PROCEEDINGS OF THE EATSA CONFERENCE 2019

Proceeding of the EATSA Conference 2019

978-605-4988-50-1

Proceeding

Title:

BUILDING COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE OF EURO-ASIAN TOURISM

Proceedings of the EATSA Conference 2019

Editor:

Kevser ÇINAR

Copyright © Necmettin Erbakan University

e-ISBN: 978-605-4988-50-1

All rights reserved. Apart from fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review, no

part of this book may be reproduced by any process without written permission from the publisher.

Any enquiries should be directed to arikankevser@yahoo.com

The 5 AnnualConference of EATSA; Building Competitive Advantage of Euro Asian Tourism

CONTENTS

The 2018-1-TR01-KA203-058344 TOURiBOOST Project: Recreating heritage narratives on the

verge of the 4 Industrial Revolution .......................................................................................... 1

Dorothea Papathanasiou-Zurt , Kevser Çınar Aldo Di Russo

The Emotional Attachment Gained by Organizing of Events With Culinary and Heritage

Promotion Content ..................................................................................................................... 2

Marica Mazurek

The Role of Transportation System in Revitalization of Touristic Historical Neighborhood of

Oudlajan in Tehran ..................................................................................................................... 3

Ali Afshar and Shiva Hakimian

Destination Brand Gnosis (DBGnosis) An Innovative Tool For Tourism Research .......................... 4

Fransisco Dias , Lucilia Cardoso , Noelia Araujo and Arthur Filipe de Araujo

Analysis of the Employees’ Contentment in Hotel’s Restaurants in Western Hungary .................. 5

Csaba Kőmíves

The Investigation of Traditional Aşlama of Adana within the Scope of Gastronomy Tourism ....... 6

Halil Akmeşe , Cem Taner Hiçyakmazer

The Evaluation of Restaurant Managers’ Approaches to the Use of Physical Evidence: An

Investigation on Upscale Restaurants in Konya ........................................................................... 7

Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı, Emel Çınarlı

A Model Approach For Top Quality Standards In Tour Operators and Ankara Province Case ........ 8

Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı, Gökhan Şener

Data security As the Basis For the Operation of Online Travel Platforms on the Example of

Platforms Dedicated to Nautical Tourism: Cyber Analysis and Geographical Impacts .................. 9

Enrico Panai, Aleksandra Łapko, Maria Veronica Camerada and Roma Strulak-Wójcikiewicz

Impact of Customer Satisfaction, Physical Appearance and Service Quality on Customer Loyalty:

A Case of Restaurants in Kathmandu ........................................................................................ 10

Dwarika Upreti

The Effects of Country of Origin, Product Packaging on Consumers’ Purchasing Wiliness and

Perceived Value-An Example of Craft Beers. ............................................................................. 11

Huang, Pin Hsuan Su, Che-Jen

Peer-to-Peer Property Rentals, Housing, and Hospitality Markets: General Setting and

Perspectives From Paris.............................................................................................................12

Sauveur Giannoni, Malgorzata Ogonowska and Dominique Torre

Employer Branding: A Study of Organizational Attractiveness in Nepalese Hotel Industry ......... 13

Amar Bahadur Lama and Singhania University

Mystic Factors Serving Destination Marketing .......................................................................... 14

Seda Yetimoğlu , Yurdanur Yumuk

Sustainable Religious Tourism: The Islamic Concept of (Khairyyah) Goodliness .......................... 15

Tariq Elhadary

Internet Marketing and Promotion Strategies in Tour Operators and Ankara Province Case ...... 16


Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı, Gökhan Şener

An Exploratory Study on the Sources and Self-Efficacy of Students' Career: A Case Study of the

Related Department of Tourism and Leisure, Universities of the Technology in Central Taiwan . 17

Yueh-Ying Wang, Yu-Huei Lin, Ying-Ti Tao and Wen-chuan Ho

One-Day Cultural Tours – A Netnographic Study Of Customer Satisfaction ................................ 18

Ilınka Terziyska

A Qualitative Research on The Case of Self- Realization of The Students Going Abroad With

Erasmus + Programs ................................................................................................................. 19

Şerife ÖZCAN and Kevser ÇINAR

Adolescents’ Motivation of Family Travel: A Cross-cultural Perspective ..................................... 20

I-Fang Cheng , Che-Jen Su, Hsin-Hsing Liao, Nicolas Lorgnier, Monica Chaudhary, Wilson Ozuem , Wen-Shen Yen ,

Hui-Ling Hu, Chia-Nan Wang and Yi-Fang Lan

Case Studies of Social Enterprises in West Kalimantan, Indonesia ............................................. 22

Yanki Hartijasti, Venie Hartinie

Airline Service Recovery Policies for Voluntary Denied Boarding Due to Overbooking ................ 23

Tsung-Hsien Tsai , Chien-Tz Chiu

Monitoring the Quality Costs in Accommodation Enterprises: A Research in Antalya ................. 24

Halil Akmeşe, Pınar Yeşilçimen

The Use of Integrated Marketing Communication Approach for Incentives and Supports Provided

to Tourism Industry in Turkey ................................................................................................... 25

Kaplan Uğurlu, Efe Adiller

Comparison between wine and beer tourism: a vision of French people through free-word

associations ............................................................................................................................. 26

Roxane Corbel, Patrick Bouchet, and Anne-Marie Lebrun

Selecting principles of Sustainable Tourism in Small Island Development for Kish Island ............ 27

Mona Erfanian Salim

Hotel’s Survival in Crisis-Ridden Cities: Evidence From Antalya Tourism City .............................. 28

Hilal Erkuş Öztürk, Kemal Türkcan

The Role of Budapest’s Roman Heritage in Urban Tourism Development .................................. 29

Tamara Rátz, Tamás Régi, Ákos Kátay and Kevser Çınar

The Effect of Tourism Sector on the Agriculture Sector: An Assessment on Turkey-Russia Aircraft

Crisis on the Supply Chain of Herbal Products............................................................................ 30

Şerife Betül Çetinkaya , Hilal Erkuş-Öztürk

The Most Photographed Village in Europe: Tourist Imaginaries of Hallstatt, Austria, Europe ..... 31

Desmond Wee

Travelling to tell the tale? – Role or (e-)WOM in case of Lake Balaton (Hungary) ...................... 32

Judit Sulyok, Kitti Hiezl

The Role of Budapest’s Roman Heritage in Urban Tourism Development .................................. 34

Tamara Rátz, Tamás Régi, Ákos Kátay, Kevser Çınar

Analysis of the Employees’ Contentment in Hotel’s Restaurants in Western Hungary ................ 42

Csaba Kőmíves

Airline Service Recovery Policies for Voluntary Denied Boarding Due to Overbooking ................ 50

Tsung-Hsien Tsai, Chien-Tz Chiu


An Exploratory Study on the Sources and Self-Efficacy of Students' Career: A Case Study of the

Related Department of Tourism and Leisure, Universities of the Technology in Central Taiwan . 59

Yueh-Ying Wang, Yu-Huei Lin, Ying-Ti Tao and Wen-chuan Ho

The Emotional Attachment Gained By Organizing Of Events With Culinary And Heritage

Promotion Content ................................................................................................................... 66

Marica Mazurek

An Examination of Traditional Adana’s Aşlama within the Scope of Gastronomy Tourism ......... 74

Halil AKMEŞE and Cem Taner HİÇYAKMAZER

Monitoring The Quality Costs In Accommodation Enterprises: A Research In Antalya ................ 79

Halil Akmeşe and Pınar Yeşilçimen

The Evaluation of Restaurant Managers’ Views on the use Of Physical Evidence: An Investigation

on Upscale Restaurants in Konya .............................................................................................. 86

Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı and Emel Çınarlı

Digital Marketing and Promotion Strategies for Travel Agencies and Case Study in Ankara ...... 95

Gökhan Şener and Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı

The role of Transportation System in Revitalization of Touristic Historical Neighborhood of

Oudlajan in Tehran ................................................................................................................. 101

Shiva Hakimian and Ali Afshar

Hotel’s Survival in Crisis-Ridden Cities: Evidence from Antalya Tourism City ............................ 109

Hilal Erkuş Öztürk

The Effect Of Tourism Sector On The Agriculture Sector: An Assessment On Turkey-Russia Aircraft

Crisis On The Supply Chain Of Herbal Products ........................................................................ 119

Şerife Betül Çetinkaya and Hilal Erkuş Öztürk

ABSTRACT


The 2018-1-TR01-KA203-058344 TOURiBOOST Project: Recreating

heritage narratives on the verge of the 4 th Industrial Revolution

Dorothea Papathanasiou-Zurt a , Kevser Çınar b Aldo Di Russo c

a EAP –Hellenic Open University, Department of Social

Sciences Parodos Aristotelous 18, 26 335 Patras - Greece

papathanasiou.dorothea@ac.eap.gr

b Necmettin Erbakan University, Faculty of Tourism

Kürden Mh. Kasim Halife Sk no 11 Meram Konya. Turkey

k.cinar22@gmail.com

c ARTIFACTORY, PO Box 13b, Kastrosykia, 48100 Preveza, Greece

aldo@artifactory.gr

Abstract

We argue that on the verge of the 4 th Industrial revolution a new digital publishing can re-create tourism offers

with enhanced heritage-based products and services and facilitate their uptake by the global market. We present a

composite tourism product in Turkey, Hungary, Holland, Italy and Greece evenly spread across 60 heritage places,

which connect with audiences through compelling stories in multimedia formats. We present a composite tourism

product created in 7 peripheral destinations in Greece, Italy, Spain, Slovenia, Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey

developed by the 2018-1-TR01-KA203-058344 Touriboost Project funded by the Erasmus+ Project of Higher

Education and the Turkish National Agency. The final product aims to demonstrate the skills required to liaise the

technology intense experience with onsite authenticity, and is seamlessly connected in real times with tourism

consumption points at place level. The product builds an unprecedented opportunity to terminate the vicious circle

of generating and distributing low quality tourism commodities exchangeable by price. In this vein the 2018-1-

TR01-KA203-058344 Touriboost Project builds a first attempt to weave a cohesive digital cultural heritage

narrative for non-captive audiences focusing multisensory experiences in situ and not be necessarily restricted on

the interactivity at technical level. We argue that a) by exploiting socio-historical content to deliver the sense of the

place, b) by creating the unexpected art momentum in the digital form, and c) by managing cognitive loads to

facilitate perception and understanding from a working memory limitation perspective, a new digital artwork is

created, where the audience is inspired to engage in critical thinking and replace gazing with participatory

practices in the cultural space.

Keywords

Cultural Heritage Narrative, Digital Artwork, Heritage Tourism, Non-Captive Audiences, Human Cognitive

Architecture

1


The Emotional Attachment Gained by Organizing of Events With Culinary

and Heritage Promotion Content

Marica Mazurek, MSc., PhD. Candidate

University of Žilina The Faculty of Humanities Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies

Univerzitná 8215/1 010 26 Žilina Slovakia,

marica0011@yahoo.ca

Abstract

The emotional attachment to tourism destinations can be fulfilled via attitudes, attributes of the place, sophisticated

management and management of brand attributes, for example natural environment, history, culture, heritage and

service quality in tourism destinations. Two of important components of comparative advantage are history and

culture. Cultural products could be provided in the framework of different culinary specialties and proposed by

organizing of events in order to boost competitiveness. Especially organizing of traditional events could increase

multiplication effect in a particular city. Organizing of events can boost visitation, familiarity and place branding

strategies of cities. The article will explore how these components have been used in marketing strategy of Banska

Bystrica, Slovakia (Radvansky Jarmok – Radvan Market) now and in the past. Originality of this research could be

proved by using the authentic examples from a former mining city in Slovakia.

The exploratory method of research has been used, especially based on the studied materials (secondary research) by

collecting of historical material; however also a primary research has been applied (personal experiences, empirical

approach, collecting of pictures and evaluation of secondary statistical materials). The purpose of research is to explore

how cultural events with heritage and culinary content could be useful for destination competitiveness growth and the

findings might be a valuable tool for a statement that competitiveness is strongly based on local factors. A case study of

Banska Bystrica will be an example of this statement.

Keywords: Events with culinary and heritage promotion, Competitiveness of destinations, Place branding,

Multiplication effect.

2


The Role of Transportation System in Revitalization of Touristic Historical

Neighborhood of Oudlajan in Tehran

Ali Afshar a and Shiva Hakimian b

a Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning, Institute of Higher Education of Eqbal Lahoori, Mashhad, Iran

b Faculty of Art and Architecture, Islamic Azad University Tehran South Branch, Tehran

shivahakimian71@gmail.com

Abstract:

Oudlajan neighborhood is one of the main tourist attractions of the historical urban fabric of the 200 year-old capital

city of Iran. Despite all its valuable tourism potentials, Oudlajan faces with the lack of urban life and the increasing

poverty in different aspects. Regarding the above, revitalization of the neighborhood is essential to increase its

sustainability in different aspects. Tourism is one of the ways to revive valuable historic urban fabrics. It has been

considered in the master plan of Tehran as the future prospect of the old fabric in this neighborhood. Infrastructure

services such as transportation system are essential elements to expand tourism industry. Tourists always consider two

factors in their decisions which are cost and time. Type and quality of the transportation system affects these two

factors. In addition, the quality of the transportation system is a fundamental element of the tourists‘ experience in the

destination. Considering the importance of tourism development in the revitalization of the Oudlajan, one of the basic

preconditions for arrival of the tourist to this neighborhood is improving the quality of the transportation system, for

the local community and for the tourists. As a result, this study shows that how expanding the tourism industry in the

Oudlajan neighborhood can revitalize its historic and valuable fabric. Therefore, this paper aims to define a coherent

architectural and urban design pattern between tourism and the local community transport services, by using the

descriptive-analytical method as well as documentary and field studies.

Keywords: Transportation System, Revitalization, Oudlajan Touristic Neighborhood

3


Destination Brand Gnosis (DBGnosis) An Innovative Tool For Tourism

Research

Fransisco Dias a , Lucilia Cardoso b , Noelia Araujo c , and Arthur Filipe de Araujo d

a Dr in Tourism Sciences by the University of Perpignan, France.

francisco.dias@ipleiria.pt

b Dr in Business Sciences and Tourism by Vigo University, Spain

c Dr in direction and Planning of Tourism by the University of Vigo, Spain.

d Phd Candidate in Tourism and Master in Business Management by the University of Aveiro – Portugal.

Abstract

Nowadays, in the globalised and competitive world, destination management organizations need to be aware of the

latest market trends in order to be competitive. Therefore, information becomes the key to effective management, and

big data analysis arises as an opportunity for destination managers willing to achieve competitive advantages through

technological innovation. In this paper, we present and describe the DB Gnosis sotware (acronym of Destination Brand

Gnosis) that was created in the context of the ―Tower of Babel‖ project (http://favouritedestinations.con/en/), carried

out under the auspices of the Euro-Asia Tourism Studies Association – EATSA. This is a purpose developed software for

big data analysis related to tourism destinations. To this end, first, a brief theoretical reflection on tourism innovation

technologies is presented. Then, the implications of big data analysis for the tourism industry and research are

discussed. Finally, the software‘s potential is discussed, and its operation is described.

Keywords: Tourism Innovation, Technologies, Big data analysis, Destination Brand Gnosis (DBGnosis).

4


Analysis of the Employees’ Contentment in Hotel’s Restaurants in Western

Hungary

Csaba Kőmíves

Széchenyi Isvtán University Kautz Gyula Faculty of Economics – Department of Tourism

Egyetem tér 1., 9026 Győr - Hungary

komives.csaba@sze.hu

Abstract

The significant fluctuation of high degree in hospitality occurs more often in Győr than in other regions of the country

due to greater proximity to the Austrian border. The study examines the job satisfaction of the waiters and cooks and

its consequences in the catering units in Győr-Moson-Sopron, Vas and Zala counties. The lack of motivation of workers

of different age groups (Baby-boomer, X, Y, Z generation) and the lack of communication, cooperation and problemsolving

competencies required to perform the work determine the high fluctuation rate in this sector. Primary research

was conducted with a quantitative (questionnaire) survey between 10th January 2017 and 30th September 2017. The

sample from 496 persons is not representative, respondents were chosen with arbitrary sampling. Data were processed

by means of the SPSS 23 statistical program package which contain cross-table analysis, data reduction and cluster

analysis in addition to the descriptive statistical analyses.

Keywords: Competences, Satisfaction

5


The Investigation of Traditional Aşlama of Adana within the Scope of

Gastronomy Tourism

Halil Akmeşe a , Cem Taner Hiçyakmazer b

a Necmettin Erbakan University, Tourism Faculty, Tourism Management Department, Turkey,

hakmese@erbakan.edu.tr

b Necmettin Erbakan University, Institute of Social Sciences, Tourism Management Department,

Turkey,

cemtanerer@gmail.com

Abstract

The number of people participating in tourism movements has been continuously increasing worldwide with the

development of transportation facilities. Especially, along with the high demand for mass tourism (sea-sand-sun), it can

be observed that the demand for alternative tourism types has considerably increased. Gastronomy tourism, which

attracts attention among these types, is based upon presentation of food and beverages belonging to a region to the

tourists who are visiting the region as an attraction and their being experienced by the tourists. Local food and

beverages, which are effective in the promotion of touristic destinations, have become an important element of tourists'

holiday choices. For this reason, ―gastronomy tourism‖ has become one of the most prominent sources of attraction

and experience in destination marketing and branding worldwide. It‘s known that Turkey‘s popularity in gastronomy

tourism has increased in recent years. Adana Region, which adds value to the richness. of Turkish Cuisine with its

various tastes, is a destination with a high potential in terms of gastronomy tourism. The aim of this research, which is

a compilation, is to analyze ―Aşlama‖, a local beverage specific to Adana and has been produced as a source of herbal

healing since ancient times, within the scope of gastronomy tourism. The investigation, promotion and keeping the

sustainability of Aşlama, which is known as a street flavour in Adana, is of great importance in terms of gastronomy

tourism. With this research, it is aimed to contribute to the diversification and increase of tourism activities in the

region by revealing the importance of Aşlama in terms of gastronomy tourism. All stakeholders especially local

enterprises, researchers and regional decision-makers, can benefit from this study.

Keywords: Aşlama, Gastronomy Tourism, Adana.

6


The Evaluation of Restaurant Managers’ Approaches to the Use of Physical

Evidence: An Investigation on Upscale Restaurants in Konya

a Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı, b Emel Çınarlı


ahmetbuyuksalvarci@gmail.com

b Necmettin Erbakan University, Institute of Social Sciences, Tourism Management Department, Turkey,

ecakmak87@hotmail.com

Abstract

The role of the physical environment in influencing customer behavior and in creating a supplier‘s image is highly re

levant to the service sector, including restaurant industry. Indeed; while customers are eating in a restaurant, they

perceive the physical environment consciously or unconsciously before, during and after the meal. Whereas food and

service should be of acceptable quality; the elements of pleasant physical environment such as decor, furnishings, layout

and music can largely determine the degree of customer satisfaction and then customer behavior. Physical evidences

basically refer to the physical environment in which the service experience takes place. The aim of this study is to

evaluate the approaches of upscale restaurant managers in Konya to the use of physical evidence. In this context; in

May 2019, face-to-face interviews were conducted with the managers of restaurants using semi-structured interview

technique, which is one of the data collection techniques used in qualitative researches.

Keywords: Physical evidence, Restaurant

7


A Model Approach For Top Quality Standards In Tour Operators and Ankara

Province Case

a Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı, b Gökhan Şener




gokhan.sener@outlook.com.tr

Abstract

The role of the travel agencies is becoming more crucial in the tourism market. They enhance services such as selling

plane tickets, arranging packet tours, making hotel and cruise reservations, which could be basically done online in a

couple of minutes. It is feasible to observe that this role could be in an essentially unseen position when compared with

the last decade. Since the technology is taking over the place where the labor power has been reigning in all industries,

travelers are now willing to eliminate the intermediaries. Nowadays, travel agencies are not only competing with each

other but also against internet. In order to achieve and manage high quality services, travel agencies ought to aim high

customer satisfaction. Several reasons for the preferences and the advantages of the guidance done by travel agencies

and a model approach for the top service qualities for tour operators are mentioned and examined on that very paper.

Keywords: Quality standards, tour operators, service quality, Ankara

8


Data security As the Basis For the Operation of Online Travel Platforms on

the Example of Platforms Dedicated to Nautical Tourism: Cyber Analysis and

Geographical Impacts

Enrico Panai a , Aleksandra Łapko b , Maria Veronica Camerada and Roma Strulak-

Wójcikiewicz

a Geoeconomics and Geopolitics - Department of Humanities and Social Science (DUMAS) University of Sassari,

Via Roma 151, 07100 Sassari, Italy

epanai1@uniss.it

b Faculty of Economics and Transport Engineering

Maritime University of Szczecin, ul. H. Pobożnego 11, 70-507 Szczecin, Poland

a.lapko@am.szczecin.pl

Abstract

The article aims to draw attention to the important role of data security in the functioning of online platforms. This

phenomenon is an issue that is critically important to the growing popularity of these tools, which are now increasingly

used for tourism purposes. The main focus of the article is on platforms related to nautical tourism. The first part of the

article presents basic information about the use of internet platforms and their significance for the tourism market.

Next, an analysis of the content of exemplary platforms used by sailors was presented. The last part of the article

identifies data that should be particularly protected by platform operators, as well as the geopolitical implications that

may result from neglecting this issue. The study involves the analysis of literature sources and websites. Trust is

becoming a key instrument in any virtual transaction. Therefore, the protection of trust should be a central subject in

the online tourism sector. A systematic understanding of how cybersecurity contributes to trust and competitiveness is

still lacking. It is hoped that this research will contribute to a deeper understanding of the phenomenon.

Keywords: Online Platforms, Cyber Security, Tourism Management, Nautical Tourism, Sailing, Cyber Geography

9


Impact of Customer Satisfaction, Physical Appearance and Service Quality on

Customer Loyalty: A Case of Restaurants in Kathmandu

Dwarika Upreti

Tribhuvan University (TU)

Nepal Mega College

dwarikaupreti2000@gmail.com

Abstract

The main objective the study is to examine the impact of customer satisfaction, physical appearance and service quality

on customer loyalty in Nepalese hotel restaurant. The study examines how customer satisfaction, physical appearance

and service quality affect the loyalty of customers in restaurants industry in Kathmandu. The study focuses on

association of customer satisfaction, physical appearance and service quality and customer loyalty. Primary data has

been used in the study. The data has been collected through structured questionnaire using convenient sampling

technique from 212 customers visiting different restaurants in Kathmandu valley. Descriptive statistical analysis,

correlation and multiple regression analysis have been used to diagnose data collected to draw valid conclusions.

Customer satisfaction, physical appearance and service quality have been taken as independent variables to explore the

degree of relationship with customer loyalty. Correlation shows that all independent variables have significant

relationship with dependent variable. The result shows that there is a significant impact of customer satisfaction,

physical appearance and service quality on customer loyalty. The result indicates that the restaurants should pay

proper attention on maintaining customer satisfaction, physical appearance and service quality to enhance the

customer loyalty in Nepalese restaurants.

Keywords: Customer satisfaction, Physical appearance, Service quality, Restaurants and Customer loyalty

10


The Effects of Country of Origin, Product Packaging on Consumers’

Purchasing Wiliness and Perceived Value-An Example of Craft Beers.

Huang, Pin Hsuan a 、Su, Che-Jen b

a Department of Restaurant, Hotel and Institutional Management, Fu Jen Catholic University,

sylvia8407@gmail.com

b Department of Restaurant, Hotel and Institutional Management, Fu Jen Catholic University,

040084@mail.fju.edu.tw

Abstract

Since Taiwan abolished the internal fiscal monopoly of tobacco and alcohol, the craft beer industry began to grow

at a steady rate. In 2016, the Taiwan craft beer market grewn to 1.7%, and the total revenue was approximately 4

billion NTD. Increased global trade also brought increased popularity. In the past three years, imported beer has

increased from 33% of the Taiwanese beer industry to 35%. Due to the strong competition of foreign beers, a vast

majority of the increased consumer needs focused on imported beer brands. Past research shows that the countryof-origin

will affect the perceived value of the product as well as the purchasing willingness of consumers. A

products‘ packaging will likewise affect how it is judged by consumers. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to

explore whether the country-of-origin and product packaging affect the consumers‘ purchasing willingness of craft

beers. This study utilizes the experiment design method as its research method, and SPSS for its statistical data

analysis. The results will help the Taiwanese craft beer industry to set relevant marketing methods and attract

more potential consumers.

Keywords: craft beer, country of origin, product package purchasing willingness, perceived value

11


Peer-to-Peer Property Rentals, Housing, and Hospitality Markets: General

Setting and Perspectives From Paris

Sauveur Giannoni a , Malgorzata Ogonowska b1 and Dominique Torre c

a Università di Corsica – LISA – CNRS, Campus Mariani, Avenue Jean Nicoli BP 52, 20250 Corte, France

giannoni_s@univ-corse.fr

b Université Paris 8 – LED, 2 rue de la Liberté, 93526 Saint-Denis, France

malgorzata.ogonowska@univ-paris8.fr

c Université Côte d'Azur - GREDEG - CNRS, 250 rue Albert Einstein, 06560 Valbonne, France

dominique.torre@gredeg.cnrs.fr

Abstract

Peer-to-peer property rental platforms are rapidly expanding worldwide and gaining important market shares in

tourism. They actively compete with traditional hospitality actors. Their development has also significant impact on

housing market. Property owners can decide to lease their apartments/houses to residents or to travelers. This paper

aims at better understanding of these two phenomena. It investigates under which conditions peer-to-peer property

rental platforms improve lodging supply; their influence on prices, rents, and housing stock; hoteliers‘ reactions to this

new competition; and conditions of property owners‘ decisions. We develop a game analyzing interactions among a

rental park‘ owner, a hotelier, and three categories of clients: residents, business travelers and tourists. First, we study

the benchmark, where both long-term rental market and short-term one are considered separately. Next, the property

owner accesses a peer-to-peer property rental platform and offers its apartments on short-term basis to travelers,

competing directly with the hotelier. We study the outcomes of this competition. Results depend on the availability of

apartments to lease, but also on legal requirements of short-term rentals. We find that in some cases, hotel prices

decrease while the number of travelers increases without any consequences on the long-term rentals. In other cases, we

find that the number of properties for long-term rentals decrease and rents increase. Then, we illustrate model‘s results

with case of Paris. The paper analyses the impacts of peer-to-peer property rentals on both hospitality and housing

markets. Its provides a general framework, which can be applied to different destinations.

Keywords: Tourism Economics, Peer-to-peer property rentals, Hospitality, Housing market, Market regulation

12


Employer Branding: A Study of Organizational Attractiveness in Nepalese

Hotel Industry

Dr. Amar Bahadur Lama- Singhania University

lamaamardhoj@gmail.com

Abstract

Organizations all around the world always try to hire those people who can be an asset for the organization but it is

important to know the efforts of these organizations to become employer of choice. This research is made to investigate

the importance of employer branding and talent management which helps organizational attractiveness. This study is

significant in such a way that the growing corporate knowledge of Nepalese university students can determine their

future path for choosing the employer of choice. Employer branding has a significant role for the hiring of human

capital. This paper aims to provide a view of employer branding and organizational attractiveness in Nepalese hotel

industry. It also aims to examine the relationship between the salary benefits, work environment, image and reputation,

training and development and organizational attractiveness. A quantitative approach was taken to conduct the

research. A well-structured questionnaire was collected from 142 respondents via convenience sampling technique. The

result found that there was positive relationship between salary benefits, work environment, image and reputation,

training and development and organizational attractiveness. It concludes the need for committed, lucratic salary,

organizational image and reputation, congenial working environment and pertinent training and development in the

attainment of immediate and long-term objectives, so crucial for hospitality organizations, to combat organizational

attractiveness for fresh college graduates in the industry. It informs the potential of organizational attractiveness as a

driver of competitive advantage, within an industry where investment in people is a priority to ensure quality of service

provision. The paper provides an applied perspective on the organizational attractiveness via employer branding

within hospitality, highlighting the need for increased industry-wide recognition and reputation.

Keywords: Salary benefits, Working environment, Training and development, Image and reputation, Employer

branding and Organizational attractiveness.

13


Mystic Factors Serving Destination Marketing

Seda Yetimoğlu a , Yurdanur Yumuk b

a Necmettin Erbakan University, Faculty of Tourism, Department of Gastronomy and Culinary Arts, Konya E-mail:

seda14028@gmail.com

b yumukyurdanur16@gmail.com

Abstract

The destination defined as any region with marketable tourism products (Kesic ve Pavlic, 2011:9) can also be defined as

a geographic area of tourist resources and attractiveness, infrastructure, equipment, service providers, other

supporting sectors and local government institutions (Pike, 2008:25). The management philosophy, which includes

research, decisions and applications related to the touristic products produced by a touristic destination by taking into

consideration the characteristics of touristic demand in order to generate high income, is defined as destination

marketing (Özer, 2012). In order for a destination to be marketed, first of all, there must be natural resources and

charms of the region and their sustainability must be ensured (Buhalis, 2000: 98-100). In destination marketing,

mysticism is used in promoting tourism products, in other words, making them more attractive. In this process, it is

tried to make the consumer feel different and to reveal the mystical values that existed in the culture of the consumer

for centuries. For example, the evil eye bead, which is believed to protect from malicious glances, means the same thing

for every human being. What is important in marketing is to be able to use it as an element of promotion and to attract

attention. It is thought that incorporating mysticism in destination marketing can increase the competitiveness of

destinations. In the study, the role of mystical elements in destination marketing will be examined in a conceptual

framework and the ways how mystical elements are being used in the marketing of tourism regions in Turkey and in

the world will be explained through samples. Due to limited research on the subject in domestic and foreign literature,

it is thought that the research will serve as an example for future researches and at the same time increase the

competitiveness of tourist

Keywords: Mysticism, Mystical Elements, Destination Marketing, Tourism

14


Sustainable Religious Tourism: The Islamic Concept of (Khairyyah)

Goodliness

Tariq Elhadary, PhD

Necmettin Erbakan University, Konya, Turkey,

tariqelhadary1@gmail.com

Abstract

Developing and sustaining religious tourism has almost always become a primary interest and priority for concerned

communities. The religious virtues which form the cultural values of Muslim communities affect this crucial issue as

they build in the affective domain of sustainability awareness. The study explores the Qur‘anic verses and Islamic

teachings which urge Muslims to design, build, and keep highly sustainable communities in general and religious

tourist sites in particular. The role of Islamic religious tourism in keeping the environmental, cultural and economic

sustainability is highlighted in a variety of Islamic teachings. The discussion in this study presents a wealth of original

research and source material, it illuminates and clarifies the concept of (Khairyyah) Goodliness - the literature of

which, it is argued, is vital to understanding how sustainable tourism development can be implemented from an

Islamic point of view.

As religious tourism becomes increasingly important to Muslim communities around the Islamic world, the need to

develop religious tourism sustainability also becomes a primary concern. Hence, the paper emphasizes the need to

make the Islamic communities aware of the Islamic teachings in this regard, and hold them responsible for

sustainable community development in general and sustainable tourism development in particular.

Keywords: Sustainability, Islamic Teachings, Qur’an, Communities, (Khairyyah) Goodliness.

15


Internet Marketing and Promotion Strategies in Tour Operators and Ankara

Province Case

a Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı, b Gökhan Şener

Abstract





Marketing activities begin with the recognition of the goods and services that will be sold by the producing companies

in the first place. If a company can analyze its products in a wide range, the firm can bring out and examine the

necessary definitions for its sale. Nowadays, unfortunately, we are very much observing the examples of providing false

or incomplete information to the consumers in order to complete the sales. When the qualities of the product sold are

transmitted to the potential consumers in a correct and clear manner, the firms become less under due in any negative

situation after the sale. The advertisements demonstrated on the internet attract customers, without any doubt.

Nonetheless, to manage to understand customers‘ perspectives, essentially observing tour operators‘ ideas and

strategies is a must; therefore, this paper is written to clarify travel agencies‘ sales and marketing protocols.

Keywords: Internet marketing, customers’ perspective, promotion, tour operators, Ankara.

16


An Exploratory Study on the Sources and Self-Efficacy of Students' Career: A

Case Study of the Related Department of Tourism and Leisure, Universities of

the Technology in Central Taiwan

Yueh-Ying Wang a , Yu-Huei Lin b , Ying-Ti Tao c and Wen-chuan Ho d

a Department of Leisure Business Management , Nan Kai University of Technology,

yyw518606@gmail.com

b Department of Leisure Business Management , Nan Kai University of Technology

c Master Student , Department of Leisure Business Management , Nan Kai University of Technology, Taiwan

d * Wen-chuan Ho, Department of Tourism and Recreation Management, Overseas Chinese University, PhD

student, Department of Finance, National Chang-hua University of Education

(Corresponding)

100, Chiao Kwang Rd., Taichung, Taiwan 40752, m06@ocu.edu.tw

Abstract

Students from the tourism and leisure-related programs at science and technology universities were chosen as samples

in this study to explore the impacts of students' perception of internship and self-efficacy on career preference. The

purposes of this study were to understand factors affecting students' choice of internship organization and investigate

changes brought about by diversification of career information sources. The results of this study were first analyzed by

inductive reasoning of statements, supplemented by surveys on multiple dimensions of self-efficacy, including internship

perception, adaptability, enthusiasm, and confidence, and then evaluated by structural equation modeling to estimate

the impact levels of various parameters.

Findings from this study showed that: the greater the perceived self-efficacy, adaptability, enthusiasm and

confidence, the higher the likelihood and willingness to participate in the off-campus internship courses would be.

Student gender and sources of career information were found interference factors affecting the relationship; both had

significantly different effects on the structure of perception level and self-efficacy factors. Female students were

relatively more enthusiastic than their male peers, but gender differences were not significant in terms of adaptability

and confidence. With regard to the source of information, the internship information acquired from universities and

teachers were much more significant than from families and friends; the information on internship provided by

universities and teachers appeared to have a greater and more apparent impact on career preference. This analysis

hopes to serve as a reference for the tourism and leisure -related departments when advising students for their career

ambition, thereby enhancing students' role and knowledge in the workplace and narrow the employment gap.

Keywords: Off-campus internship, self-efficacy, career orientation introduction.

17


One-Day Cultural Tours – A Netnographic Study Of Customer Satisfaction

Ilınka Terziyska

Abstract

lynnterziyska@gmail.com

The aim of this paper is to identify the factors affecting customer satisfaction of tourists taking organized one-day

cultural tours. The study is based on the netnographic approach, using as a main data source consumer comments and

feedback on TripAdvisor. The findings are then validated through a survey. Four main factors were found to be most

strongly connected to tourist satisfaction – the quality of tour guiding, the overall organization of the trip (mostly

technical aspects), sites visited / undertaken activities, and comfort of transport vehicles. The results could be of use to

tour operators. Research on customer satisfaction regarding organized tours is limited, so this paper will contribute to

knowledge of the factors that affect it.

