includes the description of the prototype built at Four Points by Sheraton Catania, the monitoring phase that lasted between 2016 and 2017, and other strategic business-related initiatives. This paper also contributes to the advancement of the literature discussing regenerative business models, which to date has been a largely unexplored aspect of hospitality. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Marketing and Sustainability in the Hospitality Industry)
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16 pages, 1534 KiB  
Article
Digital Nomads: Advances in Hospitality and Destination Attractiveness
by Ioulia Poulaki, Eleni Mavragani, Alexandra Kaziani and Eleftheria Chatzimichali
Tour. Hosp. 2023, 4(3), 483-498; https://doi.org/10.3390/tourhosp4030030 - 4 Sep 2023
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 5195
Abstract
As remote work goes from trend to mainstream, digital nomads are on the rise, becoming a market every destination needs to attract. Considering the needs and wants of digital nomads, this paper aims to investigate the strengths and the opportunities of Greece, as [...] Read more.
As remote work goes from trend to mainstream, digital nomads are on the rise, becoming a market every destination needs to attract. Considering the needs and wants of digital nomads, this paper aims to investigate the strengths and the opportunities of Greece, as an ideal destination for digital nomads, underlining, at the same time, the opportunities and threats challenging the country’s attractiveness towards this market segment. Furthermore, the authors analyze the content of website “Work From Greece: Become Digital Nomad in Greece”, the official Greek website dedicated to digital nomads in order to define Greece’s online presence, within this digital global community. In addition, co-working spaces in Greece are explored as an advanced form of hospitality favorable to digital nomads. The research methodology employed to draw conclusions combines a SWOT analysis and content analysis for websites of tourism businesses and organizations, as has been developed in previous research. The findings of this study reflect the current situation, providing academic and managerial implications when it comes to further research and recommendations for tourism policy and destination planning. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Marketing and Sustainability in the Hospitality Industry)
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22 pages, 860 KiB  
Article
Influencing Hotel Patrons to Use Reef-Safe Sunscreen
by Christine Bergman, Rochelle Good and Andrew Moreo
Tour. Hosp. 2022, 3(3), 536-557; https://doi.org/10.3390/tourhosp3030033 - 24 Jun 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 3440
Abstract
The health of Hawaiian coral reefs is threatened by sunscreen ingredients (e.g., oxybenzone). This study sought to determine factors leading to the pro-environmental behavior of using reef-safe sunscreen (RSS) and identify practices hoteliers could implement to influence patrons to engage in this behavior. [...] Read more.
The health of Hawaiian coral reefs is threatened by sunscreen ingredients (e.g., oxybenzone). This study sought to determine factors leading to the pro-environmental behavior of using reef-safe sunscreen (RSS) and identify practices hoteliers could implement to influence patrons to engage in this behavior. The study applied a framework to model pro-environmental behavior in the hospitality industry. It proposed that attitudes, personal capabilities, and habits are causal variables that influence pro-environmental intention, the predictor of pro-environmental behavior. Contextual factors were proposed as moderating variables for the relationship between pro-environmental intention and pro-environmental behavior. Past Hawaiian hotel patrons (n = 400) were the subjects for this survey. Intention to use RSS and the factors that influenced intention were investigated. Responses were analyzed using multiple linear regression and ANOVA. Results suggested that hotel patrons’ intention to use RSS was primarily influenced by three determinants: attitudes, personal capabilities, and contextual factors. Targeting the development of personal capabilities and employing contextual factors that facilitate the behavior were shown as effective methods to influence RSS use. Findings supported educational campaigns and complimentary RSS programs as practices that Hawaii hotel operators could use to influence patrons’ intention to use RSS. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Marketing and Sustainability in the Hospitality Industry)
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