Keywords: one-day tours, customer satisfaction

18


A Qualitative Research on The Case of Self- Realization of The Students Going

Abroad With Erasmus + Programs

Şerife ÖZCAN a and Kevser ÇINAR b

a Institute of Social Science, Necmettin Erbakan University

Necip Fazıl Mahallesi Yeni Meram Caddesi 132C PK:42090 Meram / Konya

ozcanserife014@gmail.com

b Necmettin Erbakan University, Faculty of Tourism Köyceğiz Yerleşkesi,

Dere Aşıklar Mah. Demeç Sok. No:42 Meram/Konya,

kcinar@erbakan.edu.tr

Abstract

The aim of the study is to examines the relationship between tourism and psychology, and to investigate the the

students' self-realization. The students who participated in Erasmus + Youth and Higher Education programs were

included in the study. Within the scope of Erasmus + exchange programs, it has been observed that it has made a

significant contribution to the higher education and youth programs within the tourism sector, psychology, and the

European Union.

The semi-structured interview method was used in the study,. Eight questions were directed to the participants in order

to examine the self-realization cases within the Erasmus + programs they participated and the findings were designed

in light of the answers given. According to the findings, majority of the tourism students expressed their study abroad

experience as highly valuable for their career progression, particularly related to their professionalism and positive

international outlook, improved communication and problem-solving skills, and better time management. They

negotiated and reconstructed their personal and professional identities at the interface between cultural and social

values, norms and behaviors while studying abroad. 86.84% of the participants who are participated in Erasmus +

programs stated that they enhanced self-efficacy, independence and international awareness in the concepts of the

purpose of the participation in the program. On their return home, the returnees not only bring new cognitive, social

and emotional experiences, but also engage in new processes of re-enculturation, socialization and professionalization.

Evidence points to well-being connections between language mastery, social interaction, personal development and

academic outcomes in relation to intercultural adaptation, indicating that identity change is the key to their success.

Keywords: Tourism, Psychology, Motivation, Self-realization, Erasmus+

19


Adolescents’ Motivation of Family Travel: A Cross-cultural Perspective

I-Fang Cheng a , Che-Jen Su b* , Hsin-Hsing Liao c , Nicolas Lorgnier d , Monica Chaudhary e ,

Wilson Ozuem f , Wen-Shen Yen g , Hui-Ling Hu h , Chia-Nan Wang i , and Yi-Fang Lan j

a Department of Industrial Engineering and Management, National Kaohsiung University of Science and

Technology, Kaohsiung City, Taiwan

lisa@kentington.com.tw

b* Department of Restaurant, Hotel and Institutional Management, Fu Jen Catholic University,

510, Zhongzheng Rd., Xinzhuang, New Taipei City 24205, Taiwan


c Department of Culinary Arts, Nanya Institute of Technology, Taoyuan City, Taiwan

liao13579@gmail.com

d Sport Management and the Master of Sport Administration, Canisius College, Baffalo, the United States

lorgnien@canisius.edu

e Department of Humanities and Social Science, Jaypee Institute of Information Technology, India

monica.chaudhary@jiit.ac.in

f University of Gloucestershire, UK

wozuem1@glos.ac.uk

g

Department of Restaurant, Hotel and Institutional Management, Fu Jen Catholic

University, 510, Zhongzheng Rd., Xinzhuang, New Taipei City 24205, Taiwan


h Department of Hospitality Management, Nanya Institute of Technology, Taoyuan City, Taiwan

ling@nanya.edu.tw

i Department of Industrial Engineering and Management, National Kaohsiung University of Science and

Technology, Kaohsiung City, Taiwan

cn.wang@kuas.edu.tw

*corresponding author

j Graduate School of Tourism, Wakayama University, Wakayama City, Japan

cinque320@gmail.com

Abstract

Adolescents‘ roles of family purchase decision making has been a notable issue of tourism studies. However, typical

research rarely discussed adolescents‘ motivations towards attending family travel cross-culturally. A commonly

accepted model of tourist motivations entails components of personal escape, interpersonal escape, personal seeking,

and interpersonal seeking. This worldwide project intends to examine comparability and applicability of this

quaternion model across 25 societal contexts, and compare mean of each motivational dimension towards attending

family travel across these societies. In addition, we conduct society-level analyses to explore correlations of each

motivational dimension with cultural values and societal features. Data were collected in 25 societies from Africa, Asia,

America, and Europe. The 5,826 adolescent participants were students of senior high schools.

We firstly conducted a series of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Adolescent motivation emerges in a

refined and validated model of three subscales (i.e., interpersonal escape, personal escape and seeking) indicating its

construct equivalence across societies. Inter-rater agreement (IRA) of subscales of each society suggested that the

individual-level scores are appropriate to be aggregated to society-level scores. Moreover, we conducted a regression

analysis to correct the

20


score of each society. Results of Spearman rank order correlation analyses showed that in general societal effectiveness

and cultural values were more correlated with females‘ travel motivations of interpersonal escape and seeking than

with males‘ ones.

Keywords:

Adolescents, cultural values, family travel, motivation, measurement invariance, societal effectiveness

21


Exploring the Best Fit Model for Community-Based Tourism:

Case Studies of Social Enterprises in West Kalimantan, Indonesia

Yanki Hartijasti 1 , Venie Hartinie 2

1 Department of Management, Faculty of Economics and Business, Jakarta, Universitas Indonesia

Email: yanki.hartijasti@ui.ac.id, yankihartijasti@yahoo.com

2 EcoBorneo Excursions, Pontianak, West Kalimantan, Indonesia

Email: veniehartinie@ecoborneo.id, venie.har@gmail.com

Abstract

Community-based tourism (CBT) is proven to contribute to cultural and environmental conservation, as well as to the

redistribution of economic benefits among the most vulnerable groups specifically in the developing countries.

Nevertheless, several researchers still argue about its critical success factors due to a lack of community participation

and involvement which was particularly due to scarcity of educated and knowledgeable people in many developing

countries. These circumstances are similar to the condition of West Kalimantan, one of the provinces in Indonesia

which is well known for its tropical forests, rich natural resources, and exotic flora and fauna with hundreds of large

and small rivers. The local communities who stay in the remote tropical rain forests do not understand how to make

the most of the natural beauty of their villages because of their low educational level. The objective of the study is to

explore to what extent economic, social, and environmental conditions in West Kalimantan should be taken into

consideration in designing CBT programs suitable to the local community. Using a case study methodology, this study

examines two social enterprises which have been in the industry for more than ten years developing and promoting

CBT in West Kalimantan. Findings reveal that previous studies‘ argument regarding a lack of participation and

involvement in many developing countries can be debated. With low educational level, it does not mean that CBT will

not be successful. As long as the leader has a commitment to provide innovative solutions to encounter resource

scarcity, lack of support from governments, or a culture of greed and selfishness of certain group of people, CBT can

still be implemented to shape community development.

Keywords: Community-Based Tourism, Case Studies, Local Values, Social Enterprises, West Kalimantan, Indonesia

22


Airline Service Recovery Policies for Voluntary Denied Boarding Due to

Overbooking

Tsung-Hsien Tsai a , Chien-Tz Chiu

a Department of Tourism Management, National Quemoy University 1 University Rd., Jinning Township, Kinmen 892,

Taiwan thtsai@nqu.edu.tw

Abstract

Tourism is considered a lever to develop economics and smooth transition between destinations via airlines is a vital

factor for success. As overbooking of capacity is a must-do in airline operation to mitigate the impact of cancellations

and no-shows, it is unavoidable to have guests who have to be denied boarding (DB). Since it is not uncommon to see

DB situations in real, it is critical to implement service recovery policies to sooth guests. In this study, we will address

the issue of service compensation from tourists‘ perspectives once DB occurs. A stated preference experiment is

conducted and twelve attributes are considered to propose a theoretic framework. Given a situation to be denied

boarding from Taipei to Tokyo, the effects of offset via meal, airport lounge, duty-free discount, accommodation,

alternative flight, cabin upgrade, seat choice, free egress transportation service, tourism bus, and compensation

voucher are explored. We collect 420 questionnaires and apply logit-based choice models to test consumers‘

preferences. The empirical results show that most of the applied attributes are statistically significant. Airline

consumers prefer to have meal voucher, use airport lounge, stay at a hotel if needed, switch to flights of other airlines,

definitely want upgrade, choose first-row seat, expect free egress service, and also obtain monetary compensations. In

addition, consumers do not prefer to wait at the origin airport for too long. The issue of DB compensation is explored to

investigate consumers‘ expectations once such service failure happens. The results can be of help for airlines to

understand tourists‘ preferences and conduct appropriate service recovery policies to maintain satisfaction and loyalty.

Keywords: Overbooking, Denied Boarding, Compensation Policy, Service Recovery, Revenue Management

23


Monitoring the Quality Costs in Accommodation Enterprises: A Research in

Antalya

Halil Akmeşe a , Pınar Yeşilçimen b

a Necmettin Erbakan University, Faculty of Tourism

hakmese@erbakan.edu.tr

b Karamanoğlu Mehmetbey University, Vocational School of Social Sciences

pinaraydag@kmu.edu.tr

Abstract

In a globalized world, tourism is considered important for countries due to its high socio-economic impacts. The fact

that the number of tourists reached 1.4 billion in 2018 indicates the size of the market. It is observed that the tourism

enterprises that want to make a difference in this market emphasize the measures to increase the service quality.

Businesses, in accordance with the wishes and expectations of the participants in the tourism movement, to achieve the

highest level of quality are doing various studies. One of these studies is that each enterprise establishes its own quality

control department. It is very important to measure the cost of an effective quality system to the enterprise and to

eliminate these costs partially or completely. The research prepared for this purpose, has been prepared in order to

evaluate the accommodation enterprises serving in Antalya province in terms of quality cost systems. In this research, it

is tried to determine how hotel managers perceive the quality costs and how they measure these costs. 85.5% of the 5-

star accommodation companies participating in the research have a quality certificate, while only 52.7% have a quality

control department.

Keywords: Quality Cost, Total Quality Management, Accommodation, Cost Management

24


The Use of Integrated Marketing Communication Approach for Incentives

and Supports Provided to Tourism Industry in Turkey

Kaplan Uğurlu a , Efe Adiller b

a Kırklareli University, Faculty of Tourism, Department of Tourism Management, Kırklareli, Turkey

E-mail: kugurlu@superonline.com

b Kırklareli University, Social Science Institute, Department of Tourism Management, Kırklareli, Turkey E-mail:

efeadiller@gmail.com

Abstract

When the processes of marketing have been examined from past to present, it is seen that the communication is

constantly increasing in marketing activities. Integrated marketing communication is the process of managing

customer relationships that make up the brand value. In this context, integrated marketing communication is defined

as a cross-functional process aimed at strategically controlling all messages sent to customers and other parties,

influencing and based on data, also establishing a profitable relationship by establishing and promoting a purposeful

dialogue. The purpose of this study is to reveal usability and importance of integrated communication tools for

incentives and supports provided to tourism industry in Turkey and to see the results of the application of investment

incentives and supports in the tourism industry in Turkey by examination. This is a conceptual paper based on the

literature consisting of secondary data. In this paper, to relate among the integrated marketing communication tools,

tourism incentives and supports was endeavoured, the analysis of statistical data and examples regarding to tourism

investment incentives and supports and the efficiency of the marketing communication dimension of the process were

reviewed. According to data from the world tourism industry; while Turkey is in a good position statistically in the

market, the investment in the tourism industry in Turkey still appears to be insufficient. Therefore, it has been

concluded that investments in the tourism industry can be increased and the process can be carried out more

successfully by using integrated marketing communication tools and activities in the promotion, informing, training

and use of the incentives and supports provided to the tourism industry.

Keywords: Integrated Marketing Communication, Tourism Incentives, Tourism Investment, Tourism, Turkey

25


Comparison between wine and beer tourism: a vision of French people

through free-word associations

Abstract

Roxane CORBEL, Patrick BOUCHET, and Anne-Marie LEBRUN,

C3S - UFR STAPS – University of Burgundy

3 Rue Edgar Faure, 21000 Dijon - France

corbel.roxane@gmail.com

anne-marie.lebrun@u-bourgogne.fr

patrick.bouchet@u-bourgogne.fr

Over the past decade, gastronomy tourism has become a key component of destination marketing strategies (Du Rand

& Heath, 2006). Economically speaking, gastronomy tourism has become one of the most dynamic and creative

segments of the global tourism market (WTO, 2012) and represents 25% of global tourism spending (World Food

Travel Association, 2014). Many destinations communicate about their gastronomic resources to differentiate

themselves from others (Chang et al., 2010; Hall & Mitchell, 2002; Scarpato, 2002). Wine and beer belong to French

gastronomic meal and are becoming niche markets in tourism. Some research exists on wine tourism (Bruwer, 2003;

Corbel et al., 2018; Getz, 2000; Getz & Brown, 2006; Hall et al., 2009; Laferté, 2002; Sparks, 2007) or beer tourism

(Plummer et al., 2005), but none offers a comparison.

Social representations, which are a useful framework in the field of tourism (Dickinson & Dickinson, 2006; Dickinson &

Robbins, 2007, 2008, 2009; Dickinson et al., 2009; Moscardo, 2009, 2011; Meliou & Maroudas, 2010, 2011; Lai, Hsu, &

Nepal, 2013; Lebrun, 2014, 2015), will allow to compare both type of tourism.

This research, based on online interviews, used a convenience sample of 930 French tourists. The results show that wine

tourism is more focused on products (red, white, Bordeaux, Bourgogne) and production attributes (cellar, grape, vine)

while beer tourism is more related to context (friends, discovery, taste, breweries) and some specific characteristics

(alcohol, hop, foam, blonde). Those comparisons are particularly significant to develop new offers and to communicate.

Keywords: Social representation, Wine tourism, Beer Tourism, Free-word association.

26


Selecting principles of Sustainable Tourism in Small Island Development for

Kish Island

Mona Erfanian Salim

Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning, Institute of Higher Education of Eqbal Lahoori, Mashhad, E-mail:

alafshar@gmail.com

Abstract

Kish Island is one of the most important sea and beach recreational holiday and tourism destination in Iran. As a Small

Island, the Kish Island‘s current development and tourism practices may not be sustainable in the longer term. Small

Islands are supposed to follow the sustainable tourism principles through balancing between the environmental and

economic concerns for improvement of Small Island Development State (SIDS). Nevertheless, in the contemporary

development guidelines of Kish, the crucial issue of the sustainable tourism principals has been neglected. This study

intends to develop principles of tourism sustainable for SIDS in Kish Island as one of the most favorite tourism zones in

Iran. A literature review is carried out to understand sustainable principles of SIDS at the tourism global scenario.

Subsequently, the paper compares the existing tourism guidelines against the international SIDS guidelines. Then, it

identifies the gaps between the principles of sustainable tourism for Kish Island. The findings indicate that the

weakness of sustainable tourism development in the island lacks the environmental and economic aspects. Finally, the

paper concludes with some recommendations towards developing social and environmental tourism guidelines for Kish

Island.

Keywords: Sustainable Tourism, Small Island Developing State (SIDS), Kish Island

27


Hotel’s Survival in Crisis-Ridden Cities: Evidence From Antalya Tourism City

Hilal Erkuş Öztürk a , Kemal Türkcan b

a Akdeniz University, Faculty of Architecture, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, 07058, Kampus, Antalya,

Turkey; hilalerkus@yahoo.com.

b Akdeniz University, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Department of Economics, 07058, Kampus,

Antalya, Turkey; kturkcan@akdeniz.edu.tr

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the factors influencing the survival of hotels in the crisis-ridden tourism city Antalya. By

using firm entry and exit data from 2000 to 2017, a survival analysis of hotels is made by using a discrete-time hazard

model to analyze the determinants of the survival of hotels in crisis periods. While the survival of hotels in tourism

specialized region in crisis periods depends on age, size ownership structure of the firm, entry-rate, we find no evidence

that destination size, tourism location and diversification have a survival advantage.

Keywords: Survival analysis, crisis, hotels, tourism cities, Antalya.

28


The Role of Budapest’s Roman Heritage in Urban Tourism Development

Tamara Rátz a , Tamás Régi b , Ákos Kátay c , and Kevser Çınar d

a Tourism Department, Kodolányi János

University 1139 Budapest, Frangepán u- 50-

56. Hungary

tratz@kodolanyi.hu

b Tourism Department, Kodolányi János University

1139 Budapest, Frangepán u- 50-56. Hungary

rtamas@kodolanyi.hu

c Tourism Department, Kodolányi János University


akatay@kodolanyi.hu

d Necmettin Erbakan University, Faculty of Tourism,

Köyceğiz Yerleşkesi, Dere Aşıklar Mah. Demeç Sok. No:42 Meram/Konya

kcinar@erbakan.edu.tr

Abstract

The outer frontier of the Roman Pannonia province lies in the Carpathian Basin along the Danube. This heritage, as

Frontiers of the Roman Empire – Ripa Pannonica in Hungary, was submitted in 2009 on the Hungarian World Heritage

tentative list. Due to the physical obstacle of the Danube, hardly any man-made obstacles needed to be built:

consequently, the site mainly takes shape on regional planners‘ and educated potential visitors‘ mental maps, a virtual

product of their collective historic awareness. Based on expert interviews, questionnaire survey, site visits, and content

analysis of planning documents and promotional materials, the paper assesses the role of the Roman heritage in the

urban tourism development strategy of Budapest, analyse the existing stakeholder networks and identify the problems

in their operation, in order to gain a clearer picture of the tourism potential of this project. In addition, the

interpretation and visitor management techniques used at selected sites of the Ripa Pannonica are also investigated,

with special emphasis on their contribution to awareness-building, and their effectiveness and efficiency in visitor

experience creation.

Keywords: Roman Heritage, Budapest, Urban Tourism, Heritage Tourism

29


The Effect of Tourism Sector on the Agriculture Sector: An Assessment on

Turkey-Russia Aircraft Crisis on the Supply Chain of Herbal Products

Abstract

Şerife Betül ÇETİNKAYA 1 , Hilal ERKUŞ-ÖZTÜRK 2

Akdeniz University, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Turkey.

Akdeniz University, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Turkey.

hilalerkus@yahoo.com.

In recent years, the tourism sector has a significant economic impact on the agricultural sector. Vegetables and fruits

that are heavily consumed in the tourism sector are obtained from agriculture sector through brokers and suppliers.

Therefore, the tourism sector and the agriculture sector are in a close input-output relationship. The sector is an

important customer potential especially for herbal products suppliers. Therefore, the crisis affects the tourism sector

negatively and also affects the agricultural sector. The aim of this study is to examine the impact of the tourism sector

on the supply chain of herbal products in agricultural sector in the crisis period. As a case study area, Antalya is

selected due to being the center of tourism and vegetable production. Surveys and face-to-face interviews with tourism

suppliers in Antalya‘s vegetable and fruit market, will be evaluated with various quantitative and qualitative analysis

techniques.

Keywords: Tourism Sector, Agricultural Sector, Crisis, Resilience, Supply Chain.

30


The Most Photographed Village in Europe: Tourist Imaginaries of Hallstatt,

Austria, Europe

Desmond Wee

CBS Cologne Business School GmbH

Hardefuststraße 1, D-50677 Köln

d.wee@cbs.de

Abstract

This paper uses the town of Hallstatt in Austria to question how tourism may indeed be a reflexive part of the everyday,

embodied and full of agency. Hallstatt has been visited by increasing numbers of Chinese tourists within the last 10

years, causing problems of overtourism, much to the disdain of the 1000 inhabitants. It comes as no surprise that the

DMO and local authorities in Hallstatt are faced with pressing issues, especially with regards to the co-ordination and

handling of increasing Chinese tourism influx. What is more interesting is the existence of its reproduction in China,

exemplified by a replica Hallstatt in Huizhou, China. It remains to be seen if Hallstatt China‘, is indeed the precursor for

the real thing‘ in Austria, or that there is some kind of inherent relationship that connects the two towns. What

becomes clear is that experiences are no longer desires that require an escapism toward the exotic, but experiences

that are encapsulated in and through everyday practice, de-familiarizing familiar spaces and playing up to the

imaginary. The paper will explore the representation of European‘ beauty at its best, epitomized in the quaint little city

of Hallstatt, Austria. This will be done through participant observation, analyzing visitor expectations and practices

with tourist representations of place. To a lesser extent, the paper will investigate tourism discourses in China wedding

tourism, family tourism and even residential listings giving rise to the blend between the spectacular and the

residential, and why Hallstatt is such a romanticized, constitutive‘ village embodying Europe‘.This paper situates both

Hallstatt Austria and Halstatt China as places constitutive of each other in place making, in which one space informs

the other through tourism practices, networks and mobilities. It can be said that they are also changing places‘

concurrently as they strive to define themselves in relation to each other, both as brand and self. This paper

investigates tourism flows in Hallstatt by considering its unique way of experiencing and consuming places, paying

attention to possible influences on Hallstatt as a place in both Austria and China. Be it mundane‘ or exotic‘ desires, the

quest for experiences in Hallstatt shapes the expectation of prospective visitors of a destination, alongside the existence

of the sister‘ destination. Hence, tourism may be repositioned as part of a particular everyday, in order to explore new

tourist practices in which spaces and identities are constantly evolving in contingent ways.

31


Travelling to tell the tale? – Role or (e-)WOM in case of Lake Balaton

(Hungary)

Judit Sulyok 1 , Kitti Hiezl 2

1 Balaton Tourism Research Institute, University of Pannonia Faculty of Business and Economics,

H-8200, Veszprém, Egyetem utca 10.

sulyok.judit@gtk.uni-pannon.hu

2 PhD student, University of Pannonia Faculty of Business and

Economics, H-8200, Veszprém, Egyetem utca 10.

hiezl.kitti@gtk.uni-pannon.hu

Abstract

The recommendations of our family and acquaintances are among the most important sources of information. Tourism

researchers put great emphasis on the (e-)WOM including mapping its role and analyze the content generated by

travelers. The three pillars of the research were the analyses of the input, output and the content of the (e-)WOM. The

research is based on a quantitative survey among domestic travelers (n=591 within EFOP 3.6.2—16-2017-00017

project) realized in 2018. The outcomes of the research show that the sample reflects the results of other surveys in

similar topic. Among the motivational factors the recommendation of friends and family, is the most significant

followed by previous experience and special offer of the accommodation. Facebook has the most prominent role among

the social media platforms when searching for information. Review platforms and video sharing sites have much less

significance. On the output side - besides personal interaction - the most common ways to share personal experiences, is

by sharing photos and videos on social media sites during or after the journey. The research covered the entire

customer journey it enables the address both the input and the output side of the (e-)WOM. From the practice point of

view the results support tourism stakeholders when selecting marketing communication channels and defining

communication messages.

Keywords: (e-)WOM, information source, tourism mobility, motivation

32

FULL TEXT

The 5 AnnualConference of EATSA; Building Competitive Advantage of Euro Asian Tourism,

The Role of Budapest’s Roman Heritage in Urban Tourism Development

Tamara Rátz a , Tamás Régi b , Ákos Kátay c , Kevser Çınar d

a Tourism Department, Kodolányi János University


tratz@kodolanyi.hu

b Tourism Department, Kodolányi János University


rtamas@kodolanyi.hu

c Tourism Department, Kodolányi János University


: akatay@kodolanyi.hu

d Necmettin Erbakan University, Department of Tourism

Kürden Mh. Kasim Halife Sk no 11 Meram Konya. Turkey

k.cinar22@gmail.com

Abstract

The outer frontier of the Roman Pannonia province

lies in the Carpathian Basin along the Danube. This

heritage, as Frontiers of the Roman Empire – Ripa

Pannonica in Hungary, was submitted in 2009 on the

Hungarian World Heritage tentative list. Due to the

physical obstacle of the Danube, hardly any manmade

obstacles needed to be built: consequently, the

site mainly takes shape on regional planners’ and

educated potential visitors’ mental maps, a virtual

product of their collective historic awareness.

Based on expert interviews, questionnaire survey, site

visits, and content analysis of planning documents

and promotional materials, the paper assesses the

role of the Roman heritage in the urban tourism

development strategy of Budapest, analyse the

existing stakeholder networks and identify the

problems in their operation, in order to gain a clearer

picture of the tourism potential of this project. In

addition, the interpretation and visitor management

techniques used at selected sites of the Ripa

Pannonica are also investigated, with special

emphasis on their contribution to awarenessbuilding,

and their effectiveness and efficiency in

visitor experience creation.

Keywords:

Roman Heritage, Budapest, Urban Tourism,

Heritage Tourism

Introduction

The Limes, the border line of the Roman Empire at

its greatest extent in the 2 nd century AD, followed

the line of the River Danube in the Carpathian Basin.

Today an important part of this heritage is located

in Budapest, the capital of Hungary. However, in the

current tourist product of Budapest the Roman

heritage sites are not particularly highlighted: they

are not featured among the top 10 attractions by the

Budapest Festival and Tourism Centre, the city’s

official organisation for tourism, culture and

marketing [1], not mentioned among the top sights

in Budapest by Lonely Planet [2], not listed among

the 15 must-visit attractions by Culture Trip [3],

and not included in the Budapest Top 10 list on

visitbudapest.travel, a site that claims to be an

“insider’s guide” that helps visitors “explore

Budapest & Hungary beyond the traditional tourist

routes” [4]. The only reference to the city’s Roman

heritage on these sites – the first ones listed by

google when searching for “visit Budapest” –

appears on visitbudapest.travel’s Top 10 for History

Buffs list where one of the suggestions is to “set foot

on part of the Ancient Roman Empire in Aquincum”

(however, the description of the site is factually

inaccurate at various points).

The relatively low perceived touristic value of these

heritage resources, as demonstrated by the above

34


sites, seems to be slightly surprising in the light that

the heritage of the ancient Roman Limes, as

Frontiers of the Roman Empire – Ripa Pannonica in

Hungary, was submitted in 2009 on the Hungarian

World Heritage tentative list by the Secretariat of

the Hungarian World Heritage Commission and the

National Office of Cultural Heritage, as an extension

to the Frontiers of the Roman Empire World Heritage

Site [5]. And while the proposed site as a whole

mainly takes shape on regional planners’ and

educated potential visitors’ mental maps, a virtual

product of their collective historic awareness as a

consequence of the physical obstacle of the Danube,

the majority of the most significant Roman heritage

assets are to be found in Budapest, predominantly

in the district of Óbuda, but there are also visible

remains in the city centre and in the southern part

of Buda (Figure 1) [6].

In recent years, although major efforts have been

made to develop the heritage of the Limes as a

cultural route, and to establish the network of

stakeholders necessary to create and maintain a

visible and feasible tourist product, progress has

been relatively slow and difficult. Since the area

along the Limes has been redeveloped countless

times during the last 2000 years, it is an additional

challenge to visualise the Roman theme as the core

of the planned cultural route, as opposed to

developing a non-thematic linear tourist product

along the river Danube.

Figure 1 – Roman heritage sites in Budapest

Assets representing the Roman heritage of

Budapest are in the focus of the TOURiBOOST

project, an international project that aims to

establish long-lasting, transnational partnerships

with the mission to remodel the tourism supplydemand

pattern at heritage places, to upgrade

heritage-based tourism products, to promote

tourism entrepreneurship in heritage tourism, to

increase the competitiveness of small businesses

operating in this field, and to efficiently

communicate heritage places to potential

consumers [7].

Within the framework of the TOURiBOOST project,

a survey was carried out to explore place image and

cultural reputation in each Pilot Project Area, and to

evaluate the status quo of cultural products and

services. In addition, as a result of the stakeholder

meetings held in each participating country, tourism

business models were developed for the selected

geolocations, mapping local expertise and

knowledge. The current paper presents some of the

preliminary findings of the Hungarian survey, in

addition to the business models created for the five

Budapest geolocations.

Roman heritage sites in Budapest

Assets representing the Roman heritage of

Budapest were selected as the Hungarian

geolocations of the TOURiBOOST project for various

reasons. As it was mentioned before, the Ripa

Pannonica, the outer frontier of Pannonia and the

Roman Empire located in Austria, Slovakia,

Hungary, Croatia and Serbia is a tentative World

Heritage site which is being nominated for WH

status in 2019 as an extension to the already

existing Frontiers of the Roman Empire World

Heritage Site. The Hungarian Limes Association was

founded in 2010 with the aim to establish and

maintain a unique cultural route including Roman

heritage-themed museums, exhibitions,

archaeological parks and memorial places along the

Pannonian Limes.

The sites of the Ripa Pannonica in Hungary lie

mostly on the right bank of the Danube, including

well-developed and less well-developed heritage

assets located in Budapest such as military

installations and civil settlement structures. The

south and the west gate of the legionary fortress,

the Roman baths and two amphitheatres are partly

preserved and still visible. The core element of the

Roman site of Budapest-Aquincum is the

archaeological park which includes a large open-air

space and a new museum building. It offers regular

exhibitions, education programmes and a museum

store with extensive information material, i.e. it is

35


already developed as a high quality tourist

attraction. Besides the Aquincum Museum and

Archaeological Park, the list of Roman remains in

Budapest include, among others, the Hercules Villa,

the Thermae Maiores Roman Baths Museum, the

currently closed Military Town Museum, two

Roman amphitheatres, the northern town wall and

gate, the eastern and the southern gates of the

legionary fortress, the Roman aqueduct, the ruins of

a barrack block and sanctuary, and the Cella

Trichora (an early Christian burial chapel) [6].

The five geolocations selected for the

TOURiBOOST project in Hungary are the following:

• Inner-city Parish Church of Our Lady

• Március 15 Square

• Civil Town Amphitheatre

• Aquincum Museum and Archaeological Park

• Roman Bath Museum – Thermae Maiores

A particularly important element of Budapest’s

Roman heritage is the remains of the fort of Contra-

Aquincum in downtown Budapest, partly located

within the building of the Inner-city Parish Church

of Our Lady, partly under the current Március 15

Square. The Roman Catholic Inner-city Parish

Church is the oldest church in Budapest, its

architectural and cultural heritage illustrate the

2000-year-long history of the city. The church

building and the square in front of it covers a large

Roman relic, a four-sided camp with dimensions of

86 by 84 meters. The Roman camp was completed

in 350 AD and it was used after 375. A three-naved

church, built in the 11th-12th century, occupied the

place of the old command building near to the

southern wall of the 4th century Roman camp.

Excavations between 2014 and 2015 provided

information about the Roman and medieval remains

found under the church floor. In addition to the

Roman heritage, the church has a rich history,

making it an invaluable asset in heritage tourism

development in Budapest, and it is one of the most

dynamically developing managed visitor attractions

in Budapest, with an active and creative tourism

management team. Due to its central Pest location,

the church building may serve as a focal point for

the new heritage tourism product to be developed.

The Roman ruins of Contra-Aquincum are

exceptionally well excavated and exhibited in the

24-hour-open church building, visible both from the

ground level through a glass platform and inside the

lower chapel, also as a background to the liturgical

and secular events organised in this unique space

(Figure 2). The Church is situated in Március 15

Square, on the site of the Contra-Aquincum fort, an

important historic site along the Ripa Pannonica.

Although the underground remains of the fort are

only partly visible (and currently not accessible)

from the square, the site serves as a unique

geolocation since between the northern and

southern sections of the former Roman wall, a

stylized line representing the Danube river can be

seen, with the names and floor plans of the Roman

military garrisons in Pannonia province. The

remains of Contra-Aquincum can be seen through a

glass cover at the street level. Consequently, the

Inner-city Parish Church and the Március 15 Square

form a unique complex with a high potential in the

interpretation and development of Budapest’s

Roman heritage.

Figure 2 – The Inner-City Parish Church and

Március 15 Square (photo by Tamara Rátz)

The Civil Town amphitheatre is the smaller of

Aquincum's two amphitheatres. Its remains lie

beyond the northern wall of the former Roman

town. The building, already in operation in the mid-

2 nd century, was renovated multiple times during

the 3 rd century. Based on its structure, the almost

circular building can be classified as an earth

amphitheatre that could host roughly 6-7000

spectators who could enter the partially-covered

stands from a ramp on the outside. The arena,

which was surrounded by a 3-metre-high wall,

could be entered through a gate on either side of the

east-west axis. The amphitheatre held various

sporting events and gladiatorial games mixed with

animal hunts. Since this building had the largest

capacity in the town, it was also used for more

serious public business, such as assemblies and

civic festivals as well as speeches in honour of the

visiting emperor. The gladiator barracks were

located by the amphitheatre, where the champions

of the popular games exercised and trained. Its

courtyard, surrounded by a stone wall, and its

tower are now below ground. On the southern side

of the western gate stood a sanctuary of Nemesis,

the goddess of amphitheatre games. During the

excavation of the sanctuary, a fragment of the

goddess’s statuette was found along with a number

of inscribed altars [8]. Nowadays the amphitheatre

is used, occasionally, according to its original

function, i.e. as an event space. Figure 3 illustrates a

36


special occasion: on 10 May 2019, the Hungarian

tribute band Keep Floyding reconstructed the

legendary Live at Pompeii concert of Pink Floyd

from 1972.

Figure 3 – Concert in the Civil Town amphitheatre

in Budapest (photo by Tamara Rátz)

The Roman Bath Museum presents the baths of the

Roman legionary fortress, the Thermae Maiores.

One of the halls of the legionary fortress’s baths was

found in 1778, during the first archaeological

excavation in Aquincum. The legionary baths were a

monumental structure (120 m by 140 m) that laid

at the intersection of the fortress’s two main roads.

The building was constructed in the 2 nd century and

rebuilt a number of times afterwards. The bath

complex offered soldiers an exercise court

(palaestra), cold, warm, and hot pools, baths, steam

baths, and spacious halls with underfloor heating.

Entrance to the remains is available through the

pedestrian underpass at Flórián Square. Above the

ruins, two two-lane overpasses were built for car

traffic between Szentendrei Road and Árpád Bridge,

which provide partial protection against the

weather. Within the archaeological area, detailed

descriptions and maps help visitors' orientation

[10] (Figure 5).

Aquincum Museum and Archaeological Park, a

branch of Budapest History Museum, opened its

gates in 1894. The Museum’s permanent exhibitions

present, among others, the unique Aquincum organ,

as well as mosaics, statues, tombstones and other

valuable archaeological finds from the Governor’s

Palace.

Figure 5 – The Roman Bath Museum in Budapest

(photo by Tamara Rátz)

Figure 4 – Floralia in Aquincum (photo by Tamara

Rátz)

The Archaeological Park displays the remains of

around a third of the Aquincum Civil Town,

including the most characteristic public buildings

and dozens of private houses, reflecting the town’s

layout during the 2 nd and 3 rd centuries. The Museum

is the largest collection site of Roman archaeological

and historical monuments of Budapest. Each year

the Museum hosts a traditional Roman spring

festival called Floralia, with theatre performances

and gladiator shows [9] (Figure 4).

Methods

Various quantitative and qualitative methods were

used to evaluate the current use of the above

described Roman heritage assets as current and

potential tourist attractions, to explore place image

and cultural reputation in each Pilot Project Area,

and to evaluate the status quo of cultural products

and services.

Local stakeholders were invited to fill in a

questionnaire (n=15) that focused on awareness of

the selected assets, their contribution to a

distinctive area identity, the accessibility and

competitiveness of the sites, the importance of

storytelling in heritage interpretation, and the

potential impacts of the TOURiBOOST project on

cultural heritage consumption at local level. The

questionnaires were partly filled in during personal

37


meetings with the respondents, and partly by email,

following previous agreement of the selected

stakeholders.

Following the questionnaire survey, a local

stakeholder meeting was organised in Budapest in

May 2019, with the participation of the following

partners:

• Hungarian Tourism Agency

• Budapest Festival and Tourism Centre

• Aquincum Museum and Archaeological Park

• Inner-City Parish Church of Budapest

• Esernyős Cultural, Tourism and Information

Point in Óbuda

• Hungarian Tourist Guide Association (MIE)

• Individual guides

• Individual cultural tourism experts

• Kodolányi János University

The participants represent the selected

geolocations on the one hand, and tourism

development authorities from national (Hungarian

Tourism Agency), city (Budapest Festival and

Tourism Centre) and district level (Esernyős

Cultural, Tourism and Information Point in Óbuda)

on the other hand. Since the aim of the

TOURiBOOST project is to ensure the seamless

integration of new products and services in

Budapest’s heritage tourism, the organisers also

found it very important to involve tour guides (both

MIE and individual guides) who play a key role in

developing new itineraries and services in the city.

Research findings

According to the survey results, the further

development of Budapest’s Roman heritage sites as

a tourism product – either in the form of a local

themed route or as part of the wider Limes project –

could positively contribute to the destination’s

identity and its image. Interestingly, higher level of

consensus could be experienced in the question of

identity (100%) than in the case of image (77%),

despite the fact that the Roman heritage of

Aquincum and Pannonia province precedes the

arrival of the Hungarian tribes to the Carpathian

basin.

Figure 6 represents the most frequently mentioned

words in association with the distinctive identity of

the TOURiBOOST pilot project in Budapest. As

demonstrated in the word cloud, it is clearly

perceived as a tourism project with visitors in the

centre, with the involvement and cooperation of

various stakeholders, based on international

expertise, using storytelling to influence the

destination’s image and to create an innovative,

high quality attraction of the heritage of the ancient

Roman Pannonia province.

As part of the workshop’s agenda, the participating

stakeholders reflected on tourism in Budapest, the

Roman heritage of the city, the present situation of

the tourism use of the key Roman heritage assets of

Óbuda, the development plans of these sites, as well

as the obstacles, challenges and difficulties faced by

the current users. Content analysis was performed

on the information gathered during the meeting in

order to better understand the key issues, and the

results were used as the basis of the tourism

business models that were developed for each

selected geolocation.

In addition to the questionnaire survey and the

content analysis of the stakeholder meeting’s

transcript, personal observation in the form of

study visits was conducted in the five selected

geolocations as well as in additional sites (the

Lapidarium of the National Museum, and the porta

principalis dextra, i.e. the southern gate of the

legionary fortress in Flórián Square), to collect

information on the current use of these assets and

the interpretation and visitor management

techniques applied at the sites, with special

emphasis on their contribution to awarenessbuilding

as well as their effectiveness and efficiency

in visitor experience creation.

Figure 6 – The distinctive identity of the

TOURiBOOST Pilot Project in Budapest

However, beyond the most easily noticeable

notions, further themes appear as well, colouring

the overall picture. The parallel mention of “local”

and “residents” refer to the fact that the improved

use of Roman heritage would not only benefit

visitors to the city, but also local residents could

enjoy these assets as educational and recreational

spaces.

38


Furthermore, there are various terms associated

with historical, cultural and religious “diversity” in

the word cloud, such as “Mithras”, “Seuso” or

“Iseum”, suggesting an innovative and inclusive

angle to tourism developers and interpretation

designers. This subject, in turn, is connected to the

perceived educational aspect of the pilot project,

expressed in terms such as “creation”, “education”,

“knowledge”, “MOOC”, “dissemination” and “learn”.

The educational benefits brought about by the

cooperation of universities and experts from five

countries – Turkey, the Netherlands, Italy, Greece

and Hungary – were considered among the most

important positive impacts of the TOURiBOOST

project, not only for the added value that this

collaboration can generate in the field of tourism

product development or in the use of storytelling in

creating innovative, novel business ideas in heritage

tourism, but also for the fact that tourism scholars

finally joined the archaeologists and historians who

have been active for a long time in researching the

Roman heritage of Budapest.

According to the stakeholders, another distinctive

feature of the project is its ability to connect the

“past” and the “present” by meeting the challenges of

the “21 st century” in heritage tourism development,

experience design and interpretation. Storytelling

can also play a key role in this aspect, as long as the

developers are able to find those stories that can

bring history closer to the targeted audience’s

everyday life and can help potential visitors become

cognitively and emotionally involved in 2000-yearold

Roman heritage.

There was a general consensus (100%) among the

stakeholders concerning the project’s potential to

provide new interpretation of existing heritage

resources, to contribute to the conceptual

development of new assets, and to create an optimal

mix of varied attractions and activities built on the

Roman heritage theme. However, only 72% of the

survey participants believed that the project can

result in new stories about local heritage, despite

generally acknowledging the significance of

storytelling in enriching national heritage (Table 1).

Table 1 – The perceived significance of storytelling

(%)

Strong Partial None

In cultural consumption 82 18 0

development

In reaching a wide

73 27 0

group of consumers

In engaging young

64 36 0

consumers

In providing

uniqueness among

global heritage assets

55 45 0

In innovative heritage

interpretation

In innovative heritage

consumption

For a business oriented

approach

In enriching national

heritage

73 27 0

55 45 0

64 36 0

64 27 9

The role of storytelling seems to be particularly

significant in cultural consumption development,

but it also seen as having a major role in reaching

out to a wide range of cultural consumers – who

may not all be experienced users of cultural services

–, and in innovative heritage interpretation.

Additional perceived strengths of the TOURiBOOST

project are its ability to stimulate the development

of new cultural products and services (100%

consensus), create complementarities with existing

cultural products (91%), encourage regional

networking among a wide range of service

providers who are connected with a certain theme

or operate within a geographical area, improve the

reputation of a place as a cultural destination, and

inspire young audiences to participate in heritage

tourism and/or in heritage education (82-82%,

respectively).

The overall accessibility of the selected Roman

heritage sites in Budapest was perceived as

adequate, although with different levels of

satisfaction associated with the various aspects of

the notion (Table 2).

Table 2 – Perceived accessibility of Roman heritage

sites in Budapest (%)

Aspect Yes No

Affordable 100 0

Easily accessible by 82 18

transport

Available without 73 27

restrictions

Available information, 55 45

advanced use of ICT

Cognitively and mentally 82 18

accessible

Emotionally accessible 82 18

As illustrated by Table 2, the availability of

information, and particularly the advanced use of

ICT tools in information provision and

interpretation before, during and after the visit

were considered as the weakest component of the

overall accessibility of the selected sites, despite the

fact that they key stakeholders – the Inner-city

Parish Church and the Aquincum Museum and

Archaeological Park – both have informative,

39


multilingual websites and both are active on social

media platforms.

The tourism business models (Figures 7-11),

developed on the basis of the questionnaire survey,

the stakeholder meeting and the study visit

conducted at the sites, summarise each

geolocation’s key partners, activities and resources,

in addition to their customer relationships and

interactions, their revenues and costs, as well as the

main values that they provide.

Figure 9 – Business model of Civil Town

Amphitheatre

Figure 7 – Business model of Aquincum Museum

and Archaeological Park

As demonstrated by the business models, there are

two primary stakeholders in the project : the

Aquincum Museum and Archaeological Park in

Óbuda – since it is also responsible for the Roman

Bath Museum and for the Civil Town Amphitheatre -

, and the Inner-City Parish Church of Our Lady, since

the surrounding Március 15 Square is a public space

that would be classified as a Roman heritage

tourism asset independently, without the added

value of the church’s active presence in the tourism

market of Budapest.

The key partners depend on the selected sites’

geographical location – Óbuda or central Pest –,

their involvement in the Budapest tourist market,

and their association with one of the fundamental

stakeholders. It shall be noted that although the five

sites are conceptually connected through their

association with Budapest’s Roman heritage,

currently there is no direct collaboration between

the two groups of assets (Aquincum Museum and

Archaeological Park, Roman Bath Museum and Civil

Town Amphitheatre on the one hand, Inner-City

Parish Church of Our Lady and Március 15 Square

on the other hand). The first step in creating an allembracing

network of Roman heritage sites in

Budapest, enhanced by a range of supplementary

cultural institutions, professional organisations and

local businesses, was the TOURiBOOST stakeholder

meeting held in May 2019.

Figure 10 – Business model of Inner-City Parish

Church of Our Lady

Figure 8 – Business model of Roman Bath Museum

The Roman heritage is the fundamental asset in

each case, except for the Inner-City Parish Church:

although its history also started during the Roman

Empire, the past 2000 years have enriched it

significantly, making the Roman ruins in the lower

chapel a starting point and not the culmination of

the visitor experience.

A unique value provided by the Inner-City Parish

Church is spiritual development, which also enables

the institution to build a strong, committed

community beyond the Hungarian and international

visitors. Although the remaining four geolocations

are not religious sites, The permanent exhibition of

the Aquincum Museum includes a reconstructed

Mithras shrine, testament of a hidden and

mysterious cult, which might be the starting point of

storytelling in the field of spiritual diversity.

40


Figure 11 – Business model of Március 15 Square

The uniqueness of Március 15 Square lies in the fact

that it is a central public space open for everyone,

without the type of management that the other

geolocations enjoy. However, the story of the square

is inextricably linked to that of the Inner-City Parish

Church, both preserving the ruins of the Contra-

Aquincum fort. The scale of the square makes it

possible to represent, in a stylized way, the total

length of the Ripa Pannonica and its fortifications

and settlements, thus providing an ideal starting

point for understanding the – hopefully – future

World Heritage.

Conclusions

This paper is a preliminary attempt to analyse the

potential impacts of the TOURiBOOST project, its

significance in heritage tourism development in

Budapest, the interrelationships of the various

stakeholders representing the city’s Roman

heritage, and their perceptions and expectations

concerning the benefits of the project.

Based on the research results discussed in the

paper, the project undoubtedly has the potential to

contribute to the diversity of local tourism supply,

and can stimulate and encourage cooperation

among local stakeholders. The knowledge and

experiences brought into this international

cooperation by the project partners have the

potential introduce new business models based on

customer insights, proactive stakeholder

engagement and key experiences. During the

collaboration process it needs to be ensured that

the project initiatives fit within the existing system

of development plans and proposals, in order to

complement the local programmes and not compete

with them.

[2] Lonely Planet (2019). Top sights in Budapest.

https://www.lonelyplanet.com/hungary/budap

est (downloaded on 14 June 2019)

[3] Culture Trip (2019). 15 Must-Visit Attractions in

Budapest.

https://theculturetrip.com/europe/hungary/art

icles/15-must-visit-attractions-in-budapest/

(downloaded on 14 June 2019)

[4] VisitBudapest.travel (2019). Budapest Top 10.

http://visitbudapest.travel/activities/budapesttop-10/


[5] UNESCO WHC (2019). Frontiers of the Roman

Empire – Ripa Pannonica in Hungary.

http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5452/


[6] Aquincum Museum and Archaeological Park

(2019). Roman Remains in Budapest.

http://www.aquincum.hu/en/amuzeumrol/budapest-romai-emlekei/terkep/


[7] TOURiBOOST (2019). The Project.

https://touriboostproject.org/the_project/



(2019). The Civil Town Amphitheatre.

http://www.aquincum.hu/en/romaiorokseg/mi

nta/ (downloaded on 10 June 2019)


(2019). About the museum.

http://www.aquincum.hu/en/amuzeumrol/rolunk/muzeumtortenet/



(2019). Bath Museum.

http://www.aquincum.hu/en/amuzeumrol/budapest-romai-emlekei/furdomuzeum/


References

[1] Budapest Festival and Tourism Centre (2019).

Top Sights. https://www.budapestinfo.hu/topsights


41


Analysis of the Employees’ Contentment in Hotel’s Restaurants in Western

Hungary

Csaba Kőmíves

Széchenyi Isvtán University Kautz Gyula Faculty of Economics – Department of Tourism

Egyetem tér 1., 9026 Győr - Hungary

komives.csaba@sze.hu

Abstract

The significant fluctuation of high degree in

hospitality occurs more often in Győr than in other

regions of the country due to greater proximity to the

Austrian border. The study examines the job

satisfaction of the waiters and cooks and its

consequences in the catering units in Győr-Moson-

Sopron, Vas and Zala counties. The lack of motivation

of workers of different age groups (Baby-boomer, X,

Y, Z generation) and the lack of communication,

cooperation and problem-solving competencies

required to perform the work determine the high

fluctuation rate in this sector. Primary research was

conducted with a quantitative (questionnaire) survey

between 10th January 2017 and 30th September

2017. The sample from 496 persons is not

representative, respondents were chosen with

arbitrary sampling. Data were processed by means of

the SPSS 23 statistical program package which

contain cross-table analysis, data reduction and

cluster analysis in addition to the descriptive

statistical analyses.

Keywords:

Competences, Motivation, Satisfaction,

Introduction

This research is based on my doctoral thesis in

which I examined the relationship between Human

Resource and hospitality industry. My aim was to

investigate the satisfaction of the employees at

workplace (salary, working hours, atmosphere at

work, communication, compensation) and work

relations. The attitudes of the employees regarding

their workplace and their jobs carry serious

behavioural consequences so it is important for the

employer to analyse the effect of any new

information on the attitude of the employees or how

the existing ones can be changed. Justification of the

human resource management and the strategic

human resource management is unquestionable in

the 21 st century because they attend together with

their all functions in the life of enterprises, and one

of the most important factors of their successful

operation is to keep their key persons in order to

maintain their competitiveness in the permanently

changing economic environment. The role of the

human resource management has better still

become more important in the 21 st century, catering

has a large demand for live labour, the cost of

workforce is increasing more and more. The

strategic task of HR is to promote the commitment

of the employees to the enterprise with the proper

compensation means, to ensure them the

professional development. It is very important

because the employees spend a significant part of

their life at their workplaces.

Literature review

Conceptualization of satisfaction and commitment is

even mixed in the literature such as motivation and

encouragement (Nemes-Szlávicz 2011).

The employees’ satisfaction at the workplace has

been studied by several authors in several

industries. Some of them are as follows: Harter et al.

(2002) in the American business level, Bencsik

(2005), Gyökér-Krajcsák (2009) tested satisfaction

and commitment models, Nemes-Szlávicz (2011)

studied the employees of industrial companies in

Hungary, Lazányi (2011) tested at the Medical and

Health Science Centre of the Debrecen University,

Németh (2013) carried out in health service as well,

Hídvégi (2015) examined the employees of the

Customs and Excise, Fényszárosi et al. (2018)

studied the motivation at workplace on the basis of

self-determination theory, Reukauf (2018)

examined the satisfaction of the employees of the

American small businesses. Catering is not a

research area in Hungary, Rudolfné (2015)

examined the consumers’ behaviour in catering in

her doctoral thesis, Kőmíves (2015, 2016, 2017)

analysed the work satisfaction of waiters and cooks

working in catering.

The Concise Dictionary of the Hungarian Language

gives the following definition of satisfaction:

“…noun The condition that someone or something is

satisfied, that is, feels satisfaction.” (Juhász et al.

42


2000:273). As Bakacsi wrote (2004), the most

important attitude in connection with the

workplace is the satisfaction or dissatisfaction with

work which is resulted from how much the

completion of the work means to the employees.

How far they consider the salary got for it fair, how

far supporting the work condition and atmosphere

as well as the workmates and bosses are. Klein

(2009) expressed the notion of satisfaction more

strongly emphasizing that the general attitudes of

employee satisfaction included three areas. These

are the special work factors, the individual

characters and the group relations out of work. In

Csíkszentmihályi’s interpretation the job

satisfaction also depends on whether a worker has

an autotelic personality or not. „Probably no one of

the two strategies makes the work enjoyable alone;

the combination of the two, however, can greatly

contribute to the perfect experience.”

(Csíkszentmihályi 1997:77). The research results of

Happ–Mészáros (2015) also support the importance

of the employees’ attitudes which indirectly affect

the consumer behavior of the guests.

The principles of reward management were

formulated by Armstrong and Murlis (2005) who

declares that employers are obliged to work out a

strategy along the values represented by the

organisation and they are supposed to reward their

workers in a fair, even and consistent way. The task

of the Human Resource management is not only

recruiting and employing new colleagues but also

keeping key persons, becoming a learning

organisation and first of all, learning. Poór (2013)

claims that stimulation management can be realised

flexibly by relying on the interests of the employees,

connecting guided requirements to the attainment

of specific organisational goals. This will make it

possible for the employees to become interested

and the employers enforce their own goals by

creating and operating a remuneration

(stimulating) system. The employers apply these

factors in a way that the employees’ interests are

parallel to theirs and they enhance each other. In

Teson’s view (2008) the leader combines

motivation and responsibility to create the right

conditions from the part of the management, which

generate a self-reinforcing (inner) motivation in the

employees, in this way progress can involve the

possibility of the highest efficiency. In case of

inappropriate communication channels Teson is on

the opinion that the operation of the organisation is

disfunctional, the guests might be overburdened or

they do not understand the jargon. He emphasizes

the importance of both the vertical and the

horizontal communication in the right functioning

of the organisation. Inappropriate communication

may diminish the employees’ commitment to the

company which leads to growing fluctuation.

Nickson’s interpretation (2013) is that the

paternalist countries of south-eastern Asia have an

advantage over western societies, given the fact that

in these countries the members of an organisation

stay together after the working hours, in this way

precision and loyalty become even more efficient in

the organisational culture. As for security, young

people are in the most endangered situation as they

are particularly exposed to violence and abuse at

the workplace. Unfortunately, there is a growing

number of verbal and physical instances of these.

The employees' satisfaction depends on the

organization's culture which defines the national

culture, on the leadership style Hofstede G. and

Hofstede G.J. (2005), on the motivation, the work

atmosphere, the responsibility, the apparatus of

employees and HR activities. The last one has an

important role to influence employees in what to

believe, what opinion to have, with that it develops

the culture of the company Trompenaars (1993).

Regarding to the subject, I consider it important to

mention among the motivation theories the twofactor

theory of Herzberg (motivators and sanitary

factors), Maslow’s pyramid of needs founded on

each other (1943), Hunt’s six-dimensional model

(1988), Alderfer’s ERG 1 theory (1969) which means

that the needs can succeed simultaneously and

reduced the 5 levels of Maslow to 3 (existence,

relatedness and growth). According to McClelland

(1965) the learnt needs can be developed by

education, the strength of the single needs can be

influenced and increased with trainings.

According to the literature the motivation process

has to be examined on the basis of two conditions.

One is the performance-result, in this case the

employees forward the organization to its aims with

their behaviour, the employers can modify the

whole working process by measuring, assessing and

feeding back the performance resulting from the

behaviour so that it is repeatable and the

performance of the employees can increase. The

other relation is the behaviour-result for which the

employee gets to the result through the product

repetition of a concrete behaviour. In this case the

leaders adjust the behaviour of the employees

examining if they follow the desired behaviour and

they want to reach it by changing the consequences.

In the opinion of Kópházi (2007) the employers can

reach the employees’ loyalty as a multi-factor

function of the motivation, each employee has their

own priorities during working which personally

motivate them and determine the efforts taken by

the employees.

The five-dimension results of satisfaction, the

factors mostly determining the satisfaction of the

employees are the following concepts which

characterize the Emotional Quotient-level

(hereinafter EQ) as well: self-knowledge, self-

1 E = Existence, R = Relatedness, G = Growth

43


control, motivation, empathy and social value.

Bencsik (2009) flashes a light on that the individual

harmonize the aims of the organization in order to

implement the own aims, hereby producing a higher

quality work increasing the own satisfaction at

workplace. So the quality work is the condition of

not tactical but strategic competitiveness during

which the five dimensions of the emotional

intelligence defines the norms of the group and so

of the individual as well. The following Table 1

examines the satisfaction of employees in the lights

of the EQ. The leadership’s styles have an important

part in maintaining or creating the competitiveness

of the organization.

Table 1- Examination of satisfaction

Features of Characteristics of satisfaction

satisfaction

trust

faithful, open, secure atmosphere,

natural

communication,

unobscured information flow

taking

independent decision and being

responsibility provided by the management

realization of the work

evaluation of the results of

working

conditions

acceptance

performance

evaluation

decisions

physical conditions (material

conditions)

state of technical development

state of supply with means

ideas

creativity

employees’ motions

expectation – possibility

harmony of conditions

organization of work and

processes

3.0 Research methodology

Features

of EQ

communic

ation

conscientio

usness

optimism

reliability

innovation

leading

accurate

selfassessment

Following the secondary research, I applied primary

research methods in order to collect the missing

pieces of information and data. My primary

research consisted of quantitative methods

(questionnaires) asking employees about their jobs

attitudes. The most important questions were

whether the employees were satisfied with their

salaries, working hours, the atmosphere at the

workplace, if they had possibilities for professional

development.

I try to support or reject my hypotheses with these

results. The data was collected between 1 April

2017 and 30 September 2017. The sample is not

representative; the respondents were selected with

snowball method from the West-Hungarian region.

Before composing the questionnaire, I made the

following assumptions:

• Is there a significant difference in the

motivating means of the generations?

• Do the employees have the competences

needed for working?

3.1 Phrasing the hypotheses

H1: Direct and indirect (immediate, short, or

long term) components of employee satisfaction can

be distinguished.

H2: Respondents can be severely separated

according to the main components of the

satisfaction, and can be classified into clusters.

H3: The time spent at the workplace is longer

for those workers who are determined by the

short-term impulses in the satisfaction dimension.

3.2 The methodology of the research

Following the secondary research, I applied primary

research methods in order to collect the missing

pieces of information and data. My primary

research involved quantitative methods

(questionnaires), and I chose restaurants in

Western- Hungarian regions. For measuring the

satisfaction and motivation at workplace I used a

questionnaire in which the responders answered in

a 5-grade Likert-scale (1 not at all, 5 totally agree).

The questionnaire was built on 4 question groups

regarding to the conditions and the motivations, the

organizational culture, the commitment and the

possibilities of professional development. The

questionnaire contained 5 open questions, 5 scales

and 20 nominal questions. For example, the

Cronbach alpha 2 values according to the above list

are as follows: for the satisfaction with the salary:

0.836, for the importance of the leader’s style 0.829,

the importance of the loyalty to the company: 0.828

and for the possibilities of professional

development 0.782. With this value, the overall

consistency of the dependent variables will be

acceptable. The coefficient usually varies between 0

and 1, although it can take negative values when

there are items that are negatively correlated. A

coefficient value between 0.8-0.7 usually indicates a

questionable internal consistency. The Pearson’s

correlation examination shows a positive

interaction for all dependant variables, for example

satisfaction with the salary (r(497)=0.380,

p<0.001). Each employee at each location was given

a questionnaire; samples were taken from 497

persons, 181 women (36,4%) and 316 men

(63,6%). The scopes of activity were the following:

66 persons were middle managers (34 F&B

managers, 14 assistant restaurant managers, 11

persons were chefs and 7 assistant chefs), 417

employees (312 waiters and 105 cooks). 4.4% of

them worked for five-star, 26.2% of them worked

for four-star hotels, 19.5% of them were employed

in three-star hotels. 6.8% of them worked in

pensions, 38.6% worked in restaurants but not in

2 The Cronbach’s Alpha (α) estimates the internal consistency

of a mesaurement scale.

44


hotels. The questionnaire included four groups of

questions as well as demographic data (sex, age,

qualification). In the first group of questions I asked

the people about working conditions and

motivation: are they appreciated and stimulated to

make the restaurant work more effectively, are they

satisfied with the remuneration and the working

order? In the second, they were asked about

commitment and willingness to cooperate: how

long they have been working in the restaurant,

whether their goals are in accordance with the goals

of the organisation. In the third group of questions I

examined the chances of personal and professional

progress: whether they consider it realistic to make

professional progress. In the fourth, I asked

questions about the organisational culture, the flow

of information and the relationship between the HR

and the employees: do they consider the

atmosphere at the workplace people-centred;

furthermore, can they turn to their HR colleague

with their questions? 20 scales, three nominal

questions and an open question appear in the

questionnaire. (Figure 1.)

dimensions. A K-centred cluster analysis was chosen

as a result of which 3 clusters were outlined. The first

and second factors got into the first cluster, the third

one went into the second cluster and the third one

included the forth factor. It is shown in the following

table.

Table 2 – Examination of rotated factors with the

statistic software package SPSS 23

with

external

control

Depended variables

Importance

accurate

of

information for do

the job

Satisfaction

working hours

Satisfaction

salary

with

with

Component

1 2 3 4

0.766 0.079 0.051 0.106

0.678 0.109 0.229 -0.046

0.669 0.022 0.280 0.018

Importance

appreciation

Importance

explicit tasks

of

of

0.656 0.190 0.320 -0.092

0.651 -0.086 0.022 0.430

Sense of own

0.526 0.160 0.375 -0.079

importance

Sense of secure

0.521 0.072 0.389 0.091

workplace

Importance

of

0.075 0.782 0.012 -0.027

Figure 1-The model of the research

4.0 The results of the research

After inputting the data, they were processed with the

help of the program SPSS 23, and I applied descriptive

statistical, frequency and cross-chart analysis, as well

as cluster analysis. As for the proportion of the sexes,

the hospitality industry is still masculine; however,

during the first decades of the 21 st century, women will

have the advantage. As far as age is concerned, 14,3%

is Baby-boomer, 21,5% X generation (39-53 years

old), 48,3% Y (39-53 years old), and 15,9% Z (19-22

years old).

I reduced the original 20 dependent variables with

primary component analysis by means of factor

analysis. As a result, I obtained 4 new variables

explaining the 56% part of the original set of variables.

My first hypothesis is accepted.

The factors were renamed then I wondered if it is

possible to form homogenous groups among the

employees, along these primary component

information flow

Importance of the

organization of

work processes

short term Importance of

attachment

Importance of

helping the new

workmates

Importance of

leadership’s styles

Importance of

diversified work

Real opportunity to

advance

Importance of

feedback

0.128 0.772 -0.111 0.134

0.166 0.700 0.211 -0.176

0.119 0.643 0.245 -0.016

0.036 0.639 -0.031 0.384

-0.095 0.512 0.234 0.374

0.158 -0.033 0.750 0.294

0.239 0.117 0.736 -0.034

45


long term Importance of

with internal

control

advancement

Importance of the

atmosphere

workplace

Importance

similarity

objectives

Importance

career

Appreciation

individual

development

at

of

of

of

of

0.215 0.006 0.730 0.249

0.343 0.142 0.604 -0.041

0.402 0.232 0.513 -0.020

-0.036 0.346 0.011 0.700

0.174 -0.139 0.365 0.612

Table 3- Examination of clusters

Clusters

1 2 3

REGR factor score 1 for analysis 21 2.34817 -1.53702 -.88618

REGR factor score 2 for analysis 21 1.01734 -.48960 -.63839

REGR factor score 3 for analysis 21 -1.31319 2.99138 -.82608

REGR factor score 4 for analysis 21 -1.73497 -.95379 2.67529

So it can be stated that the responders can be well

divided into homogenous groups considering the

workplace satisfaction primary components. There are

some employees who are determined by the external,

short term effects (naturally these can be both direct

and indirect ones) such as verbal or written praise of

the leader, explicit assigning of the tasks by the leader.

There are employees for whom an external, long term

effect is influenced by the working circumstances.

Among others such circumstances are the possibility to

walk through the career paths, real opportunity to

advance, relative match between the individual and

organizational goals. There are employees for whom

the personal future images constitute priority.

For analysing the fields of work I have found out the

following. In all tree clusters the presence of waiters is

dominant, in approximately same distribution, 62.0%

and 64.4%. Most of the cooks are in the second cluster,

the most leaders are in the first one. The distribution of

it is 16.8%.

For analysing the school qualification of the

employees I have established that the most employees

in the first and third clusters have professional school

qualifications, most of the employees in the second

class studied in technical schools for catering. Those

being in the second cluster have the highest level of

education (university 2.6% and collage for

catering13.5%). The employees who took their school

leaving exam not in a technical school catering are in

the same cluster.

Among the subordinates the foreign language

knowledge of waiters was analysed about one, two

and three languages. For knowing one foreign

language the dominant role of German language can

be demonstrated for all three clusters and English is

the second most frequently spoken language. In

case of knowing two foreign languages the

combination of the mentioned two is dominant, in

the first cluster 5,2% is German-French

combination, in the second cluster 0.9% of the

respondents speaks German-French, Russian-Italian

and German-Spanish languages, in the third cluster

2.2% of them speaks German-Russian and 1.1%

German-French languages. In case of three

languages in the first cluster the share of English-

German-Italian and English-German-French is 1.5%

each, in the second cluster the distribution of

languages is similar (their ratio is higher than that

of in the first cluster) and there is an additional

Slavonic language: Ukrainian. The third cluster

shows many similarities with the second one, in this

group there are 4 languages, in addition to German,

English, French, Italian and Ukrainian, Russian

language is spoken as well.

For examining the leader-subordinate relation

most of those being in the first cluster are on good

terms with their boss, those in the other ones

tolerate them. In all three cluster the smallest share

is the friendship between the leaders and

subordinates. The recognition of the leader's

professional knowledge is at the 2nd place for all

three clusters. The not good relation with the

leaders, looking for compromise have the same

importance in the opinion of the responders in all

three clusters.

The relation of the workmates with each other is

characterized by the followings: In all three clusters

the lateral relations are considered good, its share is

the larger in the second cluster. In each cluster the

responders ranked the relation limited to the

completion of work in the same way. The shares of

the bad relation between a negative mentor and the

mentored, of the professional jealousy and of bad

working relations are low.

Among the motivation elements verbal praise if the

mostly preferred mean in each cluster. Disciplining

and punishment is rather characteristic for the

members of the second and third clusters, especially

for the members of the Y generation. Written praise

is most frequently applied for the employees on the

third cluster, this share is 6.9%. The reorganization

of manpower is the most characteristic also in the

third cluster, 5.6%, it is 3.4% in the second one and

46


it is used by the leaders the less in the first cluster:

2.2%. Changing of work site is applied only few

times, its share is 3.5% in the third cluster, 3.4% in

the second one and 0.5% in the first one. Regarding

the importance of incentives given in money, it is

considered important by the employees in the first

and third clusters, it is considered less important in

the second cluster. Regarding their salary and the

sectorial average each cluster thinks that their

salary is equivalent to that of the sector, the

employees of the second cluster think the best that

they salary is below the sectorial average, the

employees in the third cluster consider their salary

higher than the sectorial one.

My second hypothesis is accepted.

I was spurred by curiosity so I started to think

about what influenced the cluster membership of

the responders. Is it experience abroad, or the time

spent at a given workplace, or the age, educational

level, or the assignment, the gender? The result of

the Levene test is not significant (see Table 4), that

is the deviations are not equivalent so I could

perform the one-dimensional analysis of variance. It

can be well seen from the data of the following table

that the average time spent at the same workplace

is 10.86 years in the first cluster, 4.17 years in the

second one and 5.32 years for the employees in the

third cluster. Since in the first cluster the

employment (spent) time of the employees at a

given workplace is almost 11 years (see Table 5),

this fact supports my supposition that the

employees for whom the workplace satisfaction is

determined mainly by the short term factors are

really those ones who form the first cluster. The

Table 6. demonstrates the significance level of the

clusters, it can be well from the data that the

significance level of all three clusters is 0.

Table 4- Examination of the equivalence of

deviations

Levene

Statistics df1 df2 Sig.

106.148 2 434 0.000

Table 5- Examination of one-dimensional analysis of

variance

95%

Confidence

Interval

for Mean

Std. Lowe Uppe

Deviati Std. r r Minim Maximu

N Mean on Error limit limit um m

1 168 10.8 11.818 0.912 9.06 12.66 1 40

6

2 144 4.17 4.027 0.336 3.51 4.84 1 26

3 125 5.32 5.713 0.511 4.31 6.34 1 36

Totally 437 7.07 8.790 0.420 6.25 7.90 1 40

Table 6 - ANOVA – Examination of the significance

level of each factor-score

REGR factor score

1 for analysis 21

REGR factor score

2 for analysis 21

REGR factor score

3 for analysis 21

REGR factor score

4 for analysis 21

Cluster

Std.

Deviation

df

Std.

Error

Deviation

df

F

Sig.

100.780 2 0.589 486 170.993 0.000

126.751 2 0.483 486 262.692 0.000

53.658 2 0.783 486 68.503 0.000

35.070 2 0.860 486 40.788 0.000

As far as my third hypothesis is concerned, is it

accepted.

In the following answers are given to the research

questions. Regarding the first question (motivating

means of generations) I can state that a significant

difference can be observed which is shown in the

Table, the value of the Pearson Chi-Square test is

more than 0.005 (0.013) so there is a significant

difference in the motivating means of the various

generations. Consequently, my first resource

question is rejected.

Table 7 - Chi-Square Tests

Value df

Asymp. Sig.

(2-sided)

Pearson Chi-Square 29.616 a 15 0,013

Likelihood Ratio 30.914 15 0,009

Linear-by-Linear

Association

N of Valid Cases 484

2.451 1 0,117

The language knowledge of cooks wasn’t examined

because their knowledge is not relevant from their

working aspect (only in case if they work abroad), it

is not a practice in Hungary yet that the chefs go out

to the guests as in Germany or Austria. I got the

following conclusion: all the employees have the

professional qualification necessary for doing the

job; 11% of them have university, 31% have

technical school, 37% have vocational school

qualification. The most widely spoken foreign

language is German because of the vicinity of the

Austrian border: nine people with university, sixtysix

people with technical school, seventy with

vocational school qualification speak this language.

47


Regarding English, the numbers are far lower: three

persons with university, thirty-three persons with

secondary and nine with vocational technical

qualification speak English. Most of those speaking

two foreign languages (German and English) are

waiters. Consequently, my second resource

question proved true.

0,64 0 0,64 0

39,1

25

3,52

0 0,64 2,08 0,28 0 1,15 0 0,32 0 2,58 0 1,43 0

Figure 2-Examination of the foreign

language knowledge of waiters

Summary

39,58

26,92

11,85

4,17 Waiter

Head

waiter

With my publication I achieved the goals I set,

answered my research questions and hypotheses,

which all have been accepted. The range of the

research covers the region, Budapest and the

county towns of the southern and eastern

Hungarian counties. Later the primary research will

be completed with structured interviews which will

be made with the leaders of catering establishments

and they will be compared with the answers given

to the questionnaires. The task of Human Resource

management is motivation which, being at the

beginning of our century, has to be solved flexibly

by approaching the interests of the two sides. In

order to achieve this, we must find the balance

which ensures it for them. In my opinion the raison

d’ѐtre of the HR is beyond question at the beginning

of the 21 st century. It would be promising if

employers recognised the fact that the HR and SHR

were necessary for enhancing the successfulness of

the businesses by retaining the key persons and

improving their employees’ professional

competence in order that the knowledge

accumulated by the organisation and the

Intellectual Capital of the employees continued to

strengthen the given organisation. The catering

managers have to recognize that their most

important treasure are their employees and they

have to develop the optimal incentive scheme with

which they can keep them. Focusing on the causes

because of which the employees leave the

organization and properly understanding the

reasons of losing them, the managers can reduce the

number of the employees leaving their

organizations.

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Internationalization, initiatives to establish a new

source of researchers and graduates, and

development of knowledge and technological

transfer as instruments of intelligent specializations

at Szechenyi University.

49


Airline Service Recovery Policies for Voluntary Denied Boarding Due to

Overbooking

Tsung-Hsien Tsai a , Chien-Tz Chiu

a Department of Tourism Management, National Quemoy University

1 University Rd., Jinning Township, Kinmen 892, Taiwan

thtsai@nqu.edu.tw

Abstract

Tourism is considered a lever to develop economics

and smooth transition between destinations via

airlines is a vital factor for success. As overbooking of

capacity is a must-do in airline operation to mitigate

the impact of cancellations and no-shows, it is

unavoidable to have guests who have to be denied

boarding (DB). Since it is not uncommon to see DB

situations in real, it is critical to implement service

recovery policies to sooth guests. In this study, we will

address the issue of service compensation from

tourists’ perspectives once DB occurs. A stated

preference experiment is conducted and twelve

attributes are considered to propose a theoretic

framework. Given a situation to be denied boarding

from Taipei to Tokyo, the effects of offset via meal,

airport lounge, duty-free discount, accommodation,

alternative flight, cabin upgrade, seat choice, free

egress transportation service, tourism bus, and

compensation voucher are explored. We collect 420

questionnaires and apply logit-based choice models

to test consumers’ preferences. The empirical results

show that most of the applied attributes are

statistically significant. Airline consumers prefer to

have meal voucher, use airport lounge, stay at a hotel

if needed, switch to flights of other airlines, definitely

want upgrade, choose first-row seat, expect free

egress service, and also obtain monetary

compensations. In addition, consumers do not prefer

to wait at the origin airport for too long. The issue of

DB compensation is explored to investigate

consumers’ expectations once such service failure

happens. The results can be of help for airlines to

understand tourists’ preferences and conduct

appropriate service recovery policies to maintain

satisfaction and loyalty.

Keywords:

Overbooking, Denied Boarding, Compensation

Policy, Service Recovery, Revenue Management

Introduction

As transportation is usually essential for realizing

tourism purposes, effectively utilizing perishable

seat resources has become a critical issue for

transportation companies. Furthermore, air

transportation is of major modes for many

countries or destinations to develop and promote

tourism. For airline operators, it is vital to figure out

different strategies to balance passengers’ demand

and supply so that perishable seat resources can be

effectively utilized and routes can be sustainably

operated. In this regard, revenue management

(RM), as shown to be a successful practice [1][2][3],

is commonly adopted by airline operators to take

advantages of market segmentation and create seatbased

differential services to attract tourists from

different segments. In reality, Smith et al. indicated

that American Airlines has gained significant

increase of 1.4 billion US dollars after the

implementation of RM [4]. Rannou and Melli also

observed 3% ~ 7% increase of revenue after the

adoption of RM in the airline market [5]. In the

hotel, rental car, and airline industries, Kimes

pointed out that 3% ~ 5% extra revenue can be

secured if RM practices are applied [3]. In fact, the

use of RM has attracted significant intentions from

various business areas such as parking, casino hotel,

golf court, and amusement park [1][6][7][8][9].

RM constitutes of four vital pillars and they are

forecasting, pricing, overbooking, and seat

allocation. Normally, pricing, as one of important

marketing components, is considered as an effective

tool to increase tourists’ purchase intention. The

role of pricing in RM provides essential fare

information to form booking classes and avoid the

commoditization of service in order to optimize the

use of perishable seat resources [10][11]. With the

structure of booking classes, the tasks of

forecasting, overbooking, and seat allocation can

then be implemented consequently in the quantitybased

RM system [12]. In the literature, some

discussions focused on the decision of allotment

based on the structure of fare classes

50


[13][14][15][16] and others addressed how to set

up fare menus [17][18] or constructed forecasting

models [19][20][21].

On the issue of overbooking, which airline operators

sell more seats than the capacity of a flight, the topic

is potential to mitigate the influence of cancellations

and no-shows. In the literature, some researchers

integrated the issue while solving optimal seat

allocation problems given multiple fare classes.

Nevertheless, discussions in a relation to the

consequence of airline overbooking were seldom

addressed. The practice of overbooking which aims

to offset the volume of cancellations, duplicated

bookings, and no-shows before departure and avoid

vacant seats is almost adopted and executed by

every airline companies. More specifically, airlines

would sell more seats than the capacity so that the

influence of unexpected no-shows and last-minute

cancellations can be mitigated. Garrow pointed out

that overbooking is an indispensable tool for

airlines to maintain operating performance and

reasonable fares [22]. On the other side of the coin,

it is also important to concern whether consumers’

rights and benefits are secured in the situation of

voluntary or involuntary denied boarding (DB) due

to the implementation of overbooking. A vivid and

dramatic event of dragging passengers from the

flight operated by United Airline is still

uncomfortably recalled.

Normally, service recovery practices are conducted

by airlines in the check-in counters once airline

receptionists notify the situation that the number of

check-in passengers is going to exceed the capacity

of a particular flight. Decent compensation of food

and beverage or even complimentary flight

vouchers are rendered in overbooked flights by

major branded airlines to mitigate consumer

dissatisfaction so that the counter effect of

overbooking can be controlled. However, some

airlines may only provide trivial compensation to

passengers whose rights and benefits are genuinely

overlooked when DB occurs. Although this topic is

practical and vital, empirical studies in the

literature are rare. In order to comprehensively

understand passengers’ preferences toward service

recovery practices when DB occurs, this study

attempts to address the issue and explore useful

and preferred service recovery practices from

passengers’ perspectives. With findings obtained in

this study, airline operators and managers can

realize passengers’ preferences and use these

potential attributes to design their service recovery

policies. More importantly, airline receptionists can

have clues to negotiate with passengers so that they

will be prone to accept voluntary DB and reduce the

counter effect of overbooking [23].

In the next section, we review related studies to

further justify the necessity of this study and

indicate the research gap. In the third section, we

brief the conceptual framework and also the

structure of the preference experiment. Empirical

data and analyses are introduced in the fourth

section to discover attributes influencing

passengers’ choices of DB. Conclusions and

implications are rendered in the last section.

Literature review

Overbooking and denied boarding

Overbooking is a legitimate and prevention

mechanism adopted by international airlines to

reduce the effect of cancellations and unexpected

no-shows. As Smith indicated in their study [4],

airlines would have 15% of the capacity to be

vacant as a result of cancellations and no-shows if

overbooking is not utilized in the operation. Curry

also pointed out that overbooking strategies can

yield 3% to 10% extra revenues for airlines [24]. On

the other hand, Suzuki argued that overbooking

would bring negative impacts to the airlines in the

long run and harm customer satisfaction and loyalty

[25]. Garrow regarded overbooking to be two folds

[21]. On one hand, overbooking can benefit airlines

with a high loading factor. In addition, overbooking

can also lead to more alternatives for passengers to

choose, and ultimately decrease airline fares. On the

other hand, DB caused by overbooking brings

passengers’ inconvenience and also companies’

monetary loss. In 2016, the airline with the largest

number of DB was Delta Airlines, followed by

Southwest Airlines, United Airlines, and American

Airlines [26].

The event of UN3411 flight happened Apr 9, 2017

has greatly attracted public attention. Unite Airlines

has suffered greatly from blame and accusation

from the public. Generally speaking, plausible

compensation is offered by airlines when the

situation of DB occurs. Pizam claimed that DB

customers would not show their strong against once

they obtained reasonable treatment [22]. In fact, the

US government, although, gave airlines rights to

oversell their seats, the Civil Aviation Bureau (CAB)

has also suggested compensation alternatives for

passengers to claim their rights in the situation of

DB [27]. Table 1 compares the rules applied in the

USA and EU when DB occurs. For EC No. 261/2004

in the EU, basically rearrangement of flight, food,

lodging, transportation, and communication are all

included to offset passengers’ inconvenience.

Moreover, monetary compensation is also provided

in terms of the flight distance. Similarly, the United

States also has Part 250 to regulate airlines and

protect passengers’ rights once DB occurs. As

shown in Table 1, the regulation in the US addresses

51


more on the monetary offset depending on the

domestic/international flights as well as the length

of delay. After the event of UN3411, the United

Airlines has even raised the compensation to

$10,000 US dollars in order to save its reputation

and consumers’ confidence [28][29]. In fact, it is

important for airlines to thoroughly investigate

compensation activities, especially those which are

preferred by passengers and execution costs are

low. In order to find out more potential possibilities

when DB occurs, more related discussions are

needed.

Table 1 - Rules of EC 261/2004 (EU) and Part 250

(USA)

European Union EC 261/2004

Monetary

<=1500 km 250 Euros

compensation

1500~3500 400Euros

km

>3500 km 600Euros

Rearrangement/Refu Included

nd

Food

Included

Lodging

Included

Transportation Included

United States Part 250

Monetary

compensatio

1.<1 hour delay: No compensation

2.1~2 hours delay: 2 times of one-way

n (Domestic ticket fare, max is $675 US dollars

flights) 3.>2hours delay: 4 times of one-way

ticket fare, max is $1,350 US dollars

Monetary

compensatio

n

(Internationa

l flights)

1.<1 hour delay: No compensation

2.1~4 hours delay: 2 times of one-way

ticket fare, max is $675 US dollars

3.>4 hours delay: 4 times of one-way

ticket fare, max is $1,350 US dollars

Service recovery of denied boarding

Regarding the consequence of DB, the impact is

expected to be negative. As Lindenmeier and

Tscheulin has shown in their empirical study [30],

DB causes negative effects on satisfaction. In

addition, they also found that passengers from the

business cabin have much more dissatisfaction than

those seating in the economic cabin if DB occurs.

Wangenheim and Bayo ̀n explored the influences of

downgrade, upgrade, and DB in a compensation

study. Their results showed that if passengers were

treated negatively such as downgrade and DB by an

airline, they will significantly reduce their intention

and frequencies of using its service in the future

[31]. Nevertheless, positive treatment such as

upgrade is only effective for passengers in the lowvalue

segment. As a result, Wangenheim and Bayo ̀n

argued that airline operators should be more

concern about passengers’ reactions while

manipulating RM practices [31].

In the literature, some researchers studied the

impact of service recovery which organizations

provide immediate compensations to mitigate

dissatisfaction and deal with complaints due to

service failures [32]. By doing so, companies hoped

to avoid switch intention to other alternative

service as Clark et al. have also shown that 52% of

customers would switch to other companies once

they received inferior service and no further

responses were rendered after complaints were

made [33]. Furthermore, Andreassen [34] and Tax

and Brown [35] both argued that service recovery is

one of key factors to maintain customer loyalty. In

fact, conducting effective service compensation

strategies has become one of key activities in

customer retention programs [36]. In another

study, Grewal et al. showed that recovery is useful

only when companies should be responsible for the

service failure [37]. Otherwise, service recovery did

not make any sense for customers. Wirtz and

Mattila further revealed that customer satisfaction

related to service recovery played a complete

mediating role to future intention [38]. More

specifically, companies should be aware of their

mistakes in the service process in order to satisfy

customers’ needs via service recovery practices. In a

recent study, events, reasons, and outcomes were

all shown to affect customers’ feelings toward the

company [39]. As a result, airlines should grasp the

opportunity to make passengers feel happy or at

least reduce the level dissatisfaction. In this regard,

Migacz et al. pointed out that the most effective

airline service recovery strategy is to provide

compensation which is over his or her expectation

[40].

Regarding the content of service recovery practices,

different offsets can be adopted. Normally,

apologies, explanations, compensations (either

monetary or non-monetary) are major responses to

service failures. Moreover, Schweikhart et al.

pointed out that there are three key time points to

implement compensation plans and they are before,

on-the-spot, and after service failures [41]. In

addition, the longer negative feelings occupy, the

lower customer satisfaction and loyalty presents.

Ideally, compensation practices should be

implemented immediately right after service

failures so that the duration of negative feelings can

be minimized.

Non-homogeneous consumer behaviors

Passengers, in fact, have non-homogeneous

behaviors towards flight service [42][43][44].

Tourists, as a special kind of customers, also behave

differently and possess heterogeneous perceptions

and behaviors toward service and products

[45][46]. Even for the same service or product,

individuals who share very similar socio-economic

52


status may make different decisions due to multiple

reasons such as knowledge, taste, consumption

frequency, experiences, and involvement [47].

Regarding the source of heterogeneity, socioeconomic

characteristics such as gender, income,

and age were commonly applied to segment the

mass market [44][48]. Different generations also

possess different attitudes as Yang et al. confirmed

that different generations possess different

attitudes toward the loyalty in the hotel industry

[49]. Instead of using socio-economic, experiences,

generations as segmented variables to distinguish

differences among groups, some other works utilize

the technique of cluster analysis to divide the whole

market into several segments and tackle the issue of

heterogeneity [16][50]. In addition, personalities

are recently regarded as effective variables to

segment the market. For instance, Ekinci and

Hosany initiated the idea from brand personality

and extended it to a destination choice domain [51].

They utilized three dimensions namely sincerity,

excitement, and conviviality to measure

personalities. Papadimitriou et al. further explored

and confirmed the causal relationship between

destination personality and visit intention [52].

Since tourists have shown choice heterogeneity on

many aspects in the tourism sector, it is also highly

possible for them to possess behavioral differences

on the content of service compensations.

Conceptual framework and methodology

When DB situations happen, airlines need to select

candidates from the passenger list and convince

them to voluntarily give up their seats. In this case,

airlines usually provide either non-monetary or

monetary compensations in order to encourage

passengers to give up seats. In addition, the best

time point for DB is at the check-in counter rather

than on the flight so that non-DB passengers do not

need to see the process of negotiation. On the other

side of the coin, airlines also desire to spend cost as

low as possible on the compensations and avoid

diluting revenues. In short, understanding

passengers’ preferences on the expectation of

compensation when they intend to make voluntary

DB decisions is critical.

Conceptual framework

In order to empirically explore possible attributes

for implementing service recovery, this study

carried out a stated-preference experiment and

collected responses from the targeted population.

Based on the argument made by Schweikhart et al.

[53], three key time points for offsetting service

failures are before, on-the-spot, and right after the

inferior events. Regarding the stage before take-off,

passengers need to adjust their schedule if they

accept DB. Normally, passengers need to stay at the

departure airport for at least a couple of hours as a

result of taking a later flight. In most cases,

passengers who make voluntary DB decisions

choose to wait at the airport so that they will not

miss the rearranged flight. While waiting at the

airport, it is considerate to support passengers’

basic needs such as food, lodge, and shopping. As

such, these activities can be regarded as potential

attributes for compensations. In short, four

attributes were considered at the stage before takeoff

and they are food vouchers, lodge vouchers,

duty-free-shop vouchers, and privilege to use the

airport lounge.

At the stage of on-the-spot, passengers are actually

taking the rearranged flight. Regarding the flight

itself, there are also some possibilities for

compensation purposes. First of all, the original seat

choice of economy cabin can be upgraded to

premium economy cabin or even to business cabin.

Since the fare of the upgraded cabin is higher than

the original one, it is in fact a very potential

incentive to attract passengers’ attention. Secondly,

the location of seat on the plane can be another

attraction. Usually, the seat on the first row or next

to the exit has wider leg room space than seats of

other rows. Most passengers prefer to have seats in

these two areas when they have chances, especially

for long-haul trips. As a result, the location of seat

on the plane was regarded as another incentive in

the compensation plan. Thirdly, airlines can

rearrange alternative flights for passengers from

the same brand or transferring them to other

airlines. However, the time flexibility for the DB

passengers and also the cost for the airlines are very

different when making this decision call. More

specifically, rearranging seats from other airlines

can possibly reduce passengers’ waiting time and

impatience but the cost is relatively high in

comparison with the decision of taking the flight

from the same brand.

When passengers arrive at the destination terminal,

they can have other compensations. For instance,

flight vouchers can be further provided for

attracting passengers’ future uses. In addition, as

terminal is normally not the final destination for

passengers, egress transportation arrangement can

be another incentive of compensation in addition to

monetary compensation. In most countries, MRT or

railway systems connect airport terminals and city

centers. Airlines can also provide MRT passes for

passengers to conveniently arrive at their final

destinations. In addition, passengers turn into

tourists after they arrive at the destination city. The

further provision of city tourism bus can be another

possibility to offset tourists.

53


Last but not least, passengers naturally expect

ample compensations from airlines for their loss

due to DB. Nevertheless, airlines should only

provide decent compensations based on the delay

caused by the DB situation. In other words, the

length of waiting at the departure terminal should

be a good lever for passengers to make their

decisions related to the content of compensations.

Normally, if passengers can wait for a relatively long

period of time at the departure terminal, airlines

can have enough time and flexibility to rearrange

the schedule regarding the execution costs. Figure 1

conceptually summarizes the structure of service

compensation due to DB. In the figure, we aimed to

investigate the effectiveness of the introduced

attributes with different levels of service on the

selection of compensation alternatives.

Food vouchers

Lodge vouchers

Shopping

vouchers

Airport lounge

Cabin upgrade

Before take-off

On the plane

First-row seats

Compensation

Flight brand

Arrive

destination

Cost for

passengers

Length of

waiting

Transportation

offset

Travel offset

Monetary offset

Figure 1- Conceptual framework of the service

recovery compensation

Alternatives, attributes, and levels of service

In the experiment, three hypothetical alternatives

describing by attributes and different levels of

service were rendered. In other words, the applied

alternatives were differentiated by the levels of

compensation content and also the length of

waiting. In order to provide realistic situations for

passengers to imagine their decisions in the

experiment, we adopted a short-haul and popular

itinerary as the research target. The flight time of

the studied route is about 2.5 hours in the East Asia.

As a result, the fundamental, intermediate, and

advanced alternatives with the consideration of

different levels of delay are applied. Given the three

alternatives, four dimensions containing eleven

attributes were investigated to check their

influences on the selection of alternatives.

In the first dimension, four attributes at the stage of

before take-off were considered. The attribute of

food compensation contained three levels of service

in local currency including No compensation/$250

Voucher/$500 Voucher. In the attribute of lodge

voucher, we considered the provision of No

compensation/One complimentary night. Regarding

the shopping vouchers, three levels of service were

adopted and they are No compensation/ 5%

off/10% off. In addition, we also tested the incentive

of airport lounge with the levels of No

compensation/50% off/ one complimentary use.

Secondly, three compensation attributes regarding

the taking of the flight were considered. For the

attribute of flight brand, it is possible to rearrange

seats of the same airlines or transferring passengers

to other cooperated airlines. In addition to the

choice of flight brand, cabin of seats was thought to

be another useful attribute. We compared the

influence of Original economy cabin/Premium

economy cabin. Regarding the seat location, we

addressed the impact of Non first-row seat/Firstrow

seat to observe the influence of seat location. In

the third dimension, another three attributes

regarding the arrival of destination were

investigated. On the arrangement of egress

transportation, we explored the usefulness of the

MRT complementary daily pass comparing with no

such offset to the selection of compensation

alternatives. Free tourism bus was also integrated

into the alternative to observe its potential on the

compensation effect. Monetary offset such as No

compensation/ 50% purchased fare/ 100%

purchased fare/ 150% purchased fare was provided

and tested in the applied alternatives. Last but not

least, passengers need to sacrifice their time and

wait in the departure terminal in order to have

offsets with corresponding levels of service. In this

study, we considered three situations which are

waiting at the departure terminal for about the

flight time, double the flight time, and triple the

flight time. Table 2 shows a hypothetical scenario

for respondents to choose.

Regarding the tested cases in the experiment, if a

full factorial experiment was conducted, there was a

huge number of experiments. As a result, we

conducted a fractional factorial experiment using

the orthogonal table to reduce the number of test

cases to thirty two. These scenarios were then

randomly assigned to form four subsets, each of

which consists of eight scenarios. As such, each

respondent needed to evaluate only one randomly

assigned subset. Respondents were expected to

choose one alternative from the choice set after

considering the content of levels of service. The

population focused in this study was domestic

tourists who are between 18 to 65 years old and

they also have intention to accept the situation of

DB. A pretest of the questionnaire only suggested

minor changes on wordings. Face-to-face interviews

were then conducted with tourists at the terminal

from April to May in 2018. Trained interviewers

explained what attributes and levels of service are

before respondents officially answered the

questionnaires. The surveying process was carried

out on both weekend and weekday, from 9 am to 6

pm. The principle of systematic sampling with the

interval of five was adopted and three hundred and

54


fifteen valid samples were collected for the

following empirical analysis.

rm

te

re

a

rtu

e

p

D

Food voucher

Lodge

voucher

t Shopping

h

voucher

flig

e Airport

th

lounge

n

O

a

l Flight brand

in

rm Cabin

upgrade

a

l

te

First-row

riv

seat

A

Table 2 - A hypothetical scenario of the experiment

st

o

C

Transport

offset

Travel offset

Monetary

offset

Length of

waiting

Basic

No

compensation

No

compensation

No

compensation

No

compensation

Same airlines

Original

economy seat

First row seat

No

compensation

Daily tourism

bus

No

compensation

3 to 4 hrs

Intermediate

No compensation

Daily tourism bus

50% of the

purchased fare

4 to 5 hrs

Advanced

$500NTD voucher $500NTD voucher

One complimentary

50% off

use

No compensation 5% off voucher

One complimentary One complimentary

night

night

Same airlines Same airlines

Upgraded premium Upgraded premium

economy seat economy seat

First row seat No compensation

Empirical study

Demographic profile of respondents

No compensation

No compensation

150% of the

purchased fare

6 to 7 hrs

As revealed in Table 3, the collected samples

consisted of 53% male passengers and 51% of them

are married. For the age, the 18~30 year-old group

composed 32% of the samples and followed by

31~40 year-old (25%) and 41~50 year-old (23%).

For the feature of occupation, the table shows that

respondents were from various career categories

where service, and business sector are the first two

groups. Among all samples, 80% of them possess

college degree and above. Regarding the monthly

income, the result showed that most respondents

earned between 20k and 40k dollars (local

currency). In summary, the result of Table 3 shows

no obvious bias toward any specific group of

samples in terms of the characteristics of the

population and can be used to project behaviors of

the targeted population.

Table 3 - Profiles of respondents

Characterist

ic

Percenta

ge

Characterist

ic

Percenta

ge

Gender

Education

Male 53% Middle high 3%

Female 47% Senior high 17%

Marriage University 80%

Married 51%

Single 49% Monthly income (NTD)

Age <10k 13%

18~30 yrs 32% 10k~20k 6%

31~40 yrs 25% 20k~30k 19%

41~50 yrs 23% 30k~40k 28%

51~60 yrs 15% 40k~50k 14%

61~65 yrs 5% 50k~60k 9%

Occupation 60k~70k 3%

Student 8% >70k 8%

Public

sector

19%

Service 39%

Business 27%

Freelance 1%

Others 6%

Modeling results

The goal of this study was to verify the key

attributes in a relation to the choices of service

compensation. In order to verify the effectiveness of

attributes, Multinomial Logit (MNL) model was

applied to estimate parameters using respondents’

preference data, as summarized in Table 4. In the

table, the result of MNL model verifies the

significance of the all applied attributes except

shopping voucher and tourism bus pass. More

specifically, passengers preferred to have food

vouchers to buy meals and foods when they waited

at the departure terminal. In addition, the privilege

use of the airport lounge was definitely a plus to

attract passengers’ attention. Shopping voucher,

however, was not attractive to passengers in the

selection of compensation alternatives. In short,

tourists preferred to do their own business and

simply just waited for the rearranged flight if they

encountered the situation of DB. Passengers would

barely take the opportunity of DB as gaining extra

time for shopping and having fun at the departure

airport. In addition, a complementary stay at an

airport hotel for tourists to take a rest if necessary

brings positive effects to the selection of

compensation alternatives.

Regarding the rearranged flight, passengers showed

positive attitudes if they can take the flight served

by competitive airlines. This outcome also revealed

that passengers were willing to switch to other

airlines once they have options. On the plane, the

55


upgrade of cabin and the location of seat were both

influential to the choice of compensation

alternatives. As such, passengers showed their

preferences to the area of seats on the airplane.

When passengers arrive at the destination terminal,

they showed positive attitudes toward the provision

of MRT pass since this offset can ease

transportation barriers to their final destinations

after arrival. However, passengers did not show

their likes to the utilization of tourism bus. As

tourists all have their travelling purposes, they have

arranged their plans at the visited city and taking

tourism bus is probably just not on the to-do list.

On the aspect of monetary incentives,

either 50% or 100% of the purchased fare were

expected by passengers. In fact, the coefficient of the

100% purchased fare (0.44) is much higher than

that of the 50% purchased fare (0.17) which shows

plausibility in terms of the reality. Regarding the

cost which is the length of waiting that passengers

need to pay, the coefficient is -0.07. More

specifically, the negative sign implied that

passengers did not like to wait for too long at the

departure terminal since the delay caused by DB

may significantly disturb their schedules at visited

destinations.

Table 4 - Results of MNL model

MNL

Coefficient t value

Constants

Basic 0.89*** 3.52

Intermediate 0.63*** 4.68

Food voucher

$250 NTD 0.24*** 3.17

$500 NTD 0.25*** 2.76

Airport lounge

50% off 0.17*** 2.34

Complimentary use 0.24*** 3.05

Shopping voucher

5% off 0.07 0.98

10% off 0.10 0.93

Lodge voucher

Complimentary use 0.22*** 4.06

Flight brand

Other airlines 0.09*** 2.11

Cabin choice

Premium seat 0.15*** 3.51

Seat choice

First-raw 0.14*** 3.37

Transportation offset

MRT pass 0.09*** 2.10

Tourism bus offset

Tourism bus 0.02 0.45

Monetary offset

50% purchased fare 0.17*** 2.18

100% purchased fare 0.44*** 4.18

Length of waiting -0.07* -1.69

***:99% Confidence level

**:95% Confidence level

*:90% Confidence level

56

Conclusions

This study aimed to explore key attributes to

influence the choices of compensation alternatives if

passengers choose to accept the situation of DB. The

contributions of this paper can be seen from both

theoretic and practical perspectives. In theory, this

study proposed a conceptual framework in a

relation to the content of service compensation in

the aviation industry if airlines manipulate the

operation of overbooking which is quite common

nowadays to mitigate the impact of cancellations

and no-shows. We utilized a popular route in the

East Asia market to illustrate the content of service

compensations. A questionnaire based on the

literature and also our observations in practice was

then formulated to investigate the impact of the

applied attributes. The modelling results of MNL

showed that the applied attributes were all

statistically significant except shopping voucher and

the offset of tourism bus pass. As a result, the

proposed framework can be regarded as a

foundation to conduct compensation policies when

DB is necessary.

For practical implications, airlines can prioritize

offsets considering the issue of implementation

costs. In this regard, the findings in the empirical

study showed useful management suggestions.

Activities such as food voucher, seat choice, and

MRT daily pass are relatively low costs. Operators

should adopt these activities as the fundamental

category to offset passengers. Receptionists can also

have authorization regarding the activities in this

category in order to persuade passengers to

voluntarily give up their seats. Secondly, the use of

airport lounge and lodge voucher can be taken as

activities in the category of medium cost while

communicating with passengers. Flying with

competitive airlines, cabin upgrade, and monetary

offsets can be regarded as the last category for

compensations since these activities have relatively

high implementation costs.

There are several limitations and possible

extensions which can be addressed in future

studies. First of all, this study regarded all

passengers to be identical regardless their social

backgrounds and past experiences. As introduced in

the section of literature review, passengers may

possess different attitudes even toward the same

service attribute. As a consequence, models which

are capable of dealing with heterogeneous

behaviors can be the next move to improve model

fitness. Secondly, although we have verified key

dimensions and attributes for service compensation

according to the stage of before, on-the-spot, and

after service failures, other innovative recovery

activities can be integrated into the proposed

conceptual framework. Last but not least, we


assumed that passengers have intentions to accept

DB decisions. A more comprehensive framework

which releases the limit and allows passengers to

veto the proposal of DB can be further considered

into the model based on the reality.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to show gratitude to Ministry

of Science and Technology in Taiwan for the

support of the conference attendance.

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58


An Exploratory Study on the Sources and Self-Efficacy of Students' Career:

A Case Study of the Related Department of Tourism and Leisure,

Universities of the Technology in Central Taiwan

Yueh-Ying Wang a , Yu-Huei Lin b , Ying-Ti Tao c and Wen-chuan Ho d

a Department of Leisure Business Management , Nan Kai University of Technology,

yyw518606@gmail.com

b Department of Leisure Business Management , Nan Kai University of Technology,

c Master Student , Department of Leisure Business Management , Nan Kai University of Technology,

Taiwan

d * Wen-chuan Ho, Department of Tourism and Recreation Management, Overseas Chinese University,

PhD student, Department of Finance, National Chang-hua University of Education

( Corresponding)

100, Chiao Kwang Rd., Taichung, Taiwan 40752,

m06@ocu.edu.tw

Abstract

Students from the tourism and leisure-related

programs at science and technology universities were

chosen as samples in this study to explore the impacts

of students' perception of internship and self-efficacy

on career preference. The purposes of this study were

to understand factors affecting students' choice of

internship organization and investigate changes

brought about by diversification of career

information sources. The results of this study were

first analyzed by inductive reasoning of statements,

supplemented by surveys on multiple dimensions of

self-efficacy, including internship perception,

adaptability, enthusiasm, and confidence, and then

evaluated by structural equation modeling to

estimate the impact levels of various parameters.

Findings from this study showed that: the greater

the perceived self-efficacy, adaptability, enthusiasm

and confidence, the higher the likelihood and

willingness to participate in the off-campus

internship courses would be. Student gender and

sources of career information were found

interference factors affecting the relationship; both

had significantly different effects on the structure of

perception level and self-efficacy factors. Female

students were relatively more enthusiastic than their

male peers, but gender differences were not

significant in terms of adaptability and confidence.

With regard to the source of information, the

internship information acquired from universities

and teachers were much more significant than from

families and friends; the information on internship

provided by universities and teachers appeared to

have a greater and more apparent impact on career

preference. This analysis hopes to serve as a reference

for the tourism and leisure -related departments

when advising students for their career ambition,

thereby enhancing students' role and knowledge in

the workplace and narrow the employment gap.

Keywords:

Off-campus internship, self-efficacy, career

orientation

Introduction

Tourism educators have to face many problems

along with technological progress and the rapid

increase in tourism-related departments over the

past two decades. There has been little research

from the viewpoints of students in past literature

related to tourism education. There also have been

few investigations about the cognition and intention

of students in tourism and leisure-related

departments. The current situation of tourism and

leisure-related education has been discussed

through comprehensive literature. Xiuxiang Liu

(2003) pointed out that the reasons for choosing

the tourism-related departments include “to around

the world” and “to be a tour leader or a tour guide”.

More than 90% of the students who chose the

tourism-related department do not want to take

subjects such as accounting, economics, and finance

according to the author's interview.

Fu-sheng Tsai et al (2007) also believe that the

students who cultivate from the tourism and

leisure-related department should become a force

in the tourism and leisure-related industries after

graduation. However, many graduates in the

tourism department did not enter the tourism

59


industry after graduation. It is a pity for the

educational resources invested in years of

painstaking cultivation.

The youth unemployment rate is high, for the global

economic situation is changing. The employment

rate has become a youth policy issue that advanced

countries attach importance to when the changing

global economic situation. The promotion of the

employment of university graduates has also

become one of the crucial issues to higher education

reform in Europe and the United States

The industrial structure has been changed from a

traditional manufacturing industry to service

industry in Taiwan, and the requirements for

knowledge and technology are more stringent. The

employment environment of the young generation

is getting difficult (Kun-xiang Huang et al., 2015).

Teachers can't teach what they have learned in the

past to their students to face the future society. The

education system and curriculum design needs to

be improved along with the transformation of

industrial structure, social and cultural changes.

To solve the unemployment problems and to

prevent them from happening, it is necessary to

start from strengthening the human capital of the

youth, that is, to enhance their employment. The

youth unemployment problem is an important issue

that is currently receiving much attention from our

society.

The purposes of this study were to explore the

factors that affect students’ choice of internship

organization and investigate changes brought about

by diversification of career information sources.

Off-campus internship is an important lesson. To

help our students the professional knowledge and

skills before attending internship, and to explore the

relevance of student interest and future career

development, we aims to identify the following

issues.

1. Exploring pre-intern cognition of students in

tourism and leisure-related departments,

reflecting the impact of the interpersonal

system.

2. The importance of diverse sources of each

career information system.

3. Exploring whether students' self-efficacy can

positively influence their career orientation.

4. Exploring whether the stronger the students'

self-efficacy perception is and the higher the

level of students’ cognition is.

Literature Review

Super’s (1957) career development theories

outlined five major stages of career development,

including growth, exploration, establishment,

maintenance and disengagement. Although each

profession requires special abilities, interests, and

personality traits, it is also quite flexible, allowing

individuals to engage in certain occupations, as well

as allowing different individuals to pursue the same

profession. Everyone's professional hobbies,

abilities and self-concepts change with time and

experience, thus making career choice and

adaptation a continuous process, to meet the

diverse needs of individuals.

Montagna (1977) argued that career choice is a

process in which a person decides whether or not to

do it. It is often affected by many factors in the

surrounding environment (Kuo-feng Liao et al,

2002).

1. Self-efficacy

Self-efficacy theory is the theory proposed by

Bandura, the founder of social learning theory, to

explain the reasons for motivation in special

situations (Lloyd et al., 2012). According to

Bandura, self-efficacy refers to the individual's

motivation for the work in the pursuit of a

particular job, depending on the individual's

assessment of self-efficacy (Yu-ta Chang, 2003).

Bandura (1977) argued that self-efficacy is a

judgment of a person's ability to believe that he or

she can perform a particular activity and that selfefficacy

is a construct of a particular situation.

Bandura and Jourden (1991) further suggested that

people's beliefs about their effectiveness will

influence their choices, their ambitions, how much

effort they put on a particular task, and how long

they can persist in the face of difficulties and

setbacks.

Self-efficacy is the core of social cognition theory. It

refers to an individual's ability to perceive a

particular behavior in a particular situation (Wood

and Bandura, 1989).

In many related studies on the intent of individuals

using information systems, self-efficacy has led

people to believe that they have enough knowledge

to solve working problems (Constant, Sproull, &

Kiesler, 1996 ).

2. Social system information source

Cordes et al. (1991) explored the relationship

among university students' social information

sources, job perceptions, and career choice

attitudes. Besides, they differentiated information

60


from sources such as teachers, friends, and

classmates.

3. University internship counseling and

training

The mechanism for tutoring students before the

internship includes the results of the selfassessment

of the internship interview, the

preparation before the internship interview, the

factors of choice, and the factors that determine the

consideration of the interview.

The factors to be considered are as follows: First,

the factors that students consider when choosing an

interviewer include: the environment of the intern,

their family factor, the personal factors, whether the

expectation can have self-growth, and the past

internship experience shared by the seniors.

Second, the tutor's assistance and counseling are

necessary. The relevant research in Taiwan on the

topic of the off-campus internship includes: interns'

job performance and job satisfaction survey (Shuchen

Wu, Wu-chung Wu, 2006), and what

professional competence should the interns have?

(Chu Wu, Cheng-ho Wu, 2000).

Methods

The career and internship information source

questionnaire was divided into parents, seniors and

social system, and self-efficacy items are divided

into 3 facets and 10 items. This questionnaire

adopted the Likert five-point scoring model and the

subject's perception of the source of the internship

and the behavioral intention of self-efficacy

according to his or her actual situation. The higher

the score of each item in the subject, the stronger

the intention of the item.

The survey period was from September to October

2016, and the questionnaires were issued for noninternship

students only. A total of 345

questionnaires were distributed and 341 valid

questionnaires were returned, with a recovery rate

of 99%.

Factors of extraction and analysis

According to the discussion of the literature and

theory, the potential psychological variables of the

empirical model include: internship tendency

(tend), internship cognition (cog), internship selfefficacy

(eff), adaptability (adap), enthusiasm (act),

and Self-confidence (conf), etc., in which selfefficacy

includes three adaptations: aptitude,

enthusiasm, and self-confidence, forming a twolevel

verification factor model. This section firstly

extracts the factors of the internship self-efficacy

sub-construction and selects the measurement

surface of the factor load greater than 0.7. The

Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficient of the

construct reaches 0.8 or more, and the overall

reliability value reaches 0.94, which indicates that

the respondent fully responds. Their perception is

also consistent with the requirement of high

confidence levels of potential variables.

The internship tendency (tend) measurement facet

includes te1~te5, respectively: I have the ability to

decide to participate in an off-campus internship; I

believe that I have the ability to maintain a good

relationship with my off-campus internship; I can

overcome all the difficulties of internship; I can

choose an off-campus internship according to my

wishes; and I am willing to accept off-campus

internship courses.

The self-efficacy facet factor extraction extracts: the

adaptability, positivity, and self-confidence to

measure the facet, and forms the self-efficacy (eff)

two-level verification factor analysis model. The

path analysis model was applied to present the

structure distribution. Figure 1 is the Analysis of the

two-level verification factor of internship selfefficacy

se1

e1

se2

e2

z1

se3

e3

adap

se4

e4

se7

e5

z2

se12

e6

eff

act

se13

e7

Figure 1 Analysis of the two-level verification

factor of internship self-efficacy

The two-level verification factor analysis model is

expressed as a structural equation:

Y=Λ yη+ε (1)

η=Γξ+ζ (2)

Y represents the measured self-efficacy of the

constructed facet se1~se23, h is a potential

substructure of adaptability (adap), positivity (act)

and self-confidence (conf); x represents the

potential of career self-efficacy (eff); e is to measure

the error; and z is the residual term of the structural

equation. Both (1) and (2) satisfy the traditional

assumption of the structural equation.

The analysis of the factors of the self-efficacy of the

two levels of career self-efficacy shows that the

proportion of the weight of the self-efficacy

structure of the students in the tourism and leisure-

se17

e8

conf

se19

e9

z3

se20

e10

se21

e11

se22

e12

se23

e13

61


related department (standardization coefficient) in

self-confidence (conf) of 0.93 is the highest,

followed by enthusiasm (act), and adaptability

(adap) is the lowest. It shows: through the

internship process, I am confident in my decision. I

believe that I can find a job that suits my own needs.

Not only that but also the ability to judge and

determine career goals, only in the face of

difficulties or encounters where they do not

understand, the initiative to ask for the solutions is

relatively weak.

In terms of self-confidence (conf), I have the

courage and confidence to ask teachers about the

internship information (se21) and, "I am confident

that I can find a suitable internship for myself"

(se23) 0.712 is the highest, and "I am confident that

I can prepare a complete and good autobiography"

(se19) is 0.633, which means that the internship

information provided by the career counseling

center is very high. Only when students prepare a

complete resume or autobiography, otherwise their

abilities are relatively insufficient.

The most important measure of positivity (act) is

that I can judge and determine my career goal

(se13) as high as 0.742. The relatively low facet is: I

will initiatively ask others when I encounter

academic setbacks (se12) is only 0.586, which

shows that the ability to initiatively seek for

solutions needs to be strengthened when academics

encounter setbacks.

In the adaptability facet (adap), when faced the new

career decision, I am confident that I can adapt well

(se3) up to 0.742, and to go online looking for

internship information by myself (se2) is relatively

weak. Students are dependent on the internship

opportunities and messages provided by the

universities.

Structural Equation Analysis of the Influence of

Self-efficacy and Cognition on Internship Tendency

To understand the relationship between selfefficacy

and measurement facet through the above

analysis, and to further explore the purpose of this

study, we proposed the following structural

equation models to realize what the relationship is

between self-efficacy and cognitive level on the

internship tendency. The impact relationship is

represented by the path analysis as shown in Figure

2:

Χ=Λxξ+δ (3)

Y=Λ yη+ε (4)

η=Γξ+ζ (5)

X is the cognitive measurement facet co1~co4, Y is

the performance measure facet se1~se23 and the

internship tendency is measured facet te1~te5, and

x represents potential exogenous variables such as

self-efficacy (eff) and cognitive level (cog), while h is

an endogenous potential variable, including

adaptability (adap), positivity (act), self-confidence

(conf), and internship tendency (tend)

e1

e2

e3

e4

e5

e6

e7

e8

e9

e10

e11

e12

e13

se1

se2

se3

se4

se7

se12

se13

se17

se19

se20

se21

se22

se23

Z1

adap

Z2

act

Z3

conf

eff

co1

co2

tend

Figure 2 Career internship tendency and selfefficacy

mode path analysis diagram

Using the most approximate method for parameter

estimation, the estimation results are detailed in

Table 1: The results of the career self-efficacy

impact relationship model estimation results and

the estimation results of the normalization

coefficients are found:

1. Self-efficacy and cognition have a positive

impact on career orientation, and the selfefficacy

influence is 0.659 stronger than the

cognitive variable 0.217. It also implies that the

self-efficacy implementation of the career

internship is quite obvious, but the cognitive

level needs to be strengthened.

2. The effects of self-efficacy sub-construction are

as follows: the highest adaptability is 0.961,

followed by enthusiasm 0.91, and the lowest

self-confidence is 0.871. This result is slightly

different from the above-mentioned two-stage

verification factor analysis model (highest selfconfidence,

adaptation is low). The reason is

due to the influence of the relationship between

cognition and internship.

3. Among the measurement of potential variables,

the most influential variables are adaptability:

"I can solve problems myself" (se7) up to 0.721,

enthusiasm: "I can judge and decide my career a

goal (se13) is 0.718. Self-confidence is: "I am

confident that I can find a suitable career or

internship unit" (se23) up to 0.716. The

cognition is: "I think that participation in offcampus

internships is worth encouraging."

(co4) at 0.828, the internship tendency is: "I

believe that I can maintain a good relationship

with my off-campus internship" (te2) is the

highest at 0.824. The above characteristics

show that the internship continues moving

toward a positive direction.

d1

d2

Z4

cog

co3

d3

co4

d4

te1

te2

te3

te4

te5

e14

e15

e16

e17

e18

62


Table 1 Estimation results of career self-efficacy

impact relationship model

Facet

Standardi-

Facet /

estimate

t

/

S. E.

P zation

factor

coefficient

value

factor

coefficient

tend

<--

-

eff 0.925 0.112 8.241 *** 0.659

tend

<--

-

cog 0.239 0.071 3.374 *** 0.217

adap

<--

-

eff 1.000 0.961

act

<--

-

eff 0.810 0.093 8.692 *** 0.910

conf

<--

-

eff 0.923 0.092 10.072 *** 0.871

se7

<--

-

adap 1.037 0.088 11.800 *** 0.721

se4

<--

-

adap 0.990 0.092 10.727 *** 0.652

se3

<--

-

adap 1.092 0.074 14.746 *** 0.714

se2

<--

-

adap 0.905 0.088 10.240 *** 0.622

se1

<--

-

adap 1.000 0.707

se13

<--

-

act 1.333 0.146 9.144 *** 0.718

se12

<--

-

act 1.000 0.589

se23

<--

-

conf 1.054 0.090 11.666 *** 0.716

se22

<--

-

conf 0.960 0.086 11.135 *** 0.680

se21

<--

-

conf 1.062 0.092 11.598 *** 0.715

se20

<--

-

conf 0.969 0.090 10.794 *** 0.657

se19

<--

-

conf 1.037 0.100 10.372 *** 0.636

se17

<--

-

conf 1.000 0.695

te1

<--

-

tend 1.000 0.818

te2

<--

-

tend 0.902 0.054 16.576 *** 0.824

te3

<--

-

tend 0.721 0.053 13.505 *** 0.700

te4

<--

-

tend 0.879 0.059 14.981 *** 0.762

te5

<--

-

tend 0.665 0.063 10.549 *** 0.566

co1

<--

-

cog 1.000 0.787

co2

<--

-

cog 0.880 0.064 13.867 *** 0.750

co3

<--

cog 0.823 0.064 12.828 *** 0.700

co4

-

<--

-

cog 1.082 0.070 15.395 *** 0.828

Source: This study estimates that GFI = 0.91, AGFI =

0.89 and RMSEA = 0.051

The impact of self-efficacy and cognitive level on

career orientation has a positive impact

relationship. The stronger the student's self-efficacy

(including resilience, enthusiasm, and selfconfidence),

the higher the level of cognition, and

the higher the tendency to participate in off-campus

internships.

The only difference is the gender interference, the

difference in the comparison of the standardization

coefficient shows that the degree of self-efficacy of

female participating in the difference is not higher

than that of male (0.736), and the enthusiasm of

female (0.962) is higher than that of male (0.872).

The cognitive level of female did not reach a

significant level (P=0.076). In terms of adaptability,

the male was 0.967, that of female was 0.955, the

performance of self-confidence was 0.874 for male,

and that for female was 0.870.

The cross-group test is carried out the internship

information source. The verification and estimation

results are shown in table 2 and table 3.

Table 2 Information source Cross-group

verification results

Teachers/

friends

2

D df D c P D NFI D IFI D RFI D TLI

4 3.5471 0.4707 0.0008 0.0009 -0.0011 -0.0012

Source: Estimate of this study\

Table 2 shows that the chi-square difference value

is 3.5471, the significant probability value is 0.4707,

and the difference of the remaining four matching

indicators in the table is less than 0.002, which

indicates that the information source is: There are

differences in the interference variables of career

orientation.

Table 3 Estimation results of information source

difference structure coefficient

tandardi-

Facet / Facet / estimate

S.E. C.R. P zation

factor factor coefficient

coefficient

Teachers

tend <--- eff 0.964 0.139 6.916 *** 0.639

tend <--- cog 0.288 0.086 3.373 *** 0.254

adap <--- eff 1 0.949

act <--- eff 0.857 0.11 7.788 *** 0.944

conf <--- eff 0.965 0.107 8.986 *** 0.878

Ralatives/

Friends

tend <--- eff 0.735 0.167 4.397 *** 0.669

tend <--- cog 0.142 0.119 1.191 0.234 a 0.147

adap <--- eff 1 0.964

act <--- eff 0.692 0.167 4.147 *** 0.806

conf <--- eff 0.849 0.177 4.804 *** 0.882

Source: This study estimates that “a” means not

significant

63


As shown in table 3, the two potential

variables of cognition and positiveness are quite

different. The internship information obtained by

the teacher is much more significant than that of

relatives and friends. In other words, the internship

information provided by the teacher makes the

influences of self-efficacy (eff) on career tendencies

(tend) relatively large and clear. Besides, the

performance of enthusiasm is relatively high

(0.944>0.806), and the effects of other variables are

not much different.

Results and Suggestions

Students from the tourism and leisure-related

programs at science and technology universities

were chosen as samples in this study to explore the

impacts of students' perception of internship and

self-efficacy on career preference.

Analyze students' adaptation and problems with the

curriculum, and design self-efficacy questionnaire

to further explore the influence of cognitive level

and self-efficacy on the internship tendency. Under

the influence of globalization trends and dramatic

changes in industrial structure, college students

usually need sufficient career information to meet

their job-seeking employment after graduation. To

enhance the students' future employment, and

shorten employment gap, we provided a clear

reference for the planning of future internship

courses.

To what extent the cognitive level and self-efficacy

have a specific impact on the student's career

orientation, and to analyze the gender difference of

the students and the interference effect of the

internship information source, we applied the

structural equation model and cross-group

verification analysis. According to the purpose of

this study, the following results are found:

1. Student gender and information source are the

interference factors that affect the relationship

between career orientation, and the two have

significant differential effects on a cognitive

level and self-efficacy factor structure. The

enthusiasm of female students is relatively

higher than that of male students, while the

performance of self-confidence and selfconfidence

is not much different. Finally, in

terms of sources of information: the internship

messages obtained through the teachers are

much more significant than those of relatives

and friends.

2. The information source is the interference

variable of the career direction, that is, the

influence of the different career trends of the

information sources (structural coefficient) is

different. The two potential variables of

cognition and positiveness are quite different.

The internship information obtained by the

teachers is more significant than that of

relatives and friends.

3. The proportion self-efficacy structure

(standardization coefficient) of the students in

the tourism and leisure-related departments is

the highest in self-confidence, followed by

enthusiasm, and finally in adaptability. It shows

that through the internship process, students

are confident in their decisions. In the future, I

will find a job that suits my interests. At the

same time, I will be able to judge and determine

my career goals. However, when it is difficult or

unclear, the ability to ask for help is relatively

weak.

4. Estimate the significant facet of self-confidence,

"I have the courage and confidence to ask

teachers about internships or employment

information" and "I am confident that I can find

a suitable career or internship company" are

the highest. However, "I am confident that I can

prepare a good and complete resume and

autobiography" is the lowest. It indicates that

the internship or employment information

provided by the Career Counseling Center is

beneficial to students, but for preparing a

complete resume and autobiography, the ability

is relatively insufficient.

5. The effect of self-efficacy and cognition on

career orientation shows that the higher the

self-efficacy and cognition, the stronger the

tendency of career internship. Besides, the

positive influence relationship between them,

and the influence of self-efficacy is higher than

that of cognitive variables. It is suggested that

the self-efficacy implementation of the

internship in the career is quite obvious, but the

level of cognition needs to be strengthened.

6. The sub-constructions ranking of self-efficacy

are: the highest is resilience, followed by

enthusiasm, and relatively low self-confidence.

This result is slightly different from the abovementioned

two-stage verification factor

analysis model (highest self-confidence and low

adaptability). The reason could be that the

relationship between cognition and internship

tends to be affected.

Findings from this study showed that: the greater

the perceived self-efficacy, adaptability, enthusiasm

and confidence, the higher the likelihood and

willingness to participate in the off-campus

internship courses would be. Student gender and

sources of career information are found

interference factors affecting the relationship; both

have significantly different effects on the structure

of perception level and self-efficacy factors. Female

students were relatively more enthusiastic than

their male peers, but gender differences were not

significant in terms of adaptability and confidence.

64


Regarding the source of information, the internship

information acquired from universities and teachers

is much more significant than from families and

friends; the information on internship provided by

universities and teachers appeared to have a

greater and more apparent impact on career

preference. This analysis hopes to serve as a

reference for the tourism and leisure-related

departments when advising students for their

career ambition, thereby enhancing students' role

and knowledge in the workplace and narrowing the

employment gap.

Due to ability and time, this study only filled out

sample questionnaires for some students in Taiwan

and hopes to expand the comparative analysis of

Chinese or multiple countries’ internships.

The research results provide a reference for

corporates, universities, students, parents, and

teachers so that they could have a common

understanding of off-campus internships and

achieve a win-win situation. Besides, consumers

will also feel a good service and create a win-win

situation.

Acknowledgments

I would like to express my gratitude to my partners.

[blank line]

I also would like to thank my family: my husband

and my kids for supporting me spiritually.

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65


The Emotional Attachment Gained By Organizing Of Events With Culinary

And Heritage Promotion Content

Marica Mazurek a

University of Žilina, Faculty of Humanities

Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies

Univerzitná 8215/1, 010 26 Žilina, Slovakia

marica0011@yahoo.ca

marica.mazurekova@fhv.uniza.sk

Abstract

The emotional attachment to tourism destinations

can be fulfilled via attitudes, attributes of the place,

sophisticated management and management of

brand attributes, for example natural environment,

history, culture, heritage and service quality in

tourism destinations. Two of important components

of comparative advantage are history and culture.

Cultural products could be provided in the

framework of different culinary specialties and

proposed by organizing of events in order to boost

competitiveness. Especially organizing of traditional

events could increase multiplication effect in a

particular city. Organizing of events can boost

visitation, familiarity and place branding strategies

of cities. The article will explore how these

components have been used in marketing strategy

of Banska Bystrica, Slovakia (Radvansky Jarmok –

Radvan Market) now and in the past. Originality of

this research could be proved by using the authentic

examples from a former mining city in Slovakia.

The exploratory method of research has been used,

especially based on the studied materials

(secondary research) by collecting of historical

material; however also a primary research has been

applied (personal experiences, empirical approach,

collecting of pictures and evaluation of secondary

statistical materials). The purpose of research is to

explore how cultural events with heritage and

culinary content could be useful for destination

competitiveness growth and the findings might be

a valuable tool for a statement that competitiveness

is strongly based on local factors. A case study of

Banska Bystrica will be an example of this

statement.

Key words:

events with culinary and heritage promotion,

competitiveness of destinations, place branding,

multiplication effect

66

Introduction

Competitiveness in tourism destinations has

interested researchers and academics (Heath &

Wall, 1992; Kozak & Rimmington, 1999; Dwyer &

Kim, 2003; Buhalis, 2000; Crouch & Ritchie, 2003;

Hassan, 2000; Bordas, 1994, etc.) and it tends to be

very closely related to the process of use of

comparative advantage by the application of

competitive advantage tools, for instance history

and culture, culinary products and the heritage of a

destination in favour of its better prosperity and

popularity. One of the tools of competitive

advantage for this goal could be marketing,

branding and especially organizing of events with

culinary content, for instance historical fairs and

markets.

Pritchard and Morgan (1996) suggest that a

successful brand builds an emotional link between

product and consumer and that “mood marketing” is

a useful method of destination branding; where

brand saliency is created through the development of

emotional relationship with the consumer through

highly choreographed and focused communication

campaigns.” Emotional attachment to the tourism

destinations can be fulfilled via attitudes, attributes

of the place, especially through the sophisticated

management of the tourism system in a place (place

branding and management) and management of

brand attributes, for example natural environment,

history, culture, heritage as well as services offered in

tourism destinations.

Meaning of a brand is embedded in the imagery or

image building from more intangible components.

The use of brands by different people evokes

different meaning for various social groups based on

demographic and psychographic factors. Image and

brand associations, consisting of attributes, benefits,

and brand attitudes, are basic concepts of a model.

The character of attributes influences the brand


imagery creation, i.e., the tangible attributes as

scenery, history, heritage, which could be easily

captured in customers´ memories. The intangible

attributes are, for instance, the atmosphere of the

place, character of the environment, services, and

quality of infrastructure.

Tourism destinations are becoming among the

largest brands, and their complexity means a

challenge for marketers and planners. Buhalis

(2000, p. 3) noted that “tourists perceive the

destination as a brand comprising a collection of

suppliers and services …and consume it as a

comprehensive experience during the visit.” A

separation of experience from the physical

components and attributes is not suitable for

successful branding and marketing processes in a

destination. Experiences are an excellent tool to

improve competitiveness, branding and creation of

the interesting tourism product, which might be

deeply attached to the customer´s decision making

process in favour of choosing the same destination

again (loyalty growth). This could be achieved

through the implementation of the successful place

branding strategies.

The “mobilization of ideas, knowledge and

expectations” and technologies, which can be used

also in branding, as for instance experience

economy concepts, has been discussed for instance

by Pine and Gilmore (1999). Diffusion and

transformation of knowledge is crucial. Knowledge

(tacit and codified) as well as cultural knowledge

(history, traditions, heritage) have incremental

impact on innovation and the quality of experiences.

Experiences influence dramatically visitors and

their perception of a place. The image and

reputation of a place have an incremental influence

on the popularity of a place. Anholt (2007) admitted

a correlation between the positive experience of

visiting a country and positive feelings about its

products, government, culture, and its people.

Deeper understanding of place brands in tourism

destinations and reputation might be helpful for

competitiveness.

Competitiveness of tourism destinations raises the

question of which factors might be crucial for

improvement in order to be more competitive

(Gilmore, 2002). Former rational and standardized

approaches to marketing have shifted to a more

emotional approach based on relational marketing,

which is strongly influenced by the reputation of

places, people, events, etc. In the process of building

this relationship, it is important to build a

reputation through the implementation of a

destination brand approach.

Several authors as Pyo, Mihalik & Uysal (1989)

underlined a multidimensional character of

motivation of tourists seeking an experience and

the emotional attachment to tourism destinations.

The emotional bonds and motivation are formed on

a demand side; however a tourism destination’s

desire is to create favorable conditions and to

motivate and attract more visitors and strengthen

competitive advantage through place branding.

Branding as a tool of competitive advantage is based

on the principles of value-added effect for

customers (demand side) and the equity creation

(tourism destinations, supply side). Pike (2005)

mentioned that the future of marketing is as a battle

of brands. Branding simplifies the visitors’

decisions, simplifies the process of segmentation

and positioning. It could be understood in tourism

destination branding concept as the activity, which

means “bringing together two or more adjoining

communities of similar natural and cultural

compositions and attractions” (Cai, 2002, p. 734).

Tourism destinations are becoming among the

largest brands, and their complexity means a

challenge for marketers and planners. Buhalis

(2000, p. 3) noted that “tourists perceive the

destination as a brand comprising a collection of

suppliers and services …and consume it as a

comprehensive experience during the visit.” A

separation of experience from the physical

components and attributes is not suitable for

successful branding and marketing processes in a

destination. For this reason is important to keep

strictly the authenticity principle and brand identity

approach in the whole branding process. The same

concerns appear also in place branding process,

which is the incorporation of branding principles

into the territorial marketing development

strategies.

The authors Hubbard and Hall (1998) created a

general model of management of cities (places) with

a goal to improve a new image of a city (place). This

model contains the following tasks for city

management, which means a stronger marketing

and promotion, city development, support of the

organizing of cultural activities in a city, organizing

of mega events, cultural regenration, and

partnership creation. One of the possible innovative

approaches, which could be applied by organizing of

common events in places (cities, other territories),

are specific strategies, which were described by

Jago (2003) in his specific model of planning and

events evaluation (Scheme 1).

67


Scheme 1: Model of planning and evaluation of the

influence of organized events inmarketing of

territories and the creation of brand identity of

territory, Jago et al, 2003, p. 7.

By organizing of such events is necessary to respect

the values of territories, support a co-operation of

the public and private sectors and to take into

account the economic contribution and

multiplication effect of the organized events. Crucial

is a process of building of brand identity and

improvement of image of a territory, creating of

social networks, supporting of the additional

financing of new events, creating of new employment

opportunities and many more mutliplication effects.

Organizing of events as one form of marketing

promotion has been discussed also by Reinisto who

classified several success factors in territorial

marketing (Scheme 2).

Scheme 2: Framework of the Focal Study. Success

Factors in Place Marketing, Reinisto, 2001.

In order to improve the image and define the

existing brand identy properly, Kapferer (2004)

mentioned four important sources to include: the

brand’s products, brand characters and symbols,

geographical and historical roots, and brand

essence. We will focus on historical roots and

especially cultural traditions and products based on

it, which were important for the image creation and

attraction of visitors to the specific place.

Creation of brand image and brand identity requires

a consistent and systematic approach and may last

for years to establish brand image and name

recognition and develop strong awareness of a

destination product (Morgan, Pritchard & Piggot,

2003). One of such a product could be the

organizing of annual markets in some specific place,

which is rooted in the historical context and based

on traditions. This kind of event or a product

offered through event tend to me crucial for image

building of a specific place and for the emotional

attachment of different groups of people to that

specific place, for instance inhabitants, visitors, and

entrepreneurs. This attachment and positive

feelings could lead to loyal and patriotic behaviour,

which might be important for branding of the

particular place.

Success could be, in some cases, not only trend and

novelty; it could be a loyalty to the traditional values

and attributes implied in new marketing strategies

and branding.

Destination loyalty, unfortunately, has been not

studied very often. Several authors underline the

importance of loyalty in branding, which influences

the repetition of visitation (e.g. Opperman, 2000;

Gitelson & Crompton, 1984).

One possibility of strengthening brands is brand

leveraging and brand extension process. Building

strong brands and brand extensions for instance

through events, new tourism products and services

might benefit the core brand equity of a destination.

Process of brand leveraging and extension is

extremely important in tourism destinations because

it could influence the image and fulfillment of brand

promises. Favorable brand associations with the

brand improve the brand perception and brand

equity, which enables in tourism destinations to

increase the visitation and the amount of income

(multiplication effect). Brand leveraging and brand

extension concepts tend to strengthen brand equity,

brand value, reputation of destination. The core

brand of visitors are able to create strong attachment

to the brand. Various academics underline the

importance of research on tourism brand extension

and innovation management, especially with the

focus on the development of innovative destination

strategies (e.g. Buhalis, 2000; Hankinson, 2005).

The emotional attachment and creation of image as

well as the improvement of the process of branding

of a specific destination (e.g. town or city) could be

improved by specific factors, for instance how

community is involved in the support of organizing

such events. Jago (2003) mentioned that “local

people perceive themselves as an essential part of

the event and are interested in the event, their

support will carry a positive effect on the way that

68


visitors perceive the event and the destination.“ For

this reason, not only management of such an event,

product offer, promotion, but people are crucial for

success and emotional attachment. In this moment

could be strongly seen the influence of the principle

of co-creation in product offer in a territory, where

the product (an event) has been co-created with local

people or entrepreneurs and through this process is

built a stronger tie to the specific event, which might

be culturally or historicaly important. By organizing

of such event is important to mention a cultural fit

and longevity and tradition of the event (Jago, 2004),

which might be explained as the longevity of at least

5- years in order to be sustainable.

Kotler (2002a), Ashworth and Voogd (1990),

Reinisto (2001), Hankinson (2001, 2004) were

supporting the idea of a strong place marketing and

place branding due to the goal to achieve stronger

customer´s emotional attachment to tourism

destinations and places generally.

Place is being discovered in many realms of

scholarly and professional practice. This is

happening, not in the sense of the discovery of new

locales, sites, or environments, but of a growing

appreciation of the importance of the

interrelationships of values, beliefs, experiences,

social and political history, natural environment,

economic and political practices, rituals, and

traditions of a geographically-defined region or

community.“ (Smith, 2015).

Sense of place is a function of the culture of the

place or of a vistor´s perception of that culture

(Smith, 2015). Successful tourism is not simply a

matter of having better transportation and hotels,

but adding a particular national flavour in keeping

with traditional ways of life and projecting a

favourable image and one way of promotion of a

place are historical markets with traditions, crafts,

culinary products, food tasting and heritage

promotion generally. One of such products in

tourism marketing strategies could be traditional

markets with food tasting, culinary products

promotion (culinary tourism) as well as wine

tasting and traditional culture, music (music and

culinary festivals). These events are important tools

for the competitiveness support and serve stronger

emotional attachment of visitors.

For this reason our goal was to explore how cultural

events with heritage and culinary content could be

useful for destination competitiveness growth and a

city Banska Bystrica offers a good example of this

statement especially due its history and activities in

the past and also in the contemporary period of

time.

Methods

The exploratory method of research has been used,

especially based on the studied materials

(secondary research) by collecting of historical

material; however also a primary research has been

used (personal experiences, empirical approach,

collecting of pictures and evaluation of secondary

statistical materials). The purpose of our research is

to explore how cultural events with heritage and

culinary content could be useful for destination

competitiveness growth and the findings might be

a valuable tool for a statement that competitiveness

is strongly based on local factors.

Case study Banska Bystrica

Banska Bystrica, a town situated in Central Slovakia,

which is familiar for its history of Radvansky market

as a tourist and formerly market attraction, was

granted the town privileges in 1255 by the King Belo

the IVth. The town was familiar for its rich sources of

copper and the entrepreneurs of Thurzo-Fugger

mining company from this town were familiar in the

whole Europe. The changing names of this town from

Nova Villa Bystriciensis, Bystricia, Neosollium,

Neusohl, Bistricz, Besterzterczebánya, Banská

Bystrica were given to the town in dependance on

the historical circumstances. In Middle Ages in the

end of the 13th century the city was populated by

Germans and for this reason it started to use the

German name Neusohl. In 1494 was created the

company Ungarisher Handel also known as Der

Neusohler Kupferhandel (Neusohl Coppermarkt),

which belonged to the biggest and most modern

mining companies in that period of time.

The town was later in the 20th century an important

center of uprising against fascism (Slovak National

Uprising). Banska Bystrica belongs to the most

beautiful towns in Slovakia and is still very popular

tourism destination for visitors. The town is

surrounded by splendid mountains and is protected

against winds. The contemporary number of citizens

living in this town is 90 thousand inhabitants. In

2017 the town was designated a title of the European

city of sport due to its sport activities, good sport

facilities and especially the origin of several excellent

sportsmen born and living in this town, for instance

Marek Hamsik, a soccer champion. Banska Bystrica is

also familiar in tourism activities and belongs to the

attractive tourism destinations visited annually by

tourists.

The town representatives started to recognize the

importance of events organizing and supported in

the co-operation with the private sector to the

organizing of several events and festivals in this

town. Some of the events were based on long term

traditions and have a historical background. These

types of events belong to the cultural heritage of the

town of Banska Bystrica. The existence of these

69


events through centuries created also deeper ties of

different towns and regions in Slovakia to this town.

History of Radvansky jarmok (Radvan

markt)

History of Radvansky jarmok (Radvan markt) started

in the 17th century and the first Radvansky markt

took place in September 8th, 1657. Radvan was a

village close to the town Banska Bystrica and later

became a part of Banska Bystrica. First written

evidence about the Radvansky markt is from 1655

when the Austrian-Hungarian king Leopold II.

Habsburg granted the privileges to organize it in

Radvan. Radvan was familiar for organizing of

several different markts in autumn or spring period,

but the most important was Radvansky markt

organized in fall, traditionally from 8th to 10th of

September. In the 19th century the importance of

this markt gained the international level similar to

the markts in Leipzig (Germany), Novgorod (Russia),

Kiacht (the boundary between Russia and Mongolia).

The traditions of handcraft and local agricultural

products were popular for this markt similarly as for

the other markts in the world; however, each

country, region or a town had a typical flavour, image

or products. These are the roots of place branding

and especially the identity of a place creation. Local

people and the visitors from neighbour regions or

towns as well as from abroad started to get used to

the flavour of markt.

The traditional products became typical for the

specific region or a town. These are beginnings of the

emotional attachment to the place built through the

organizing of events of different character. Most

popular became such events as Radvansky markt

because of the fulfillment of everyday needs for living

sources – sale of groceries, local products, and special

meals. The second reason of the popularity of such

events was a sale of local craft products, sale of

agricultural products and needs for agricultural

activities, live stock, animals (especially in the past).

Similar markts still exist everywhere in the world,

but they are not identical and especially the local

products and the atmosphere create a unique

athmosphere.

Since 2005 Radvansky markt belongs to the UNESCO

cultural heritage sites as well as some other products

typical not only for Banska Bystrica and Radvansky

markt, but also for Slovakia generally, for instance a

fabric for typical Slovak clothes of women in the past

– modrotlac (blue fabric).

Every year in the fall visit Radvansky markt more

than 330 domestic and 30 international craftsmen

especially from such countries as Hungary, Poland,

Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Romania. They

offer products as for instance potery, soap products,

leder belts, jewellery, national costumes, culinary

products as for instance honey, local meals, healthy

food products, delicatessen, furniture made from

wood and natural materials, spices, etc. Typical for

the culinary tasting are local meals as for instance

langos, home baked bread, barbecued meat, local

70


pancake filled with goose liver, pancakes with

different topings as garlic, poppy seed, nuts and a

cake called trdelnik or pampluch with sheep cheese

or bacon and sausage.

These culinary products are served with special

local drinks like beer (locally produced or

imported). The most famous for the culinary

experience of the markt are not only the above

mentioned delicious meals, but also so called

„burciak“, which is a very young wine with a high

concentration of vitamin B and an excellent

regenaration abilities for a human body. Producers

from wineries in Slovakia, especially from the

southern part of country bordering with Hungary,

offer white and red burciak wine for sale. The

visitors could try in small cups or buy wine in a

bottle. Excellent culinary environment and

products are enhanced by listening to the local

national music and by watching the local or

international folklore dancing groups.

Fascinating is the atmosphere of craftsmen

demonstrating to the visitors how they produce

local products, for instance wooden furniture,

potery, jewelery, etc. People can their production

too and participate in the process of making them.

This is a typical example of co-creation approach.

Typical for the markt is the atmosphere of the past

where people were dressed in the costumes of that

time. Children can try not only different attractions

as shooting from the bow and arrow under of

supervision of their parents, but also enjoy

watching of falcons supervised by falconers. The

most traditional is the habit to buy a wooden spoon

and try to „spank“some young attractive girl by it.

Mostly this habit was practiced by teenagers or

young men. It is not common anymore, but in the

time of deep communism was still quite common.

The existence of different political environment has

also influenced the atmosphere of the markt. In the

period of communism was for instance popular

among people to buy products, which were not

usually in stores and they were scarce, for instance

electrical products or instruments, fashion or even

tropical fruits.

After a change of the political system in the period

of market economy a scarcity was more common

and the abundance of products in the stores caused

that people were more interested in special local

products and not the ordinary products, which

could be found in the stores. This made Radvansky

markt to be a place of local heritage promotion,

which was also a former goal. In the past, in the

18th and 19th century the markt served as a place

of mutual bargain of livestock, agricultural products

and craft products. Some of these activities

remained, but some disappeared due to a new social

and economic changes and especially a life style of

local people.

Conclusions

The popularity of local markets with traditional

products and food or other culinary products, crafts

and cultural heritage atmosphere are becoming

more popular among people. Market trends

indicate that tourists are no longer just eating to

satisfy hunger but to learn and experience local

culture through local ethnic food (Smith & Xiao,

2008). Cultural tourism is becoming more popular

especially in the countries with growing number of

seniors who are a right segment for it. It brings

a combination of culinary experiences, tasting,

wellness, but also learning new things, education,

and story telling and also spending free time wisely

and together with peers or friends. This could be

also similar among younger age groups, even very

young generation, and families with children.

However, the older generation is growing

enourmously in this period of time and in different

parts of the world and their desire to live happier

life and longer could be one of the reasons why they

wish to participate at such cultural events and are

emotionally attached to the markts with local food

and culture. The older or more popular an event is,

the more people feel that they should visit and be

part of local spirit. The older generation started to

influence also the younger people who start to feel

more belonging and loyalty to that specific place.

71


Heritage is a cultural value, which cannot be copied

or transfered somewhere else. Even immigrants

who bring it to the other countries of their

residence, cannot tranfer it fully, but can bring

many parts o fit in a form of food, habits, language,

crafts; however, some items are not transferable,

for instance local historical buildings, countryside,

atmosphere, etc. This is what a local traditional

markt with a historical background offers and this

was also our attempt to discuss and bring at least

some picture of it.

Originality/Value

Originality of this research is the authenticity of the

material studied in Slovakia and an attempt to

confirm how the events contribute to the brand

identity forming, marketing strategies improvement

and consequently influence the economy of local

businesses and bring multiplication effect to the

public budgets as well. However, this has not been

explored in this study, but could be a subject of the

following study dealing with the economic aspects

and multiplication effect of organizing of local

atrractions and events. In stis stage, our goal was to

explore the importance of organizing of cultural

events for the growth of loyalty and emotional

attachment to the destination especially by evoking

an emotional and experiential effect offered by

culinary products and local heritage. This

exploratory study could serve as the starting point

for further research.

72


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73


An Examination of Traditional Adana’s Aşlama within the Scope of

Gastronomy Tourism

Halil AKMEŞE 1 and Cem Taner HİÇYAKMAZER *2

1Necmettin Erbakan University, Tourism Faculty, Tourism Management Department, Turkey,

halilakmese@gmail.com

2Necmettin Erbakan University, Institute of Social Sciences, Tourism Management Department, Turkey,

cemtanerer@gmail.com

Abstract

The number of people participating in tourism

movements has been continuously increasing

worldwide with the development of transportation

facilities. Especially, along with the high demand for

mass tourism (sea-sand-sun), it can be observed

that the demand for alternative tourism types has

considerably increased. Local food and beverages,

which are effective for the promotion of touristic

destinations, have become an important element of

tourists' holiday choices. For this reason,

“gastronomy tourism” has become one of the most

prominent sources of attraction and experience in

destination marketing and branding worldwide. It’s

known that Turkey’s popularity in gastronomy

tourism has increased in recent years. Adana which

adds value to the richness of Turkish Cuisine with

its various tastes, is a destination with a high

potential in terms of gastronomy tourism. The aim

of this research which is a compilation ,is to analys

“aşlama”- a local beverage specific to Adana-and

has been produced as a source of herbal healing

since ancient times , within the scope of gastronomy

tourism. The investigation, promotion and keeping

the sustainability of aşlama which is known as a

street flavour in Adana, is of great importance in

terms of gastronomy tourism. In this research, it is

targeted to contribute to the diversification and

increase of tourism activities in the region by

revealing the potential of aşlama in gastronomy

tourism. All stakeholders especially local

enterprises, researchers and regional decisionmakers,

can benefit from this study.

Keywords: Aşlama, Gastronomy Tourism, Adana.

Introduction

The need for food and beverage is the leading

physiological factor in the hierarchy of needs

defined by Maslow. With the rapid development of

technology in recent years, the changes in people's

demands and expectations and the perception of

physiological needs have differentiated and evolved

into a psychological and snobbish satisfaction

rather than a physical satisfaction. This change has

caused people's eating and drinking behavior to

become rather effective in choosing touristic

destinations. This topic has become very popular in

contemporary academic studies in recent years

(Kim and Eves, 2012; Phillips et al., 2013; Şengül

and Türkay, 2016; Güllü et al., 2017).

The increase in the mobility of gastronomic tourism

worldwide has reached tremendous dimensions as

a result of the development of technology and the

widespread use of social media. In addition to

providing catering services only for tourists in

hotels or independent food and beverage

enterprises. It can be benefited from gastronomy

tourism as an area which offers different tastes and

cultural experiences (Rand and Heat, 2006).

Gastronomy tourism is a particularly emphasized

subject by UNESCO and is defined as travel to

discover, taste and enjoy the local foods and drinks

offered in touristic destinations (Kyriakaki et al.,

2013). Gastronomy cities are listed under a

separate title under the ‘UNESCO Creative Cities

Network’ which was started in 2004. Gaziantep

province in Turkey was added the ‘Gastronomy

Cities’ list which was updated by UNESCO in 2015

and afterwards Hatay was added in 2017 (UNESCO,

2019). In future years it is expected that other cities

in Turkey which have rich culinary culture are

included in this list. Adana which synthesizes the

East-West culinary culture and offers different

tastes, has a significant potential in terms of being

accepted to the list of gastronomy cities. In

particular, the promotion of local delicacies and the

commercialization of sustainability will ensure that

Adana is recognized at a national and international

level. In accordance with this information, the aim

of the study is to assess local beverage “aşlama”

which is indigenous to Adana with a visuality and

ritual in its presentation and preservation in

addition to its prominent for health.

74


General Information about Adana Province

Adana is located in the southern of Turkey adjacent

to Osmaniye, Kahramanmaraş and Gaziantep in the

east, Mersin in the west, Hatay in the southeast and

the Mediterranean sea in the south. The city is

located in the Çukurova region of the

Mediterranean, and has a surface area of 14.030

km 2 and an altitude of 23m (Adana Governorship,

2019a). There are 15 districts in the province

(Aladag, Ceyhan, Cukurova, Feke, Imamoglu,

Karaisali, Karatas, Kozan, Pozanti, Saimbeyli,

Saricam, Seyhan, Tufanbeyli, Yumurtalik and

Yuregir). According to the Address Based

Population Registration System, the province had a

population of over 2.2 million in 2018 ranking the

province as the 6 th largest province in Turkey in

terms of population (TurkStat, 2019). Adana

province is located along D-400, one of the major

highways running on the west-east axis of Turkey.

168 km of the highway passes through the

provincial border (Adana Provincial Directorate of

Culture and Tourism, 2019). There is no problem of

transportation to Adana with the railway line that

opened in 1936 (TCDD, 2019) and Adana Şakirpaşa

Airport (DHMI, 2019), which has been open to

international flights since 1956. Table 1 shows the

statistics of domestic and foreign tourists entering

Adana through the airport customs gate. According

to the table, 136 thousand international and 233

thousand domestic (Turkish citizens living abroad)

tourists arrived in Adana in 2018.

Table 1: Number of Tourists Arriving in Adana via

Border Gates

Source: (Adana Province Directorate of Culture and

Tourism, 2019)

According to the archaeological excavations, many

different civilizations have lived in the Çukurova

region since the early ages. The first known history

of Çukurova begins with the Kingdom of Kitvanza.

According to Hittite inscriptions the kingdom was

under the protection of the Hittites in 1335 BC. The

Hittites perished between the dates 1191-1189 AD.

Subsequently, Adana was dominated by the

Kingdom of Cue, the Assyrians, the Kingdom of

Cilicia, the Persians, the Macedonians (Alexander

the Great), the Seleucids, the Pirates of Çukurova,

and the Romans respectively. It can be said that

Çukurova and Adana entered into the development

process during the Roman period. With the

construction of large bridges (Taşköprü), roads and

irrigation activities, Çukurova region, especially

Adana, made progress and became an important

trade center. After the Roman period, the region

was dominated by Byzantines, Arabs, Egyptian

Turkish Mamluk State and Principality of

Ramazanogulları. During the Principality of

Ramazanogulları, many architectural works were

built in Adana. Among the main works are Ulu

Mosque, Yağ Mosque and Ramazanoglu Mansion

(madrasah). With the Principality of

Ramazanogulları dependent on the Ottomans,

Adana was dominated by the Ottoman Empire.

During this period, important architectural

structures such as Yeni Mosque, Büyüksaat and

Adana Military Secondary School (Adana High

School for girls) were built in Adana. Adana invaded

by the French in 1918 after the First World War,

was freed from enemy occupation on January 5,

1922 thanks to the great heroic resistance of the

people. Gazi Mustafa Kemal Pasha, who came to

Adana on the 15 th of March 1923, honored the

people for their efforts in the Liberation War by

saying "The first true response to my call from this

beautiful Adana” (Adana Governorship, 2019b). It’s

known that Turkey’s popularity in gastronomy

tourism has increased in recent years. Adana which

adds value to the richness of Turkish Cuisine with

its various tastes, is a destination with a high

potential in terms of gastronomy tourism.

With the foundation of the Republic of Turkey,

Adana rapidly made progress to become one of the

leading cities in industry, agriculture, culture and

art activities. Adana is one of the leading cotton

producing provinces in Turkey and has shown great

progress especially through agriculture, textiles and

other industries. For this reason, the Adana-Mersin

line proceeded to turn into a metropolitan city.

Later, thanks to the increase in transportation

opportunities, other branches of industry, especially

trade, became widespread in Adana. Tourism

industry is more popular income to Adana.There

are many tourists visit Adana for years. For example

in 2013 totally visiter number is 322.479 and it is

increase year by year.In 2018 ADANA’s visiter

number is 369920 there are 6 5-star hotels, 16 4-

star hotels, 15 3-star hotels, 4 2-star hotels and 5

other accommodation facilities (boutique hotels,

75


etc.) that contribute to the tourism sector

throughout the province. The total bed capacity of

these facilities is 7,285. In addition, there are 8 food

and beverage enterprises with a tourism operation

certificate in Adana (Adana Provincial Directorate of

Culture and Tourism, 2019). Furthermore, many

alternative tourism types such as gastronomy

tourism, culture-history tourism, festival tourism,

nature tourism, agriculture tourism, adventure

tourism and shopping tourism have the chance to

be implemented in Adana. Therefore, Adana has a

significant tourism potential.

Gastronomy Tourism in Adana Province

Foods and beverages such as Adana Kebab, Stuffed

Şırdan, Turnip Juice, Aşlama, Yüksük Soup, Analı

Kızlı (soup with small and large dumplings), Sıkma

(rolled pastry), Bici Bici (ice chip pudding), Halka

Tatlı (Donut Dessert), Taş Kadayif (fried pastry

stuffed with nuts), Şam Tatlı (Semolina Dessert),

Dikenli Figs (Prickly Pear) are the most important

gastronomic flavors offered by Adana province

(Ballı, 2016).

Aşlama

Aşlama a local beverage of Adana- which has been

produced as a source of herbal healing since ancient

times within the scope of gastronomy tourism. As a

beverage among these elements, aşlama is famous

as one of the street delicacies of Adana, Çukurova

and the west of South East Anatolia and is an

important gastronomic value that attracts attention

in terms of health today.

The medicinal properties of aşlama, which is

generally consumed as a refreshing street drink in

summer months in Adana province and the

Çukurova region known as good for many ailments

since ancient times. Throughout the history, licorice,

the raw material of aşlama, has been widely used

from the Far East to Europe and even to America for

its therapeutic properties (Uygun, 2015). The

licorice root and the produced aşlama beverage

which is mentioned in Evliya Çelebi's Travel Book,

helps digestion to the contrary carbonated

beverages, and it is consumed in Çukurova Region

as a healthy beverage. It is good for coughing,

relaxes the digestive system, prevents constipation,

reduces stomach and intestinal problems. It

strengthens metabolism against viruses with its

antiviral properties. However, heart and kidney

patients should be careful in the consumption of

this beverage. Aşlama is known as the palace drink

of the Ottoman period and a herbal medicine in

ancient times (Milliyet, 2017). In summer months,

street vendors serve the drink in the form of a

ritual, wearing traditional outfits, making a sound

with a special brass metal bowl on their backs and

in their hands

Although there is no standard recipe for aşlama, it is

known that it is optionally made by using different

materials. According to a general recipe, liquorice is

kept in water at normal temperature for three to

four hours, preferably with some cinnamon, ginger,

thyme or cloves. This dark colored delicious and

sweet drink is served by cooling with ice (Karaca

and Karacaoğlu, 2016: 571).

The licorice roots, which are wood-like, are

separated into fibers before making the beverage.

The fiber licorice is then cleaned by washing with

plenty of water without boiling and heating, freed of

dust and made ready for aşlama (Photo 1).

Photo 1: Fiberization of Licorice Roots

Source: (İnternethaber, 2019)

The materials required to transform the cleaned

licorice roots into aşlama are prepared. For

example, the ingredients required for aşlama for 10

people are (Kolay Lezzet, 2019):

Main Ingredients:

• 1 bowl of fiberized licorice roots

• 2 Liters of water

• Ice for cooling

Optional Ingredients:

• Cinnamon

• Carnations

• Ginger

• Thyme

• Fresh mint leaves

Initially, the fiberized liquorice roots, which are

cleaned with plenty of water, are wrapped in a clean

cheesecloth and put into 2 liters of water in a pot.

The licorice fibers are brewed for 3-4 hours. The

licorice fibers are then removed from the pot. The

brewing level of the beverage is checked. If the brew

is too strong, water is added. If it is weak, the fibers

are kept in the pot for a while longer. With the

opinion there may be sediment in it beverage is

passed through a fine mesh strainer by taken to a

different bottle. Filtration is not applied to the

sedimentary part deposited on the bottom of the

pot so as not to spoil clarity. Optionally, sticks of

cinnamon, cloves, ginger, oregano or mint are added

to change the fragrance of the aşlama and it is

served by adding pieces of ice (Kolay Lezzet, 2019).

This recipe is applicable to household consumption.

76


However, aşlama, which is offered as a street flavor,

is produced in the amounts of 35-40 liters and

presented to the locals for the sense of taste with a

ritual in brass metal jugs.

Aşlama is mostly served as a street flavor in

provinces such as Adana, Mersin, Osmaniye,

Kahramanmaraş, Gaziantep, Kilis, Diyarbakır,

Adıyaman and Şanlıurfa. However, in recent years it

has started to be offered in restaurants (Yıldırım et

al., 2018). Aşlama is offered especially during the

daytime hot hours. Sellers often try to attract

customers' attention by wearing traditional outfits,

hanging brass metal jugs on their backs and making

rhythmic sounds with their metal bowls (Photo 2).

Photo 2: Aşlama Service

Sources: (Nisanda Adanada, 2019; Hürriyet, 2018)

Aşlama vendors pour the beverage into thin tall

glasses or metal bowls with some force to make it

foam and thus enhance the service of the beverage

with a bit of ritual. The aşlama vendors shout loudly

‘free aşlama’ to gather the people around them. This

ceremony turns into a social solidarity, sharing and

interaction in society. Therefore, aşlama becomes a

unifying element in society. The taste of aşlama may

initially seem strange to foreign tourists, however

after they have consumed the whole beverage, they

feel the delicious taste lingering on their palates and

they become more interested in the beverage. Based

on the fact that eating and drinking experiences are

very important in terms of tourist movements

(Rand and Heath, 2006), aşlama is considered to

add value to the development, promotion and

marketing of gastronomy tourism in Adana.

Methodology

The aim of this research which is a compilation ,is

to analys “aşlama”- a local beverage specific to

Adana-and has been produced as a source of

herbal healing since ancient times , within the scope

of gastronomy tourism.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Cities included in the UNESCO Creative Cities

Network under the title of “Gastronomy Cities”

attract the attention of the world with their events

and promotional activities. It is seen that these

cities have become very important attraction

centers in terms of tourism movements (Akın and

Bostancı, 2017). Therefore, it can be ascertained

that these cities attract much more attention in

terms of gastronomy tourism, and the urban image,

development and prosperity levels increase

(Cunningham, 2002; Smith and Warfield, 2008). For

example, after Gaziantep was declared a

gastronomy city in 2015, its recognition increased

and the number of domestic and foreign tourists

increased by 52% in 2018 (Gaziantep Province

Directorate of Culture and Tourism, 2019).

Considering that the cities of Gaziantep and Hatay

have been listed in the UNESCO Creative Cities

Network under the title of ‘Gastronomy Cities’,

Adana needs to work on this issue without losing

any time to be included in the list because it will be

an important milestone for the tourism

development of the city. From this point, all

stakeholders, especially regional decision-makers

(governors, municipalities, district governorships,

universities and NGOs) have important duties.

Adana Kebab, which belongs to Adana province, was

registered by Turkish Patent Institute (Karaca and

Karacaoğlu, 2016). The applications for

geographical indications for products such as

turnips, analı-kızlı, şırdan, taş kadayif and halka tatlı

are underway. However, it is known that no

geographical indication application has been made

yet for aşlama- Adana's local value. Therefore, if an

application for geographical indication is made,

both awareness of this beverage and its

sustainability will be ensured. In addition, feedback

from local and foreign tourists coming to Adana to

taste aşlama should be taken and evaluated.

Accordingly, product differentiation (with various

spices) without changing the structure of the

beverage will be beneficial in terms of a customeroriented

approach and the satisfaction of tourists.

Highlighting products such as aşlama in Adana

province in terms of gastronomy tourism,

promoting them, preserving their traditionality and

rituals will encourage more gastronomic visitors to

come to the city. Therefore, this situation will

support the increase in the number of tourism

facility investments, the emergence of new business

opportunities in the city and increase the economic

prosperity level of the city.

77


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Studies, 6(4), 376-398.

78


Monitoring The Quality Costs In Accommodation Enterprises: A Research

In Antalya

Halil Akmeşe a and Pınar Yeşilçimen b

a Necmettin Erbakan University-Faculty of Tourism, Köyceğiz Campus, Meram-Konya,

halilakmese@gmail.com

b Karamanoğlu Mehmetbey University, Vocational School of Social Sciences, Yunus Emre Campus, Karaman,

pinaraydag@gmail.com

Abstract

In a globalized world, tourism is considered

important for countries due to its high socioeconomic

impacts. The fact that the number of

tourists reached 1.4 billion in 2018 indicates the

size of the market. It is observed that the tourism

enterprises that want to make a difference in this

market emphasize the measures to increase the

service quality. Businesses, in accordance with the

wishes and expectations of the participants in the

tourism movement, to achieve the highest level of

quality are doing various studies. One of these

studies is that each enterprise establishes its own

quality control department. It is very important to

measure the cost of an effective quality system to

the enterprise and to eliminate these costs partially

or completely. The research prepared for this

purpose, has been prepared in order to evaluate the

accommodation enterprises serving in Antalya

province in terms of quality cost systems. In this

research, it is tried to determine how hotel

managers perceive the quality costs and how they

measure these costs. 85.5% of the 5-star

accommodation companies participating in the

research have a quality certificate, while only 52.7%

have a quality control department.

Keywords: quality cost, total quality management,

accommodation, cost management

Introduction

In 2018, tourism exports made up of 1.4 billion

tourists participating in the international tourism

movement reached USD 1.7 trillion. The tourism

sector accounts for 29% of world service exports

and 7% of total exports, ranking third after the

chemical and petroleum industry (UNWTO, 2019

:1). The ever-increasing growth rate demonstrates

the importance of the sector. Nowadays, with the

effect of globalization, competition increase is seen

in enterprises. The shift from the idea of selling

what I produce to a customer-oriented production

approach and the continuous change of conditions

due to the development of technology has brought

the needs of enterprises to sustainable competition.

In order to maintain the competitive advantage, the

focus has been on the production of quality

products and services (Atış ve Şener, 2017 :171). It

is a possibility that low quality products and

services will cause losses in market share.

Moreover, the return of the costs of low quality

products and services to enterprises can be quite

high cost. For this purpose, executives who want to

keep up with the increasing competitive

environment and to get a high share from the

market are doing some works in order to improve

the quality of their products and services. One of

these is to establish quality cost systems in order to

monitor quality costs and to ensure that poor

quality is prevented before realization occurs.

Quality-related costs are the result of factors that

affect the quality of service carried out in all parts of

the business.For example prevention cost, appraisal

cost etc. In this context, in order to create an

effective QCS (Quality Cost System), enterprises

must ensure the cost-effectiveness and quality of

their products and services continuously (Oğan ve

Oğan, 2017 :433). Quality departments established

to create quality and ensure continuity are planning

to reduce or eliminate quality costs. In this study,

the importance and classification of quality costs

are mentioned. In addition, the number of

enterprises with quality departments and

quality certificates was examined

Cost and Cost of Quality

Total Quality Management (TQM) is a system used

for continuous improvement of product and service

quality. TQM is a system that provides

improvement, flexibility increase, business

efficiency and efficiency. Quality costs should

therefore be identified and included in the

calculations. Because such information is required

in the quality system management process.

İnvestment in quality and the estimation of costs

resulting from low quality is an important factor in

79


the assessment of total business performance.

Nowadays, business organizations face a complex

and competitive environment. This forces

manufacturers to improve their quality, prices and

lead times in order to take advantage of their

competitors (Wudhikarn, 2012 : 3439-3440).

Researchers have made important studies on the

concept of quality. As a result of these studies,

quality standards that are valid all over the world

have been established. Founded in 1947, the ISO

(International Organization for Standardization)

has published 22208 International Standards

covering almost every sector from technology to

food safety, agriculture and health. Some standards

that are of particular interest to the tourism sector

can be listed in Table 1.

Table 1: ISO standards concerning the tourism

sector

ISO/TC 228: Tourism for everyone with accessibility standards

ISO 13009: Requirements and recommendation for beach operation

ISO 21401: Sustainability management system for accomodation establishments, requirements

ISO 21426: Medical spas, service requirements

ISO 18513: Tourism services, hotels and other types of tourism accommodation terminology

ISO 20410: Bareboat charter, minimum service and equipment requirements

ISO 17679: Welness spa: service requirements

ISO 18065: Tourist services for public use provided by Natural Protected Areas Authorities

ISO 17680: Thalassotherapy- service requirements

ISO 13810: Industrial tourism : service provision

ISO/CD 22876 Tourism and related services

ISO/DIS 22483 Tourism and related services -- Accommodation Hotels --

Service requirements

ISO/DIS 22525 Tourism and related services -- Medical tourism Service

requirements

ISO/DIS 21902 Tourism and related services Accessible tourism for all --

Requirements and recommendations

ISO/WD 21620 Tourism and related services-Heritage Hotels

ISO/AWI 23405 Tourism and related services-Principles terminology of

sustainable tourism

ISO 21103: Adventure tourism -- Information for participants

ISO 21101: Adventure tourism -- Safety management systems

Requirements

ISO/TS 13811:Tourism and related services-Guidelines developing

environmental specifications for accommodation establishments

ISO 20611:2018 Adventure tourism

ISO/DIS 21406 Tourism and related services -- Yacht harbours -- Essential

requirements for luxury harbours

ISO 13687: Tourism and related services -- Yacht harbours -- Minimum

requirements

ISO 13687-1:Yacht harbours -- Part 1: Minimum requirements for basic

service level harbours

13687-2 :Yacht harbours -- Part 2:

13687-3:Yacht harbours -- Part 3:

14785:Tourist information offices

Source:

https://www.iso.org/standards.html

Quality costs are defined as costs incurred due to

low quality, that is, they arise due to failure to meet

the requirements of the specified quality standards

(Kurşunel and Kınalı, 2018 :110). According to

British Organization-BS6143 (1990) Standards and

American Quality Control Association (ASQC, 1971),

quality cost is defined as being able to produce

quality and all of the costs that occur when quality

production is performed (Oğan and Oğan,

2017 :433). The importance of this subject has

attracted the attention of many researchers.The first

written reference to the term cost of quality was

made by Juran in the early 1950s. In particular, the

Quality Control Handbook defines the cost of poor

quality as the sum of all costs that would be lost if

there were no quality problems. According to

Sansalvador and Brotons (2017 :73), any cost that

will not arise if the quality is excellent contributes to

the cost of quality.Feigenbaum's PAF (prevention,

appraisal, failure) model in 1956 was accepted as

almost universal (Moen, 1998 :334). The definitions

for each of the categories of the PAF classification

are stated by Campanella (in 1990) (Villar-Castillo,

Smith, and Simonton, 2012 :5545). According to this

model, quality costs are divided into four parts as

prevention costs, evaluation costs, internal failure

costs and external failure costs (Waisarayutt and

Wongwiwat, 2015 :27). An effective quality

improvement program is designed to minimize total

cost of quality by reasonably balancing the four

components of quality cost (prevention, evaluation,

internal failure and external failure) (Laszlo,

1997 :410). In his book "Quality is Free", Crosby

(1979) divided quality costs into two as compliance

and non-compliance costs (Kurşunel and Kınalı,

2018 :111). Quality costs are the total cost of

problems that occur before and after a product or

service is delivered to the customer (Janssen, 1998 :

60). They represent the difference between the

actual cost of a product or service and what the cost

will be in the absence of a defect in substandard

service, product failure or manufacturing defects

(Chopra and Garg, 2011 :510).

Prevention

cost

Cost of

Quality

Appraisal

cost

Failure

cost

internal

failure

external

failure

Figure 1: Cost of Quality

Source: Rodchua, S. (2006). Factors, measures, and

problems of quality costs program implementation

in the manufacturing environment, Journal of

Industrial Technology, 22/4, 3.

Measuring and reporting the cost of quality (COQ) is

the first step in the quality management program.

Even in the service sectors, COQ systems are of

great interest. COQ information can be used to

identify key opportunities for corrective action and

80


to provide incentives to improve quality

(Wudhikarn, 2012 :3439-3440). Quality Cost (COQ)

programs provide a way to measure costs and

prioritize quality improvement efforts (Schmidt and

Pearson, 2019 :60). There are two important

reasons for quality management practices: the need

to satisfy the customer and meeting the

requirements of the supply chain. In meeting these

requirements, quality standards must be adopted

and process optimization must be achieved

(Ramdass and Nemavhola, 2018 :17). The purpose

of the quality cost system is to identify areas where

quality cost improvements can be made. Senior

management support is a crucial factor for the

successful implementation of the quality cost

program (Rodchua, 2006 :1-6). Some managers

believe that high quality leads to higher costs. This

view is based on the idea of increasing the number

of controls to improve quality. In most cases high

quality means additional investment for businesses

(Beshah, Gidey and Leta, 2017 :120). The costs of

quality practices reduce the benefits of cost savings,

create additional costs, and managers are

disgruntled ( Ramdass and Nemavhola, 2018 :17).

The cost of valuation, also known as measurement

costs, relates to the measurement, evaluation or

inspection of products, components, purchased

materials and services to ensure that products and

services comply with predetermined quality

standards and performance requirements (Chopra

and Garg, 2011 :511). Valuation costs are the costs

of quality control and testing. The beginning of the

valuation cost is the adoption of material entry

procedures that determine the properties and

conditions of the raw materials. Subsequent

activities are quality control performed by

laboratories (Waisarayutt and Wongwiwat, 2015

:27). Valuation costs are also the costs associated

with the valuation process and contract creation to

be undertaken by the manufacturer (Sedliacikova et

al., 2015 :78).

Prevention costs include quality expenditure

incurred to prevent unsatisfactory products that

arise to prevent defects and non-conformities from

occurring (Chopra and Garg, 2011 :511). These are

costs related to the activities carried out in order to

improve the quality as a result of the prevention

and elimination of risks and to prevent the

provision of low quality products and services

(Sedliacikova et al., 2015 :78). The first issue in

prevention costs is the planning of quality system

building activities such as designing, developing and

implementing quality assurance plans. These

activities are generally related to measurement and

the instruments used for measurement. The second

issue is the training program for people and

suppliers that will influence this plan. The third

issue concerns the hygiene of the production

environment throughout the process. And the final

81

issue is the cost of maintenance and e-supervision

to ensure consistent use of the quality system

(Waisarayutt and Wongwiwat, 2015 :27).

Internal failure cost; failures in the process are

related to organizational performances and

management, such as time and labor gap and

reprocessing (Waisarayutt and Wongwiwat, 2015

:27). Internal losses are costs incurred in cases

where the product and service do not meet the

quality requirements as a result of the errors that

occur during the fulfillment of the conditions

stipulated by the legislation (Sedliacikova et al.,

2015 :78). If there is no defect in the product or

service, it will be eliminated (Chopra and Garg,

2011 :511). Internal quality costs increase an

organization's operational costs and include waste,

inspection, billing errors, rework, unapproved

activities, and other preventable operational costs

(Janssen, 1998 :60). These costs can be categorized

as the cost of repetitive processes to achieve the

desired quality level, material procurement costs,

and cost of time that employees spend to correct

poor quality products or services (Dalci and Tanis,

2002 :138-139).

Losses resulting from failure to meet customer

demands and regulatory requirements after being

delivered to the customer constitute the cost of

external failure (Sedliacikova et al., 2015 :78). In

other words, if the product does not meet the needs

of customers, external downtime costs arise.

External breakdown costs increase as the number of

defective units delivered to the customer increases

(Dalci and Tanis, 2002 :139). These costs will be

eliminated even if there is no defect in the products

(Chopra and Garg, 2011 :511). External quality

costs can have a negative impact on current and

future turnover and result from product returns,

customer claims, warranty payments and lost

customers (Janssen, 1998 :60). External failure

costs; the costs arising from the compensation of

the damages due to the low quality of the product or

service received by the customers, the costs

incurred by examining, reorganizing the product or

service complained of, the costs incurred due to the

impact of low quality service provision, reduction in

sales and loss of business image can be sorted as

(Dalci and Tanis, 2002 :138-139).

RESEARCH METHOD

Purpose and Importance of Research

Customer satisfaction is very important in terms of

accommodation businesses serving in the tourism

sector.The perceived quality level of customers

purchasing products and services affects the

competitiveness level of the accommodation

business.Businesses who want to gain competitive

advantage in the market, who want to provide

quality standards in their products and services,


establish quality departments within their bodies

and ensure efficient operation of the quality cost

system.The aim of this research is to determine the

level of quality cost systems of 5 star

accommodation establishments operating in

Antalya. It is necessary for the managers to

determine the quality cost items in their enterprises

and to make comparisons with the competitors.

Population of research, Sample, Data

collection method

The 5-star accommodation establishments serving

in Antalya constitute the universe of the

research.Survey method was used as data collection

tool.The scale prepared by Gavranic (2007) was

used to determine the extent to which the

prerequisites for the implementation of quality cost

accounting are met as part of management

accounting, a subsystem of the management

information system.In order to determine the

reliability level of the scale, reliability analysis was

performed and Cronbach's Alpha value was found

to be 0.790.The closer the value is to 1, the greater

the reliability level (Nunnaly, 1978 :245).The

surveys were distributed online and handed over to

some businesses that were not available online.A

total of 80 managers answered the questionnaires

and 6 questionnaires were not evaluated due to

missing data, and frequency analysis of the data was

performed.

Findings of the Properties of Hospitality

Industry

As can be seen in Table 1, the occupancy rates of 42

out of 74 enterprises participated in the research

ranged from 60% to 89%.30 enterprises operate

with a fill rate of 90% to 100%.These rates indicate

that 5-star hotels in the Antalya region have high

occupancy rates.Although the number of personnel

working in the enterprises varies between 100 and

400, 10,81% of the hotels have over 500 personnel.

Table 2: Room occupancy rates and number of

personnel of the surveyed enterprise (All 5 star

hotel participants)

What is the occupancy rate of your F %

business?

%0-29 0 0

%30-59 2 2,7

%60-89 42 56,75

%90-100 30 40,54

How many staff do you have in your F %

business?

0-100 5 6,75

101-200 18 24,32

201-300 19 25,67

301-400 19 25,67

401-500 5 6,75

500 and above 8 10,81

Findings of Quality Cost Systems of Hospitality

Industry

Quality standards should be determined in order to

obtain the goods and services produced by the

enterprises in the quality that is closest to the

customer expectations and in the most appropriate

way.Current economic conditions require all

organizations to review and strictly control the

costs of these standards (Laszlo,1997 :410).

Monitoring quality costs is a very effective way of

finding new ways to increase the success of

businesses (Sedliacikova et al., 2015 :77). For this

reason, it is very important nowadays whether the

enterprises have quality certificates, units that work

specifically for quality and quality cost reporting

systems. 85.5% of the 74 5 star accommodation

companies participating in the research have any

quality certificate.Although this is a very high rate,

the same consciousness has not developed

sufficiently during the creation of the quality control

department.Only 52.7% of the enterprises

established a special unit for quality control.62.16%

of enterprises report quality costs.The quality cost

reporting system is at the cost centers level in

28.57% of hotels, at certain activities level in

28.57%, and at the business system level as a whole

in 26.53%.

Table 3: Findings of quality cost systems of

enterprises

Do you have quality certificate? F %

Yes 59 85,5

No 10 14,49

Do you have quality control F %

department?

Yes 39 52,7

No 35 47,29

Do you have a quality cost reporting F %

system?

Yes 46 62,16

No 28 37,83

What is your quality reporting system F %

level?

At cost centers level 14 28,57

Business system level as a whole 13 26,53

At the level of responsibility centers 8 16,32

Specific activities level 14 28,57

In this section, where the quality costs faced by 74

hotel managers participating in the research are

investigated, prevention costs are listed first. It is

seen that the enterprises mostly consider the gift of

flowers, music and animation, and the cost of

preventing flowers placed in order to contribute to

the ambiance. Quality education, which is very

important for the maintenance of the quality

standard, is the prevention cost for only 33

enterprises. When the evaluation / test costs are

examined, the "Consultation costs made by expert

or consultant organizations regarding the business

82


activities" takes the first place. The second is the

quality control cost (for independent evaluation,

inspection and control) and the third is the cost of

testing the materials and raw materials to be used

(such as the quality of meat to be used in the

kitchen or the quality of tablecloths). The most

common internal failure cost in the surveyed

enterprises was repeated services (cleaning,

towels) if the first service proved to be poor; The

most common external failure cost is price

reductions due to guest complaints.

Table 4: Quality costs of enterprises

Which of the following prevention costs do F %

you have?

Cost of collecting and analyzing quality 20 5,18

performance data

Expenditures for the continuation of the 28 7,25

quality system(rent communication etc.)

New product design costs 18 4,66

Travel costs incurred for visits to 17 4,4

recognize the competitive environment

and competitors(sending a staff member

as a guest to measure competing hotel

services and quality)

Flowers in reception area and rooms (use 37 9,58

to contribute to ambiance)

continuation of table 4

Development of quality manual and 31 8,03

procedures(documents organized to

ensure that the employees understand the

quality culture and spread this culture

within the organization)

Quality training costs 33 8,54

Costs related to communication and 23 5,95

transportation activities with suppliers

Music entertainment and animation 43 11,13

Costs associated with auditing supplier 13 3,36

activities during the selection process of

suppliers

Costs related to quality planning 19 4,92

Costs for visits to competitors (meetings, 16 4,14

etc.)

Gifts for guests 44 11,39

Costs associated with new product 16 4,14

launches

Organizational structure of suppliers and 11 2,84

costs related to the analysis of production

processes

Rewards for employees (such as premium 17 4,4

payments made to promote quality or

behave according to quality standards)

Which of the following evaluation / test F %

costs are incurred in your business?

Hotel managers’ stays at hotels to get 20 13,79

familiar with products and services

Costs of audits / consultations carried out 29 20

by experts or consultancy bodies on

operational activities

control costs incurred after purchase to 21 14,48

determine the quality of purchased

products

Costs of depreciation, maintenance and 14 9,65

repair of materials and equipment

necessary to control quality costs.

Cost of laboratory tests to determine the 10 6,89

quality of purchased products.

Cost of quality inspection (for independent 28 19,31

evaluation, inspection and control).

Costs for testing the materials and raw 23 15,86

materials to be used (such as the quality of

meat used in the kitchen or the quality of

tablecloths).

What are the following internal failure F %

costs in your business?

Repeated services (cleaning, towels) if the 42 29,78

first service proves to be poor

Loss of earnings due to poor quality (loss 10 7,09

of customers)

Unhurted products and garbage caused by 39 27,65

quality deviations (steak which cannot be

consumed due to overcooking)

Repetition of control and testing costs to 34 24,11

maintain quality standards. (eg repeated

elevator failure)

Lowering prices due to low quality (lowpriced

16 11,34

or discounted sale)

What are the following external failure F %

costs in your business?

Price reductions due to guest complaints 33 21,71

Free services to eliminate customer 31 20,39

dissatisfaction due to insufficient quality.

Subsequent expenses (expenses incurred 13 8,55

due to complaints from previous years)

The advertising cuts made to guests 27 17,76

Cost incurred if contracts with tour 11 7,23

operators are not fulfilled due to poor

quality service.

Costs related to the analysis of guest 24 15,78

complaints

Costs related to customer losses due to

guest complaints.

13 8,55

The goal of keeping and monitoring quality costs for

most hotel managers is to ensure compliance with

customers' wishes and needs.32 of the managers

(ISO 1400 ff., HACCP and other) stated that meeting

the standards as a goal of keeping quality costs, 30

said that they contribute to improving the quality of

the organization and the system as a whole.

Table 5: Purpose of keeping records of quality

costs

What is the purpose of recording and F %

monitoring quality costs?

The only measurement of the effects of 8 2,97

TQM is based on these records and followup.

Identify those responsible for poor quality 17 6,31

and impose sanctions on them.

To contribute to the level of reporting and 13 4,83

information in the business system

Determination of factors related to the 12 4,46

development of personnel,especially

administrative personnel

Evaluate the contribution of certain 14 5,2

programs to business/business

performance (eg personnel training

programs)

eliminating bottlenecks in work processes 12 4,46

83


(distressing points in the workflow)

Achieving ISO 1400 ff., HACCP and other 32 11,89

standards

To raise awareness of interdependence of 13 4,83

production and sales(quality products and

service)

Establishing a system of incentives for 13 4,83

employees to achieve better quality

Identify and eliminate the causes of nonquality

21 7,8

costs


Ensure compliance with legal regulations 27 10,03

or certain qualifications

Contribute to improving the quality of the 30 11,15

organization and the system as a whole

Ensuring compliance with customers' 47 17,47

requests and needs

No answer 10 3,71

63 of the enterprises reports the surveys in the

rooms and 48 of them report the surveys in the food

and beverage department.36 of the enterprises

report “restaurant occupational safety procedure”,

35 of them report “kitchen occupational safety

procedure and related comments’ and 34 of them

report “hygiene standards and related

interpretations”.It is seen that the enterprises

participating in the research mostly report the

quality costs in the food and beverage department.

The quality certificates to be obtained and the

studies carried out for the protection of these

documents can be cited as reasons for the

emergence of this situation.

Table 6: Reported quality costs

Which of the following Rooms F&B

services do you report on division section

the quality costs?

F % F %

Surveys 63 56 48 43

Evaluations in Professional / 23 63 12 36

Vocational / Sectoral Journals

Quality plans 24 61 15 38

Results of research conducted 21 65 11 34

by external agencies

Statistics 33 61 21 38

Reports 35 60 23 39

Checklists 23 57 17 42

VIP customer checklist 25 62 15 37

Top 10/100 customer list 18 64 10 35

Program for guests 11 39 17 60

entertainment / other

activities

Reservation procedures 21 70 9 30

/records

A la carte program, themed - - 18 90

nights,procedure

for

decorations

Cutting / cooking shows - - 18 94

Room service and comments - - 20 95

on these services

Mini bar procedure - - 22 91

Hygiene standards and related - - 34 85

comments

Kitchen occupational safety - - 35 97

procedure and related

comments

Buffet / table arrangements - - 21 95

and comments / evaluations

Entertainment programs - - 16 94

Supplier research - - 14 93

Restaurant work safety - - 36 97

procedure

Other 2 18 9 81

57.74% of enterprises compare their reports with

business circles and competitors.However, this

comparison is mainly based on sales prices.This

method is followed by the number of rooms sold /

number of overnight stays / length of stay and the

results according to the general indicators

(occupancy rate / income per room / revenue per

customer etc?). This is probably the result of

companies being stingy about providing

information.

Table 7: Comparison method used

Do you compare your results with your F %

business and competitors?

Yes 41 57,74


No 30 42,25

Which of the following data do you use F %

for benchmarking?

Number of rooms sold/ number of nights 20 20,83

/length of stay

Sales prices 30 31,25

Operating income (only for rooms) 1 1,04

Total income (rooms + spa + fitness etc.) 3 3,12

Total expenses 3 3,12

Operating expenses (general 3 3,12

administrative expenses)

Gross operating profit 4 4,16

Results according to general indicators 20 20,83

(occupancy rate / revenue per room /

revenue per customer, etc.?)

Gross profit rate 5 5,2

Cost structure (such as the ratio of fixed 3 3,12

and variable costs)

Fixed costs 1 1,04

Variable costs 2 2,08

Results of indicators based on the Uniform

Accounting System for the Hospitality

Sector (if USALI is used)

1 1,04

CONCLUSIONS AND

RECOMMENDATIONS

It is necessary for companies to perform

performance measurement in order to provide high

quality service. What is required for performance

measurement is the establishment of quality

standards. Although the quality improvement

works, which are usually created by the senior

84


management, seem to increase the total cost;

provides efficiency and profitability to the

business.Preventing the cost arising from the

repetition of the service to be provided depends on

the quality standards and implementation. Although

the concept of quality remains important in the

literature, its importance in accommodation

establishments has not yet been fully understood.

One of the most important reasons for this situation

is that managers and business owners are afraid of

the additional cost of quality studies. However,

quality service leads to positive results such as

customer satisfaction and loyalty, reduction of

waste, increase in productivity and competitive

advantage.For this reason, it is very important

nowadays whether the enterprises have quality

certificates, units that work specifically for quality

and quality cost reporting systems.It has been

determined that the majority of the hotels

participating in this study do not have a quality

control department. also businesses have been shy

about answering. Since the research is limited to

Antalya region, it is more appropriate not to

generalize.One of the limitations of the study is the

difficulty of a complete literature review due to the

large literature on COQ (Cost of Quality) models.

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85


The Evaluation of Restaurant Managers’ Views on the use Of Physical

Evidence: An Investigation on Upscale Restaurants in Konya

Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı a and Emel Çınarlı b

a Prof.Dr.-Necmettin Erbakan University – Faculty of Tourism, Department of Tourism Management

Köyceğiz Campus, Dere Aşıklar Quarter, Demeç Street, No:42 Konya - Turkey

abuyuksalvarci@konya.edu.tr

b Ph.D. Student-Necmettin Erbakan University – Institute of Social Sciences, Department of Tourism Management

Köyceğiz Campus, Dere Aşıklar Quarter, Demeç Street, No:42 Konya - Turkey

ecakmak87@hotmail.com

Abstract

The role of the physical environment in influencing

customer behavior and in creating a supplier’s image

is highly relevant to the service sector, including

restaurant industry. Indeed; while customers are

eating in a restaurant, they perceive the physical

environment consciously or unconsciously before,

during and after the meal. Whereas food and service

should be of acceptable quality; the elements of

pleasant physical environment such as decor,

furnishings, layout and music can largely determine

the degree of customer satisfaction and then

customer behavior. Physical evidences basically refer

to the physical environment in which the service

experience takes place. The aim of this study is to

evaluate the views of upscale restaurant managers in

Konya regarding the use of physical evidence. In this

context; in May 2019, face-to-face interviews were

conducted with the managers of restaurants using

semi-structured interview technique, which is one of

the data collection techniques used in qualitative

researches. According to the data obtained; it was

concluded that restaurant managers mostly focus on

customer desires, satisfaction, comfort and cost in

planning physical evidences; they benefit from

physical evidences to provide customer satisfaction

and loyalty; they usually change physical evidences

for compulsory reasons and they attach the greatest

importance to the staff element of physical evidence

dimensions. It also turned out that customers

commented on all the elements of physical evidence.

Keywords: Physical evidence, Restaurant

Introduction

The restaurant industry is one of the most

important contributors of the service sector in

many countries around the world. It is relatively

competitive by its nature resulting from an

increasive number of new entrepreneurs offering

differentiated food products and services. In

addition, customers are becoming more demanding

and their needs vary greatly. However, due to the

nature of the restaurant industry characterized by

high contact and human processing services, it is

very difficult to provide superior service for various

types of customers. Ensuring high customer

satisfaction for possible customer loyalty is crucial

to increase the competitiveness of restaurants

regardless of their type. In this respect, it is

important to understand the role and relative

importance of a number of key factors that can most

influence satisfaction and loyalty (Voon, 2017: 68).

The service, as well as sustaining competitive edge,

is also recognized as one of the effective means of

getting it.

Since the provision and exposition of services

cannot be immediate, companies should create a

favourable environment that will help customers

develop positive perceptions about the service. For

example; if the atmosphere in which they have to

wait is not pleasant, people may not want to wait

for any service or customers may disconnect from

that facility even due to single change in the layout

of the facility or the absence of clear signs (Yelkur,

2000: 111-112).

When a service is primarily consumed for hedonic

purposes and customers spend medium or long

periods in an atmospheric space, the physical

environment is an important determinant of

consumer psychology (e.g., disapproval or

satisfaction) and behavior (being a constant

customer or gossip). For instance, customers can

spend two or three hours in upscale restaurants and

they perceive the physical environment consciously

or unconsciously before, during and after the meal

(Ryu ve Jang, 2007: 57). In addition to food and

service, a pleasant physical environment which is

composed of innovative interior design and decor,

beautiful music, soft lighting, unique color scheme,

ambient fragrance, spacious layout, attractive table

settings and charming service staff determine the

overall customer satisfaction and loyalty to a great

86


extent (Han ve Ryu, 2009: 489). Physical evidences

include all concrete signs that support the provision

of the service and basically refer to the physical

environment in which the service experience takes

place (Amofah, Gyamfi ve Tutu, 2016: 106).

In this study which aims to evaluate the views of

upscale restaurant managers in Konya regarding

the use of physical evidence; the concept of physical

evidence is explained firstly, its importance in

service sector and especially in the restaurant

industry is mentioned and physical evidence

dimensions are classified. Then, the related studies

in the literature are included and the aims, methods

and findings of these studies are briefly mentioned.

Data collection technique is explained by accounting

for the purpose, importance, population and sample

of the research under the title of method. The data

obtained are explained under the head of findings.

The results reached within the scope of the research

and the recommendations developed for restaurant

managers and other researchers are presented in

the conclusions and recommendations section.

The Concept of Physical Evidence

In today's tough competition conditions, consumers

who are quite conscious compared to the past have

expectations such as benefiting from the products

offered only to them, being respected by the

enterprises and the enterprise’s comfortableness.

While consumer expectations changed, innovations

were realized in product and service marketing and

the elements of marketing mix were expanded. 4P

(Product, Price, Place, Promotion) were deemed

inadequate in service marketing and a further 3P,

consisting of People, Physical Evidence and Process

were added upon Bomms and Bitner (1981)’s

proposal. The elements of the marketing mix are

also very important for the tourism sector, as it is

for all businesses operating in the service sector.

Since touristic products can not be tested before

they are used, their quality varies according to the

perception of the customer and they are generally

not physical or touchable; it is very difficult to

market these products. That’s why; tourism

businesses and especially restaurants can succeed

in marketing the business by paying attention to

physical evidences that provide services with

touchability and provide concrete clues to

customers about the service (Demiral ve Özel, 2016:

192-193).

Akroush (2011) indicates that physical evidences

constitute all concrete elements that provide an

intimate atmosphere within the service

environment. He also adds that this is often ignored

by most service providers. According to Kotler

(2003); due to the abstraction, there is more

uncertainty in the purchase of a service, but the

uncertainty can be reduced when there are material

elements to embody this abstraction. Therefore, in

some cases; he stated that the atmosphere of the

space could be as important as the product itself

(such as food and services) in the decision making

process. Creative use of physical design in a

restaurant business will be important in developing

certain marketing objectives such as positive

perception of quality by customers, positive

evaluation of experience and developing positive

attitudes.

Elements that directly or indirectly affect

consumers in the service environment constitute

physical evidences which is one of the components

of the service marketing mix. Physical evidences are

the elements that affect service perceptions of the

individuals by adressing the sense organs of them

(Avan, 2015: 33). Physical evidence mixture

involves the elements such as maintenance of

building and interior decor, smooth walls and

ceilings, clean floor space and signboards,

temperature and personal items to enhance

costomer experience (Amofah vd., 2016: 106).

Bitner (1992) presented a comprehensive model to

understand how the physical environment of a

service organization can affect the individual

behavior of customers, arguing that the physical

environment helps distinguish a service provider

from its competitors and thus affects customer

choice. Physical environment dimensions involve

ambient conditions such as noise, music, smell,

lighting, temperature and spatial layout including

arrangement of furniture and equipment, signs,

symbols, decor and signboards.

In the literature; the dimensions of physical

evidence are classified in various ways in different

studies on physical evidences used in the

restaurants. In this study; physical evidences based

on generally accepted classifications in the

literature; are categorized in 4 dimensions (Demiral

ve Özel, 2016: 200):

• Ambience (music, smell, colour, lighting,

noise, temperature/ventilation and

cleanliness)

• Design factors (place/location, exterior and

interior design, decor and the equipment

used)

• Signboards/signs and symbols

• Social elements (staff and customers)

Literature Review

Bitner (1992), in her study in which she

investigated the impact of physical environment on

customers and employees, used the term

“servicescape” in order to describe “built

environment” or in particular “man-made physical

87


environment as opposed to natural or social

environment”. In her study physical environment

involved all objective physical factors that can be

controlled by service firms to improve the internal

(e.g.,comprehension, emotion, satisfaction) and

external responses (e.g., stay, being a regular

customer, attitude) of customers (or emplyees).

Bitner (1992) argued that the intangible nature of

services might lead to consumers’ carrying out

cognitive evaluations of service quality based on

exogenous clues in the service environment of

consumers.

In their study, Kim and Moon (2009), investigated

the cognitive, emotional and actionable responses of

customers to the service environment in

restaurants. Based on Bitner’s environmental

perception framework, these hypotheses were

proposed; 1)Will the service environment have a

significant impact on the perceived service quality

of the customers and the sense of pleasure? 2)Do

customers’ perceived service quality and sense of

pleasure affect positively their intention to visit

again? 3)Does situational factor, i.e. the type of

themed restaurant, play a moderate role among

perceived quality of service, sense of pleasure and

intention to visit again? The research hypotheses

were tested using survey data collected from 208

visitors at the Banff Tourist Information Center in

Alberta, Canada in 2009. The results emphasize that

themed restaurant managers need to understand

the perception processes of customers about

emotion and cognition.

Baker and Cameron (1996), in their studies,

benefited from the literature on architecture,

environmental psychology, psychology, physiology,

operations management, sociology and marketing

in order to set a conceptual model on how the

service environment can affect and change the

perception of waiting time. Based on this model,

they provided suggestions on how certain elements

such as lighting, color and temperature in the

service environment can affect and change the

perception of time. A research agenda and

implications for the design of the service facility

were proposed at the end of the study.

In Demiral (2015)’s thesis study titled

“Determination of Restaurant Managers’

Perspectives Towards Utilization of Physical

Evidences: The Case of Eskişehir”, the data were

collected by means of a semi structured interview

form using interview technique. In the light of the

data obtained; it was concluded that the majority of

the restaurant managers took care of the ambience

and design elements when planning physical

evidence, they benefited from the physical

evidences to provide customer satisfaction, they

generally changed the physical evidences used

compulsorily and they paid the most attention to

cleanliness and decor among the physical evidence

dimensions.

In Kama (2015)’s thesis titled “Exploring the Role of

Physical Evidences on the Consumers’ Restaurant

Preferences: A Qualitative Research”, the data were

obtained through observations and interviews.

Micro analysis, open coding and selective coding

techniques were used in analysis. As a result of the

study; it was concluded that consumers perceived

color, music, hygiene, staff and menu elements as a

whole. Location and other consumers in the

restaurant were determined to be other dimensions

of physical evidence that should be included in the

dining area scale. It was observed that negative

situations could be ignored in cases where the

impact of physical evidence on the consumer was

generally positive.

In Karkın (2008)’s thesis titled “Physical Evidences

as a Component of Service Marketing and

Atmospherics in Hotels”, the specific characteristics

of the service were discussed in the context of hotel

businesses. “Physical evidences” and “service

atmosphere” of the enterprise were described in

order to develop positive attitudes of consumers

about the service and the effect of the hotel

atmosphere on customer satisfaction was examined.

Voon (2017), in his study in which he aimed to

discover the importance of service environment,

food quality and price from the perspective of the

young; conducted a questionnaire on 409

businesses including luxury restaurants, fast food

restaurants and shopping center restaurants. As a

result of the study; the key determinants of

satisfaction and loyalty were established as human

services and price. The impact of the service

environment on customer satisfaction and loyalty

was relatively low, with the exception of fast food

restaurants.

In their study, Hyun and Kang (2014) examined the

effects of environmental and non-environmental

signals on customers’ emotional responses and the

impact of emotions on customers’ behavioral

intentions. According to the data obtained; it was

concluded that both environmental and nonenvironmental

signs triggered customers’

stimulation in the upscale restaurant environment,

but environmental signs had a stronger effect on

stimulation than non-environmental signs. More

importantly, among the various environmental

signs, environmental conditions were determined to

be the most powerful element triggering customer

excitation

88


Method

The aim of this study is to evaluate the views of

upscale restaurant managers in Konya regarding

the use of physical evidence. The study population

is the managers of upscale restaurants located in

the city center of Konya. The reason of upscale

restaurant managers’ being target population of the

study is that customers of upscale restaurants often

spend 2 hours or more, sensing physical

surroundings consciously or unconsciously before,

during and after the meal (Ryu ve Jang, 2007: 57)

and thus it was assumed that more comprehensive

information on physical evidence could be obtained

from the managers of these restaurants. Purposeful

sampling method, one of the non-random sampling

methods was used in the research. İslamoğlu and

Alnıaçık (2016) described it as a sampling based on

the assumption that it will represent the population

according to various criteria.

In the study; semi-structured interview form used

in qualitative research methods was used as data

collection tool. Qualitative research methods were

preferred due to the need for in-depth information

for the purpose of the research and the fact that it

was appropriate to obtain this information directly

from the restaurant managers. The semi-structured

interview technique allows the interviewer to ask

the questions prepared in advance for the purpose

and to elaborate the subject with additional

questions depending on the answer received (Çepni,

2007:34). It also allows the interviewee to give all

kinds of information freely (İslamoğlu ve Alnıaçık,

2016: 221). The questions in the interview form

used in the research were taken from Demiral

(2015)’s thesis titled “Determination of Restaurant

Managers’ Perspectives Towards Utilization of

Physical Evidences: The Case of Eskişehir”. In

accordance with the purpose of the research;

interviews were carried out with restaurant chefs,

restaurant managers, business managers and

restaurant owners of 16 upscale restaurants in the

city center of Konya within the framework of 6 main

questions in May 2019. During the interviews,

sound recording was taken with the permission of

the participants. The points considered to be

important were also noted. The interviews lasted 20

minutes on an average.

Findings

As a result of the data analysis; managers’

intoductory information and the findings of general

characteristics of the restaurants were written.

Then, as a result of the interviews conducted with

the people working in positions such as restaurant

chef, restaurant manager, business manager and

restaurant owner; the edited form of the answers

received within the framework of 6 main research

questions were presented.

89

Managers’ Introductory Information

One of the most important criteria in the research is

the fact that the participants are composed of

people such as restaurant chefs, restaurant

managers, business managers and restaurant

owners. This is because they are the ones who know

the restaurant the best, who know the physical

evidence used in the restaurant and who have the

authority to make decisions about the planning of

the physical evidence. The table below shows the

introductory information of the restaurant

managers interviewed.

Table 1 – Managers’ introductory information

Code Age Gender Position

Profession

al time in

the

restaurant

(year)

Total

manage

ment

time

(year)

Training

in

restaura

nt

manage

ment

M1 50 Male Manager 1 30 yıl √

M2 41 Male Chef 12 11 yıl X

M3 25 Male Owner 6 months 6 ay √

M4 59 Male Owner 35 35 yıl X



M7 40 Male Manager 8 14 yıl √

M8 42 Male Chef 18 15 yıl X

M9 35 Male Manager 6 8 yıl X

M10 42 Male Manager 10 months 9 yıl X

M11 32 Male Chef 3 2 yıl √

M12 36 Female Manager 6 6 yıl X

M13 44 Male Owner 9 months 10 yıl X



M16 31 Male Chef 2 4 yıl √

When the table is examined, it is seen that the ages

of managers vary between 25 and 59. Only 1 of the

interviewed managers was female and the

remaining 15 were male. 7 of the interviewees were

restaurant owners, 5 were restaurant managers and

4 were restaurant chefs. The professional time of

the managers in the restaurant varies between 6

months and 35 years. Total management time of the

participants also range from 6 months to 35 years. 5

of the participants had training on restaurant

management or management while 11 of them

didn’t have any training in this area.

Findings of the Restaurants

General characteristics of the restaurants included

in the research were examined under the headings

of operating period, seating capacity, the number of

staff working in the restaurant, target group and the

type of restaurant. Data obtained are shown in the

table.

Table 2 – Characteristics of the restaurants


Type

Operating

Seating Staff

Kod period

Target group

capacity number

(year)

R1 1 400 33 Everyone Independent

R2 17 500 48

High-income

Independent

people

R3 6 months 423 50

Middle and

upper income Independent

groups




R7 8 250 29

High-income

Independent

people

R8 10 300 32

High-income

Independent

people

R9 19 250 27

Middle and


groups

R10 22 180 25

Middle and


groups

R11 7 200 23

High-income

Independent

people


R13 9 months 270 30

High-income

Independent

people

R14 3 450 40

High-income

Independent

people

R15 2 340 32

Middle and


groups


Operating periods of the restaurants vary from 6

months to 35 years. Their seating capasities are

between 160 and 500 people. Staff numbers of

these restaurants vary between 14 and 50. 6 of the

interviewed managers stated that their target group

was high income people, 4 of them stated that they

adressed the middle and upper income groups and

the remaining 6 of them stated that they addressed

the people from all strata. All of the restaurants

interviewed are independent restaurants.

As a result of the interviews conducted; the edited

form of the answers received within the framework

of the research questions is presented below.

What do you pay attention to when planning and

creating physical evidences in your restaurant

(the prestige of the restaurant, making more

profits, costs etc.)?

As a result of the interviews, the elements that

managers generally pay attention to when planning

and creating physical evidence are specified as;

-Ambience (cleanliness, ventilation, lighting, music)

-Design (making a difference, decoration, layout,

parking area)

-Social elements: Staff (appearance and training)

Customer (customer requests, customer

satisfaction, customer comfort, gaining the trust of

the customer)

-Quality

-Costs

-Laws and regulations

The matter to which all the interviewed managers

paid the most attention is customer requests,

satisfaction and comfort. Cost is the most focused

issue after the customer when planning and

creating physical evidence. Respectively decoration,

cleanliness and staff are the most important points

after customer and cost. Only one manager said that

due to the location of the restaurant the most

important factor was the laws and regulations.

The prominent statements of managers about the

creation and planning of physical evidences are as

follows:

…Visuality, hygiene, quality and hospitality are very

important for us. While creating all of these, we ask

ourselves “Who will we address? what are we asked

for? How can we be different? We are trying to make

a difference by giving cultural textures prominence.

The customer who came here is our biggest ad, we try

to make the customer happy.

…A restaurant with open ceilings. We have created a

very spacious environment 5 meters in height, the

ceiling does not appear. Lighting is not general,

separate for each table. A nice setting. There’s an

open kitchen which gives people confidence. Tables,

chairs, armchairs were tested one by one in the

aspects such as comfort, access to the plate. For the

staff we chose a serious outfit that carries corporate

pressure to make a serious impression on the guest.

There’s a serious ventilation system. Different music

plays every hour. Parking and valet service are

available. We thought of people’s comfort at every

step. Of course it was a serious cost. We care about

saving. We calculate how much we earn per waiter

and square meter.

…We change the clothes of the staff twice a year, in

summer and winter. We are open to innovation in

decoration. We renew the menu very often. Continuity

in quality is very important for us.

The statement of the manager, who said that they

paid the most attention to the laws and regulations

because of the location of the restaurant, is below:

…This is a protected area. There are two large tombs

in the garden. There are also eight graves in these

large tombs. Due to the large tombs, both Directorate

of Foundations and Council of Monuments have the

right to speak here. This place belongs to

municipality. We can not modify or renovate after

90


our own heart. Everything is happening with

permission. Still, we try to answer in the light of the

customers’ expectations. The restaurant spreads on

quite a large area. No restaurant integrity, not

suitable for live music since there is not a single hall.

The music played is constantly changing within

hours.

For what purposes do you benefit from physical

evidences in your restaurant?

All managers interviewed stated that they benefited

from physical evidences to ensure customer

comfort and satisfaction. Just after the comfort and

satisfaction of the customer, the most common

answer was to follow the innovations and trends.

Creating brand value, creating a beautiful

environment and adaptation of the staff were the

other three most given answers.

The purpose of restaurants to benefit from physical

evidence is reflected in the managers’ responses as

follows:

…Everything here is for the comfort of people. We

care about innovation, we follow the latest trend. We

strive to create brand value.

…The most important thing for the sustainable and

long-term trade is to ensure the trust of the customer.

If the customer is happy, both the place and the boss

are happy. If the boss is happy, the staff is also happy.

So the reason of our existence is our customers. For

example, summer is coming now; there will be

sunshade and raincoat in the open area for the

comfort of the customers. The staff wears seasonal

clothes; casual dress in summer, shirt and tie suitable

for weather conditions in winter.

…It is more a matter of supply and demand, the goal

is customer satisfaction. When implementing a new

evolution, it is first looked at how it will affect the

staff and the adaptation of the staff is ensured. For

example, there was no breakfast in the past, but there

is now. There is a training of this, the staff is trained

for the presentaion. The architect we work with

makes the necessary changes getting our opinion. For

example, the lamps on the terrace have been

increased.

…We want our customers to feel like at their home.

All our efforts are directed to this.

Did you receive any comments from the

customers about physical evidences during the

period you worked at the restaurant?

As a result of the interviews, it came out that

customers commented on all aspects of physical

evidences in the restaurants. However, it is possible

to say that decoration is the most praised issue

while parking area is the most negatively criticised

matter in the restaurants.

The prominent answers to the question “Did you

receive any comments from the customers about

physical evidences during the period you worked at

the restaurant? are as follows:

…Our kitchen is open. The client sees what he eats,

how it is cooked and how the cook makes it. We

exhibit jam, pickle, olive, hot sauce and flower okra

openly. Customer who wants can buy our homemade,

natural products whose flavor he liked, which makes

people happy. We get the most praise in this regard.

The most complained issue is the lack of masjid. But

also we’re gonna make up that deficiency. The

architectural project of it is being drawn, it will also

be done.

…Customers can comment on everything from the

saltshaker’s being single-hole to lighting. They may

want us to adjust the ambient temperature. There are

those who praise and criticise music. There may also

be customers asking why the lawn is not cared

outside. There may be people who get angry when

they can’t find a place in the parking lot. They can

comment on the presentation. We are always open to

criticism.

…Architecture and decoration are appreciated. We

get comments that chairs and tables are very

comfortable. It is appreciated that the kitchen is open

and transparent. It is said to be a beautiful setting.

We get the most negative criticism about parking.

People don’t like valet service.

…We come in for most criticism regarding the delay

of orders and the presentation.

What are the reasons of changing the elements of

physical evidences in your restaurant?

As a result of the interviews, all the managers

showed compulsory reasons such as aging,

breakage, renovation and maintenance as the

reasons of changing the physical evidences in the

restaurants. The purpose of innovation and the

arrangement according to the concept are the other

answers. The arrangement according to the concept

is realized in two ways. The first one is the

arrangement of the layout and ambience in the

events such as birthdays, henna nights, live music

and mass meals; the second is the general concept

change after a certain period of time.

The prominent statements of restaurant managers

about the reasons of changing the physical

evidences are as follows:

…These are very costly jobs. That’s why we mostly

change because of aging. We can create seating

91


arrangements by decorating the place for various

organisations such as birthdays and mass meals.

…We change many things due to breakage,

contamination, aging and of course for recondition.

We are also trying to follow new trends and fashion.

…Here is a new business which is already active for 6

months. So we don’t need to change anything for

innovation. Everything has already been designed in

accordance with the latest trends and fashion. But of

course there can be things that we have to change

constantly for reasons such as deterioration,

breakage and wear.

…We mostly make changes due to breakage and

aging. We change the decoration in a longer time. If

we have exceeded 2 years with the current concept,

we move on to a different concept. Of course the

reason of this is to offer a difference to the customer.

So that the restaurant won’t look the same every time

he comes.

What are the most frequently changed physical

evidence elements in your restaurant?

When the answers given to this question are

examined one by one, the elements of design

dimension such as glasses, plates, forks, spoons,

knives, tableclothes, salt shakers, pepper shakers,

worn objects etc. become prominent. Ambience

dimension, lighting element of which is the most

uttered one, comes after the design. Staff uniforms

are the third physical elements which are most

frequently changed. Since glasses, plates, tablecloths

are the most needed materials in the restaurant,

they are the elements which are changed as soon as

possible. Elements that include fundamental

changes such as tables, chairs and general

decoration are changed in the long run.

The statements reflecting the overall responses

received from the restaurant managers are as

follows:

…Mostly porcelain, plates and cups are changed. We

arrange the layout of the tables according to

customer demand. For example, we can arrange 20-

person if they want. Since we work in a single hall, we

can not get out of the layout. We can not make

square or u table.

…Mainly broken plates and cups are renewed.

Especially due to the ozone bleach of the tea glasses,

they get thinner and are broken quickly. When the

waiter clears the table, he can forget the fork and

knife in the tablecloth and these can be lost being

poured into the trash. The same series are reinforced

every year. Walls are painted each year. Tablecloths

are also changed very often.

…Spotlight is too much in our lighting. We change

frequently because the spots explode all the time.

Dirty places are being painted. Decorative products

are changed when worn. When forks, spoons and

knives decrease, new ones are added. Staff uniforms

are also changed twice a year.

…Tablecloths are washed in the washer. Since stains’

coming off is not easy, chemicals are used. So they

wear out and are constantly renewed but because

they are the same of the old ones, they do not seem

different to the eye. Crockery, glass and salt shaker

sets are constantly renewed.

According to you, what are the most important

physical evidence dimensions in restaurants?

Why?

The majority of the restaurant managers

interviewed stated that the most important element

of physical evidence was the staff. According to

managers; staff’s approach to customer, cleanliness

and presentation are very important in ensuring

customers’ trust. The dimension of physical

evidence considered the most important after the

staff is the clenliness of the ambience elements.

After staff and cleanliness comes the design

dimension which includes elements such as

decoration, exterior design, menu and parking area.

Examples of the explanations reflecting the most

important dimensions of physical evidence for

restaurant managers in general are as follows:

…Cleanliness and hygiene are the most important

ones. These are essential in order to gain the trust of

the customer.

…When the customer takes his first step into the

restaurant, exterior design and decor are of course

very important in the first phase but I think the most

important element is the staff. Because everything

depends on man. The biggest share in the provision of

order, hygiene and more belongs to staff.

…Service quality, presentation and continuity are

important. We need to maintain the standard. The

location of the restaurant, lack of parking problems,

being an open area, having the pool are each an

advantage. The quality of the menu is also one of the

top things.

…There are those who are in a better location than

us, I tihink the location is in the background.

Approach to the customer and giving confidence are

first and foremost. Hygiene, offering good product,

comfort are the most important things.

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Conclusions and Recommendations

Physical evidences include all concrete signs that

support the provision of the service and basically

refer to the physical environment in which the

service experience takes place. There are many

results of this study which aimed to evaluate the

views of upscale restaurant managers in Konya

regarding the use of physical evidence. Accordingly;

factors that managers generally paid attention to

when planning and creating physical evidences

were determined as ambience, design, social

elements, quality, costs, laws and regulations. It was

noticed that signs, symbols and signboards, which is

one of the physical evidences, were not taken into

consideration. The matters to which all of the

interviewed managers paid the most attention

when planning were customer requests, satisfaction

and comfort. There was only 1 restaurant; due to its

location within the protected area, that laws and

regulations were the most important elements.

All managers interviewed stated that they benefited

from physical evidences to ensure customer

comfort and satisfaction. In this way, they aim to

increase their ability to hold and compete in the

sector by providing customer loyalty. In this

context; it was found that most of the restaurant

managers were aware of the fact that the lighting

factor was quite effective on the customers and

used the lighting element to influence the

consumption behavior of the customers. This result

supports the study by Areni and Kim (1994) that

the lighting factor affects the cognition, perceived

value and consumption behavior of customers. Just

after the comfort and satisfaction of the customer,

the most common answer was to follow the

innovations and trends. Respectively creating brand

value, creating a beautiful environment and

adaptation of the staff were the other three most

given answers.

Since the managers interviewed were the managers

of upscale restaurants in Konya; these restaurants

contained a lot of physical evidences. Therefore; it

was concluded that customers could make both

positive and negative comments on all kinds of

physical evidences in the restaurants. However, it is

possible to say that decoration is the most praised

issue while parking area is the most negatively

criticised matter in the restaurants.

It was determined that physical evidence

dimensions in the restaurants were changed mostly

due to compelling reasons such as aging, breakage,

wear, modification and maintenance. In the same

way, Demiral and Özel (2016) found that the most

decisive factor for restaurant managers to change

the physical evidence in the restaurant was

necessity. Other reasons were the purpose of

innovation and the arrangement according to the

concept. Although all interviewed managers were

the managers of upscale restaurants; since

innovation in decoration and design is quite costly,

necessitiy was identified as the primary reason in

changing physical evidences. Design emerged as the

most frequently changed physical evidence

dimension. Glasses, plates and tablecloths were the

most frequently changed elements.

As a result of the study, it was concluded that the

physical evidence which restaurant managers

attached the greatest importance to was the staff

element. According to the managers; staff’s friendly

attitude to the customer, presentation style, being

good at their job and appearance were the most

important factors in the formation of the customer

satisfaction and loyalty. Olcay and Sürme (2014)

also found that the staff’s physical appearance,

smiling face and sincerity, professional knowledge

and experience constituted customer satisfaction.

Therefore, the results obtained from this study

support their study. The dimension of physical

evidence which was considered to be the most

important after the staff was the cleanliness. The

cleanliness of many items such as forks, spoons,

knives, plates, glasses, tablecloths, tables and chairs

used in the restaurant and the general cleanliness of

the staff and the restaurant were considered quite

significant in gaining the trust of the customer.

Similarly, in a study conducted by Özata (2010), it

was found that restaurant customers had many

expectations about the cleanliness of the restaurant.

Elements of the design dimension, such as the

decoration of the restaurant, were another

dimension of physical evidences that was attached

the most importance.

Physical evidences in a restaurant, in other words,

all the physical details that can give clues about the

quality of service to restaurant customers are

crucial to survive and gain competitive advantage in

the increasingly competitive environment of the

restaurant industry. Therefore; restaurant

managers need to constantly review and improve

the physical evidences in the restaurants, keeping in

mind that these clues reflect the quality of service.

By creating an environment appropriate for the

customer profile addressed by the restaurant,

differentiation from other restaurants and

competitive advantage can be achieved. Keeping

available short forms in the form of questionnaires

on the tables to provide feedback about general

service and physical evidence from restaurant

customers; customer requests, complaints,

expectations and comments can be learned quickly

and arrangements can be made to ensure customer

satisfaction.

93


This research which was done by using qualitative

methods can also be done by reaching more

restaurant managers through quantitative methods.

This study, which investigates only the upscale

restaurants, can also be carried out in order to

determine the place and importance of physical

evidences in fast food restaurants, restaurants

serving slow food, themed restaurants, ethnic

restaurants, etc.

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94


Digital Marketing and Promotion Strategies for Travel Agencies and Case

Study in Ankara

Gökhan Şener a and Ahmet Büyükşalvarcı b

a Faculty of Tourism - Necmettin Erbakan University

Köyceğiz Yerleşkesi, Dere Aşıklar Mah. Demeç Sk. No: 42 Meram - Konya - Turkey


b Faculty of Tourism - Necmettin Erbakan University

Köyceğiz Yerleşkesi, Dere Aşıklar Mah. Demeç Sk. No: 42 Meram - Konya - Turkey


Abstract

Marketing activities begin with the recognition of the

goods and services that will be sold by the producing

companies in the first place. If a company can

analyze its products in a wide range, the firm can

bring out and examine the necessary definitions for

its sale. Nowadays, unfortunately, we are very much

observing the examples of providing false or

incomplete information to the consumers in order to

complete the sales. When the qualities of the product

sold are transmitted to the potential consumers in a

correct and clear manner, the firms become less

under due in any negative situation after the sale.

The advertisements demonstrated on the internet

attract customers, without any doubt. Nonetheless,

to manage to understand customers’ perspectives,

essentially observing tour operators’ ideas and

strategies is a must; therefore, this paper is written

to clarify travel agencies’ sales and marketing

protocols.

Keywords:

Marketing, Digital Marketing, E-Commerce, Travel

Agency, Tour Operator

Introduction

In today's aggressive and competitive marketing

environment, the activities are composed of

dynamics that are highly structured. The reason for

this can be firstly assumed that there are many

choices for potential customers to buy goods and

services. Therefore, obtaining information about a

lot of alternatives and accessing products with ease

keep the competitive environment alive. Internet

and new information technologies generates

opportunity for the customers since it is easily

feasible to join an online service or switch to another

service provider (Suárez-Álvarez, Río-Lanza,

Vázquez-Casielles, and Díaz-Martín, 2019).

Marketing, which is one of the pillars of

intercompany competition, has been provided over

the internet to a large extent in the recent years

when viewed globally.

Advertising would be targeted at promoting a new

product or premeditated to promote existing ones

(Terkan, 2014). This century’s the most effective

advertisement tool, without any doubt, is digital

marketing which is in sooth too much to be ignored

not only because of its convenience, but also for the

consumer to have access to a wide range of products,

price comparisons provided over the internet, and

the advertisements are much cheaper than other

platforms –such as radio or television. While it is

that much cheaper, it is tremendously simple to

reach the target group of customers and control the

activities carried out and generate a new action plan

accordingly at the same time.

If we evaluate the marketing activities for travel

agencies, we might observe that they are widely

being advertised on the internet by tour operators.

Recently, not being able to take part in digital

marketing seems to drive travel agents’ decisions to

adopt information technologies (Andreu, Aldás,

Bigné and Mattilla, 2009). Nonetheless, commonly it

is observed that people do not purchase packed

tours very often through travel agencies like before.

Because, as in many other industries, the internet

provided a lot of significant facilities in tourism; for

instance, package tours, train tickets, flight tickets,

cruise and hotel booking services which could be

purchased online. Although there is no price

differentiation in general when the holiday is

purchased through travel agencies –because the

agencies do not add extra commissions to the

product as a service fee as they charge commission

from tour operators, customers would be able to be

deprived of the assistance and suggestions of travel

consultants for preferring the internet for ease of use

and maybe “time saving”. Thereupon, hotel websites

and online travel agencies are also in competition by

95


marketing the hotel rooms the same price so as to

derive the consolidated competition for the same

pool of customers (Guo, Zheng, Ling, and Yang,

2014). In order to experience a much more pleased

trip, the cooperation with a travel agency should be

aimed, including certain tour operator concepts and

brands. Essentially, not paying extra for tours or

tickets and also in return being assisted

professionally for vacation plans organized in a well

manner is where the travel agencies’ beneficial

advantages lies for the customers. However, still in

this digital age some of the travelers prefer online

channels and this remarks that internet is a very big

and complex market as we have mentioned. We can

understand from the fact that advertising activities

on the internet create attraction in people.

This study has purposed to determine the travel

agencies’ marketing activities. In order to study in

the aspect of quality, methodology conducted on

signage travel agencies. The literature, so far, has not

included such kind of criteria so basically that

formation of the study is what makes it unique in

that field of area. As Tsiotsou and Ratten stated for

that repetitious issue, (2010) researches in tourism

industry need more originality in the topics

addressed and the research methods used.

Concept of Marketing

Marketing success is highly correlated to financial

success of the company (Furrer, Alexandre and

Sudharshan, 2007). The tourism industry accounts

for 6% of all global revenues. Therefore, one in ten

people are being employed in the field of tourism.

The importance of the tourism industry, which is

formed by the merger of at least 40 different sectors,

can be understood in this way. If we narrow the

framework, we can specify tourism by 7 main

sectors; travel, transportation, accommodation, food

and beverage, tour operator, attraction and goods. In

order to market all these elements in qualified and

effective way, it is necessary to understand the

nature of all the factors that form tourism as a whole.

Therefore, before examining marketing in tourism,

we need to know the concept of marketing because

there are many compounds that affect marketing and

it may be difficult for us to build effective marketing

without understanding the nature of any building

block in this very cohesion.

If potent marketing is required, a vision must be

obtained first. The way to be followed is in these two

points is considering the current situation of the

organization, and the desired point, as a result, in

many ways marketing strategies could be foreseen

relatively prosperous. Which missions should be

determined to form this vision and how the

organizational structure will be shaped can then be

determined in those circumstances, given the culture

and value of the organization, the vision is

established. In summary, the crucial points are the

present conditions of the company, the

organizational goal to be reached, the way to reach

this place, and the last but not least, the planning and

strategies to be maintained in a consistent manner.

Supply and demand balances in the market should

be examined herein. Although not only valid for

tourism, it is accepted for all market segments to

indicate a main interrogatory concern: is there a

need for new services or goods in the market?

Theoretically, it is not possible to obtain profitability

under any condition if there are as many or more

products as demanded and the new product or

brand value would not make any distinctness. In this

supply-demand balance, when it is thought that the

new product creates a different and better

perception than the other products in the current

market, a feasibility report can be made by making

an accurate analysis so as to examine profitability in

short run and long run.

Online Marketing Strategies for Travel Agencies

The internet as the intermediaries’ facilitator does

not play well its role in marketing tourism as it

should have done so far in a sense that most of the

tourism companies seemed to be not yet to exploit

well the internet (Kazoba, Massawe, and Msavange,

2016). It is considered hypothesis that managers and

marketers in tourism sector are not fully aware of all

the advantages that digital marketing can bring to

their business (Leite, and Azevedo, 2017). It is still a

question of travel companies to think about how to

improve the online travel service quality and

customer satisfaction, so as to obtain the profits in a

great extent (Zhang, Zhong, Luo, and Zhu, 2015). The

internet is now the most widely used marketing

channel, thus, online channels play a crucial role in

the service and hospitality industry (Long, and Shi,

2017). The primary business use of the internet is

electronic commerce (Martínez-Costa, Viladecans,

Mas-Machuca and Marimon, 2018). The

development of information technologies and the

internet offers companies promote, and to distribute

their products and services (Silva and Gonçalves,

2016). Old-style traditional advertising tools -radio,

television, or newspapers still exist, but it would not

be appropriate to call them as effective advertising

channels as before –but of course that assumption is

a general statement since there should be a market

for people do not use digital technology and instead

consider newspapers more accurate. That is the

complexity of the marketing; advertising right

product, using right channels for the right customers

by right pricing principles.

Nonetheless, internet advertising is the most

common advertising channel that helps the

companies gain more recognition and increase sales

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volume which provisions reputation. In order not to

demolish company’s name and reputation, unethical

and unjust marketing methods shouldn’t be

considered at all. Significant amount of corporate

reputation ensures customer to prefer the same firm

again in the future (Wu, Cheng, and Ai, 2017).

Digital marketing enables firms to interact with

more users being active on the internet. Internet

advertising is relatively inexpensive compared to

other types of marketing methods and can even be

successfully implemented for free. As known, it is

very easy to register online and free to take part in

many digital platforms, and since because we can use

it as an enterprise, it can be free to apply digital

marketing strategies. The success rates of the

advertisements can be followed very easily and the

necessary actions can be taken accordingly. For

these reasons, tourism companies now provide

marketing services predominantly in digital media.

At the same time, the profit margin obtained from

the advertisements is expressed as quite higher

compared to other platforms. For digital marketing,

travel agencies have many different options in this

regard.

Search Engines

Although some internet visitors might not have

much idea about the method, search engines are

used as effective marketing methods. Today, search

engines serve an average of 100,000 users per

second on a global basis. Potential customers use

search engines to get information about any product

they want from the internet. If you have mastered

the internet and successful on this method, you

might ensure that your company could be ranked

high on the search engines. Moreover, tour operators

can direct their potential customers to their website

as the related search is being made. There are many

criteria for using such websites as a marketing tool.

First, the website must be well-qualified. In content,

the services provided or the products ready to be

sold must be attractive to the potential travelers. For

this, the web site design must be aesthetic, which is,

visuals, texts and background music, if any, must be

in harmony. By this way, the higher the quality of the

content, the more priority will be given from the

search engines. In relation to the number of clicks,

the web page may become a priority contingent on

the number of visits.

In addition, it is feasible to advertise the website by

paying a fee to the search engines. Tour operators

notably use this method very efficiently. For

instance, even if the potential customer doesn’t have

a vacation plan, it's very likely that they will find

advertisements by tour operators after searching

something related to vacation –destination, hotel

name, or attraction, especially during specific

holiday seasons. Search engines also have very

advanced algorithms on these issues. Clicking on a

tour operator's site before a search will pop-up new

advertisements by the operator at the moment they

log in to their social media accounts.

Web Sites

In order to place an advertisement on other internet

sites, it could be given 3rd party advertisements by

agreement with site administrators. Online travel

agencies do not own any hotels but host websites

that with large collections of hotel information, price

comparisons, discounts, and review comments

which attract tourists or business travelers (Chang,

Hsu, and Lan, 2019). Travel agencies may even find

an opportunity to create a web link which directs

users through to the website. This link, which could

be arranged within a framework called banner and

carries the brand value, can provide a link to any

webpage. In general, websites that provide different

products or services contain advertising agreements

among themselves.

Mobile Applications

Mobile applications carries utmost importance in

digital marketing. As it is known, the most significant

features that differentiate smart phones from any

other kinds of phones are their advanced

applications. It is possible to find a smartphone

application for almost all of our needs to make our

lives easier. Application developers also prepare

these products for profit while generating them.

Many applications are available for free of charge,

but as it’s known, most offer a number of additional

features to consumers in exchange for a fee. This

provides profits for the company. However, another

revenue segment is advertising. By advertising about

the content or products of any company, applications

also get benefited from it. They are very useful for

advertising; since many applications of tour

operators advertise according to the demographic

characteristics of the users, some of which are

addressed only to certain segments. For example,

some universities have applications for students,

such as schedules, ring services, the cafeteria menu

of the day, or weekly activities. This is and

unmissable advertising chance for tour operators

call attention to students interested in affordable

domestic or international tours.

E-Mails

Informing potential guests about new products,

services and promotions via e-mail is one of the

active marketing methods used by business

operations. It is free to apply these promotional

activities and thousands of people can be reached

and informed about the desired content at the same

time. Travel agencies shall be in touch with their

97


customers closely and send the details of the

package tours which the customers could be

interested in. It shall be underscored that the goal of

the travel agencies should be building long-term

relationships with their customers as partners

(Sowier-Kasprzyk, 2015). As a result, bulk emailing

is useful, it might be supported with a lot of visuals

and texts, but there are disadvantages unfortunately.

Sending advertisements by e-mail is very practical.

Nonetheless, that promotional activity is not only

resulted of communicating with the company and

then sharing e-mail addresses. Nowadays, as

everyone who has an e-mail address are familiar

with such situations, promotional e-mails are

directed by all kinds of companies, whether the

customer interested in or not. For this reason, e-

mails would be directly sent into the consumers’

"spam" folder, or in the inbox with many other

unnecessary e-mails which are deleted without

being read and concludes bulk e-mailing activity

utterly irrelevant.

Social Media

Social media is one of the most important tools of

digital marketing. It plays a significant role both on

the demand and the supply side of tourism. That

convenient marketing tool allows destinations to

interact directly with travelers via various internet

platforms, moreover, monitor and react on visitors´

opinions and evaluations of services (Kiráľová, and

Pavlíčeka, 2015). Advanced users now regularly use

their phone applications and for this reason, it is

very important which segment is advertised and

how.

Social media enables travelers to convey information

about a particular visiting site, which can affect the

success or failure of that tourism destination

(Matikiti, Roberts-Lombard, and Mpinganjira, 2016).

In order to make business accounts’ followers

informed and generating new, attractive images,

travel agencies must be active in social media; it is a

free and a useful channel of marketing.

Methodology

In this study, interview method was used. For that

technique, signage agencies affiliated with tour

operators in Ankara were deemed appropriate and

open-ended questions were presented to the

participants.

Currently, according to the tour operators’ web sites,

there are 87 travel agencies in those criteria. 18 of

them have accepted to be participated in the

interviews and following questions were asked;

1) How tour operators and travel agencies cooperate

in order to obtain effective

marketing activities?

2) How you manage to reach to the targeted

costumer segments?

3) To what extent does social media carry

importance as digital marketing for your

brand and why?

4) Do you give advertisements on traditional

platforms such as television and radio, or

considering digital marketing is enough to

meet your marketing objectives?

5) How you could make advertisements

descriptive enough for the travelers?

6) What are the evaluation criteria and

reviewing tools for customer opinions and

feedbacks about your advertisements?

In that regard, the findings are mentioned below.

Findings

So as to maintain long-term competitive advantage,

the development of new strategies is indispensable

(Millán and Esteban, 2004). Therefore, digital

marketing increasing its importance day by day

since the technology is taking over the traditional

methods in all areas of life. The correct way to apply

digital marketing is developing more than one

protocol to promote businesses. Apparently, tour

operators are promoting the package tours in a

professional manner. Still, we may observe that

travel agencies are also giving advertisements. Since

in Turkey, tour operators are not working with

management contract in general, instead travel

agencies only apply for franchising or the operator

request to be in collaboration. Therefore, the

products are being promoted by both travel agency

and tour operator. An interviewee has remarked that

“The brand is gaining notice and attention, which

also reflects to our travel agency as well” Another

participant claimed that “Our customers can coincide

with the brand’s advertisements and since face-toface

sales are more trustworthy, they search for the

operator’s name online and prefer to visit our

agency”. Often, tour operators promoting their brand

also share the collaborated agencies’ detailed

information, name, address, telephone number and

e-mail address as such and in that case, potential

customers may get high quality service experiences.

Regarding the reaching targeted customer segments,

during the interview, it has underscored as “Our

travel agents actively use their personal social media

accounts as promoting tools, call customers they

have met and bulk e-mail as well, in order to attract

their networks and that one-on-one channel of

communications ensure us to reach our most loyal

customer segments”. But still, one of the gap relevant

to the issue is, as a participant underlined

“Marketing activities are applied by the tour

operator so that is the reason they could monitor the

results more effectively”. They continued; “If the

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promotions are not meet the desired level of sale, the

targeted segment is not reached without any doubt”.

The tour operators are promoting their products

effectively and travel agencies generally consider the

tour operators as thriving in this regard. The study

reflects that customers give positive feedbacks about

internet advertisements. On the other hand, social

media is being considered the most prominent

promotional tool, “but commonly it would not be

enough to make advertisements via social media

solely”. “The promotion activities of other competing

tour operators are closely monitored in order to

develop new strategies and increase market share”

they followed. Thus, social media is a splendid

implement for business, any post or comment would

be monitored and allow to generate to-way

communications. It is simple to use social media, but

for business purposes being professional and

ensuring the top control mechanism for the task

carries substantialness. Even a person doesn’t

interested in brand or product could be enjoyed the

content of the post on social media and becomes a

potential customer. “Social media accounts of the

tour operators are run by the help of the

professionals about this field, however, especially

small scale travel agencies do not give the

importance to that marketing instrument” an

interviewee has responded.

Tour operators handle traditional advertising

functions in a wider range. One of the interviewee

stated as “They, the tour operators generally use

digital marketing and also traditional platforms like

national televisions, newspapers and radio channels

at the same time whereas the travel agencies don’t

prefer to invest in that segment of marketing”. As it

is known, promoting on social media requires no

cost on some levels, however, no matter in what

scale, for a travel agency promoting its business

nationwide will be generate a profit which cannot

cover the costs at all. The participant added “Even

though digital marketing is much more significant

than traditional platforms, still there is a huge

market share for the people don’t be active on the

internet” which concludes that to approach more

customers, diversification in marketing channels is a

must.

It is crucial for travels not be misled, and according

to a participant, “Potential customers cannot obtain

all necessary information about the products from

the internet and that is the strength of psychical

travel agencies; travelers would be benefited from

agents’ experiences as travel agencies are not only

be informed by their customers –getting feedbacks

during and after the services, periodically agents also

find opportunity to experience the service they offer

and sell. Travel agency employees occasionally get

invited to the package tours and holidays by their

brands so that they might sale the product in a more

effective way. Also, that recreation/training

increases job satisfaction without any doubt.

Moreover, the travel agents also consider

advertisements are not misleading the consumers

which is ethically correct and should be applied by

all kind of businesses. Still, the content of the

promotion may not be familiar to the targeted

segment, a travel agent clams “For the detailed

information and attain top-notch service quality,

travelers prefer to seek our supervisions regarding

to their programs” and adds “Advertisements are

descriptive enough as they are generated in

cooperation with professional firms in this field”.

A participant asserted that “Customers generally

conduct a research about the holiday package they

are interested in before purchasing and that help us

determining the optimal holiday plan our guests

desires”. Consulting travel agents is a sequence of

this process and during that, signage agencies

affiliated with a tour operator get the opportunity to

be informed about the personal opinions of the

visitors. Another travel agent purported as “As we

constantly revise opinions of our guests in person

and therewithal via internet” since digital marketing

platforms presents reviews, comment sections,

ratings and feedbacks.

Results

In this study, one of the main problems of the travel

agencies regarding the marketing is uncommonly

some tour operators are not leading their potential

customers to the agencies. As it is well known,

purchasing packet tours online is not as hard as it is

used to be, besides tour operators do not have to pay

commission to the psychical agency if the customers

prefer to buy products online. That is the reason why

some of the tour operators give specific discount for

online shopping or telemarketing. Theoretically, this

procedure could be viewed profitable; however, the

relationship between the agency and the operator is

being weakened in exchange both in long and short

run. Therefore that kind of undesired policies would

be resulted with not renewing contract, or

collaborating with another operator.

There are more than 20 large-scale tour operators in

Turkey and tour operators and travel agencies –just

like all the other tourism oriented businesses, shall

keep the guest satisfaction on as high as possible.

Those criteria and reviewing methods assure travel

agencies copious opportunities to improve services

as guests’ demands and directions, so forthcoming

services could be sharpened in that aspect and

resulted with inclining guest satisfactions.

On one hand, during the review of literature phase it

has observed that the scientific researches

conducted with online travel agencies and

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questionnaires were implemented instead of

interviews. On the other hand, this study has

executed in Ankara as mentioned and in order to

observe qualified service techniques and methods,

travel agencies collaborated with tour operators are

preferred to study with. Another limitation for the

research is travel agencies represent the digital

marketing structures of tour operators. Future

studies may be consist of the outside of those criteria

to obtain varied results and findings.

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100


The role of Transportation System in Revitalization of Touristic Historical

Neighborhood of Oudlajan in Tehran

Shiva Hakimian a and Ali Afshar b

a Faculty of Art and Architecture, Islamic Azad University Tehran South Branch, Tehran, Iran

Hakimian.shiva@gmail.com

b Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning, Institute of Higher Education of Eqbal Lahoori, Mashhad, Iran

alafshar@gmail.com

Abstract

Oudlajan neighborhood is one of the main tourist

attractions of the historical urban fabric of the 200

year-old capital city of Iran. Despite all its valuable

tourism potentials, Oudlajan faces with the lack of

urban life and the increasing poverty in different

aspects. Regarding the above, revitalization of the

neighborhood is essential to increase its

sustainability in different aspects. Tourism is one of

the ways to revive valuable historic urban fabrics. It

has been considered in the master plan of Tehran as

the future prospect of the old fabric in this

neighborhood. Infrastructure services such as

transportation system are essential elements to

expand tourism industry. Tourists always consider

two factors in their decisions which are cost and time.

Type and quality of the transportation system affects

these two factors. In addition, the quality of the

transportation system is a fundamental element of

the tourists’ experience in the destination.

Considering the importance of tourism development

in the revitalization of the Oudlajan, one of the basic

preconditions for arrival of the tourist to this

neighborhood is improving the quality of the

transportation system, for the local community and

for the tourists. As a result, this study shows that how

expanding the tourism industry in the Oudlajan

neighborhood can revitalize its historic and valuable

fabric. Therefore, this paper aims to define a coherent

architectural and urban design pattern between

tourism and the local community transport services,

by using the descriptive-analytical method as well as

documentary and field studies.

Keywords:

Urban Revitalization, Exhausted Neighborhoods,

Oudlajan Touristic Neighborhood, Transportation

System

Introduction

In the world today, the tourism industry has formed

as the fourth pillar of the economy of different

countries. Today, the tourist is who travels from an

origin to a destination with any purpose and

incentive, and spends in the destination, and will

make economic boom in the region. Given the fact

that Tehran, as the 200-year-old capital of Iran has

many historical and tourism potential in the form of

human and natural prospects, with the proper

management and planning in the field of attracting

tourists, can easily transform its economy in the

direction of its Comprehensive development [8].

The ancient and historical zones that are considered

as urban potentials, are important tourism

destinations due to the presence of nostalgic

attractions, architectural, cultural and valuable

buildings, which are also a symbol of the economic,

social and religious conditions of that period [6],

which, by allocating the least amount of attention

and measures to protect these historical areas,

these cultural-historical wealth, in terms of having

extraordinary values that may be Still unknown to

many of us, will simply be welcoming tourists

(though not many), which come to these valuable

national treasures, In order to gain more awareness

and recognition of the hidden secrets and truths in

the region and understanding how people of them

think [8]. However, despite the fact of significance

of the historical regions in cities, the destruction of

ancient and historical regions of Tehran and the

valuable potentials of them, because of neglecting of

people and authorities, caused the loss of urban life

in the region of these valuable urban potentials, and

this has led to abandonment of these regions

despite the worthy characteristics of them [2]. The

Oudlajan neighborhood, as one of the five main

quarters of the historical core of Tehran, despite all

its valuable potentials, due to its physical

exhaustion, faces with the lack of urban life and the

increasing poverty in the socio-cultural, economic

and physical-spatial field and because of the

extreme exhaustion in the structure and the lack of

facilities and infrastructure and amenities, has a

weak responding to the needs of the citizens. For

this reason residents living in this region are

migrating to other areas of the city that are also

more prosperous and new immigrants, often lowincome

groups of the community, are replacing

101


them. As a result of such an event, this incident

causes undermined cultural convergence,

undermined quality of the neighborhood system,

loss of identity and originality, diminution of

common social memories and sense of belonging to

the neighborhood and ultimately leads to various

injuries to the neighborhood [7]. Therefore

regarding the above, rehabilitation of the

neighborhood (participation of the neighborhood in

the current urban life), is essential to increase its

sustainability. Tourism is one of the ways to revive

valuable historic and ancient urban fabrics [6],

which has been considered in the master plan of

Tehran as the future prospect of the neighborhood.

Infrastructure services such as transportation

system are an essential element in expanding the

local and foreign tourism industry, because tourists

in their decisions always consider two factors of

cost and time and choosing the type of tourism

transportation, affects these two factors. In

addition, the quality of the transportation system,

with a direct impact on the availability or nonavailability

of tourism destinations, is an essential

element of the tourist's experience in the

destination, so it affects the quality of the

destination image in the tourist's mind and

ultimately the success or failure of a the tourism

destination. Considering the importance of

expanding tourism in revitalization of the Oudlajan

neighborhood, as well as the importance of the

quality of the transportation system on the

development of tourism industry, it can be claimed

that, one of the basic Prerequisite for attracting

tourists to the neighborhood is improving the

quality of the transportation system, including

Tourism and local transportation system [5], which

will be investigated in this paper.

This research, in terms of purpose (redefinition a

coherent pattern between tourist and local

transportation system), is in the field of applieddevelopmental

research, and in terms of nature, is a

descriptive-analytical researches (qualitative).

According to the title, the main and secondary

questions of the research are:

Main question:

How can a coherent pattern be achieved between

tourism and local transportation system in the

Oudlajan neighborhood?

Secondary questions:

1. What are the characteristics of the local

transportation system in Oudlajan

neighborhood?

2. What are the characteristics of the

transportation system of tourism in Oudlajan

neighborhood?

The following methods will be used to answer the

above questions:

1. Theoretical studies (documentary): library

102

books and Internet articles.

2. Field studies (practical): Photography.

Literature Review

• The Oudlajan neighborhood:

The Oudlajan neighborhood is the name of the

neighborhood located in the northeastern part of

Tehran and one of the five old Tehran

neighborhoods, which are: Sangelaj, Oudlajan,

Bazar, Chale meydan and Arg (Fig.1). The Oudlajan

neighborhood has been in the division of Tehran

since the Safavi era. In the reign of Nasir al-din-

Shah, the number of its inhabitants, which were

often rich people of the society, increased and

Oudlajan became a wealthy neighborhood, and

many large houses replaced its large gardens, and

its migration boomed to the point. According to

Statistical surveys of 1284 AH, the Oudlajan

neighborhood was one of the most populous

neighborhoods (36,495 people) among the five

neighborhoods of Tehran. Also according to (Fig. 2),

we find that due to the boom of migration and

construction in this neighborhood during the Qajar

period, the area of the Oudlajan neighborhood

increases compared to the Safavi period [1].

Figure 1 - Old Tehran neighborhoods decision [1]

Figure 2 - Oudlajan n (dark color) in Safavi era,

Oudlajan (light color) in Qajar era [1]


• The nomination reason of the Oudlajan

neighborhood:

The nomination reason is "Ow" meaning "AW" or

"Water" and "Delajan or" "Daragidan" means the

division and in general the place of distribution and

division of water, because Oudlajan, due to its

higher elevation than the southern regions of

Tehran, dominated these neighborhoods, and so the

water of the southern regions of Tehran were

divided from here [1].

• The Oudlajan neighborhood, historical but

exhausted:

As time passed and the city of Tehran grew, the

inhabitants of Oudlajan, who were mostly rich

people, migrated to the northern areas of Tehran,

and the neighborhood were desolated, replacing the

non-originated and low-income population [1]. As a

result of such an event, social and cultural

instability prevails in the neighborhood. This

incident causes migration of original residents and

their displacement with non-original people,

undermined cultural convergence, undermined

quality of the neighborhood system, loss of identity

and originality, diminution of common social

memories and sense of belonging to the

neighborhood and ultimately leads to various

injuries to the neighborhood, which the most

important ones are mentioned bellow:

• Low penetration possibility, which causes: 1-

Difficulty of access to residential units in

emergency cases. 2- Abandoned spaces, which

increases the rate of social anomalies such as

addiction, theft, begging and etc. 3- Low level of

urban life. 4- Low level of security.

• Lack of proper local infrastructure such as

water, electricity, sewage and etc.

• Lack of proper recreational facilities.

• Low quality and low resistance residential units.

• Reducing the Importance of valuable historical

potentials of the neighborhood, due to the

expansion of the city and decreasing the quality

level of the urban spaces.

• Low level of sense of belonging in residences [7].

Figure 5 - Low quality and low resistance

residential units [3]

Figure 6 - Lack of proper local

infrastructure such as water, electricity,

sewage, etc. [3]

Figure 7 - valuable historical potentials

of the neighborhood

(Abandonment of Tekye- Reza Gholikhan)

Figure 3 - Low level of

urban life [3]

Figure 4 - Low penetration

possibility [3]

103


Figure 8 - Threats of the neighborhood

• Necessity of developing tourism industry in

Udlajan neighborhood:

Therefore, regarding the above, rehabilitation of the

neighborhood (participation of the neighborhood in

the current urban life), is essential to increase its

sustainability. Tourism is one of the ways to revive

valuable historic and ancient urban fabrics which

has been considered in the master plan of Tehran as

the future prospect of the neighborhood fabric [6].

• The effect of transportation system quality

on tourism development:

Infrastructure services such as transportation

system are an essential element in expanding the

local and foreign tourism industry, because tourists

in their decisions always consider two factors of

cost and time and choosing the type of tourism

transportation, affects these two factors. In

addition, the quality of the transportation system,

with a direct impact on the availability or nonavailability

of tourism destinations, is an essential

element of the tourist's experience in the

destination, so it affects the quality of the

destination image in the tourist's mind and

ultimately the success or failure of a the tourism

destination. Considering the importance of

expanding tourism in revitalization of the Oudlajan

neighborhood, as well as the importance of the

quality of the transportation system on the

development of tourism industry, it can be claimed

that, one of the basic Prerequisite for attracting

tourists to the neighborhood is improving the

quality of the transportation system, including

including Tourism and local transportation system,

which will be investigated in this paper.

One of the most important features of

transportation systems is the direct and indirect

involvement of humans and society in it. This

feature causes communication expansion and

interference with other social and human fields. One

of these fields is the tourism industry. In 1994,

Haldman and Sherman proved that tourism

expansion without the transportation network

development is impossible, since transportation and

tourism have had a special interdependence on each

other, therefore lack of development of each one has

led to lack of development of the other, which

means when the transportation system loses one of

its fundamental pillars (roads, vehicles, propulsion

and energy of facilities and installations) or there is

weakness in one of the mentioned pillars, the basis

of transportation activity will collapse and, of

course will have a very negative impact on the

tourism industry and it greatly increases the impact

of transportation on tourism development.

Therefore, the existence of infrastructure services

such as a reliable, convenient and fast

transportation system is a critical element and, in

fact, is a prerequisite for expanding tourism

industry, in other words, the transportation system

is the heart of the tourism industry.

104


Tourists in their decisions always consider two

factors of cost and time and choosing the type of

tourism transportation, affect these two factors.

Therefore, although the distance between the

source and destination of the trip influences the

number of tourists, but this effect can be dimmed by

expanding access capabilities (availability of the

necessary infrastructures and transportation

system) in the neighborhood. Transportation can be

considered as the central axis of tourist activities, as

this factor is one of the most important parts of the

journey. In this regard, the type of transportation

plays an important role in the structure of the

tourist's transportation and travel attractiveness. In

addition the quality of the transportation system,

with a direct impact on the accessibility or

Inaccessibility of tourism destinations, is a

fundamental element of the tourist's experience in

the destination, so it affects the destination image in

the tourist's mind and ultimately the success or

failure of the tourist destination [5].

It is noteworthy that transportation can be

considered as an attractive element in tourism. For

example, boat trips, fast trains or even tourist walk

paths have their own attractions.

The transportation system definition from the

perspective of tourism professionals is: a system

that links the origin of tourists to destinations (with

all the attractions, facilities, organizations and other

travel features).

Also, tourism specialists divide the roads in the

transportation system into two categories:

1. High-capacity vehicles where the main purpose

is maximum speed and displacement.

2. Roads with low velocity and scenic landscapes

roads, with very low speeds compared to other

roads.

Also, tourism professionals categorize the factors

that affect the selection of different types of

transportation systems by tourists:

1. Comfort.

2. The amount of transportation network capacity

3. The speed of the transportation unit.

4. Safety.

5. The radius of the transit network operation.

6. Ease of use.

7. Cost and price.

8. The regularity of the transportation network in

planning and servicing [4].

As a summing-up, it can be stated that,

rehabilitation of the neighborhood (participation of

the neighborhood in the current urban life), is

essential to increase its sustainability. Tourism is

one of the ways to revive valuable historic and

ancient urban fabrics which has been considered in

the master plan of Tehran as the future prospect of

the neighborhood fabric. Infrastructure services,

such as the transportation system, are a vital

element and, in fact, are a prerequisite for the

expansion of the local and foreign tourism industry,

in other words, the transportation system is the

heart of the tourism industry. Considering the

importance of expanding tourism in revitalization of

the Oudlajan neighborhood, as well as the

importance of the quality of the transportation

system on the development of tourism industry, it

can be claimed that, one of the basic Prerequisite for

attracting tourists to the neighborhood is improving

the quality of the transportation system, including

tourism and local transportation system. The

following is a detailed overview of how the tourism

and local transportation network will be

coordinated with a coherent pattern caused by

tourism industry expansion in the neighborhood.

Discussions & conclusions

• Study of the local transportation system in

the Oudlajan neighborhood:

In order to investigate the current status of the local

transportation system in the Oudlajan

neighborhood, according to (Fig.9), the routes of the

neighborhood network were first categorized into

three categories (from 1 to 3 in terms of width), and

then functions, which were important around these

routes were identified

Figure 9 - Study of the local transportation

system in the Oudlajan neighborhood [3]

• Study of the tourism transportation system

in the Oudlajan neighborhood:

In order to investigate the current status of the

tourism transportation system in the Oudlajan

neighborhood, according to (Fig.10), the axis, which

connects the largest number of specific functions

located around the local routes, which can be as a

tourist attraction and bring the tourist into the

neighborhood, will be chosen as the tourism axis.

105


Figure 10 - Study of the tourism transportation system in

the Oudlajan neighborhood [3]

• Study of the local and tourism

transportation system adaptation in the

Oudlajan neighborhood:

According to (Fig.11), it is understood that the

public transport system defined in the Oudlajan

neighborhood is based on local inhabitants and is

most in line with the local communication network

and most of the services are provided to local

residents.

In contrast, tourists are forced to use a public

transport system common with residents to access

the inside of the fabric and use the defined tourism

path, because there is no defined transportation

system specified for the provision of services to

tourists in the neighborhood, as well as the existing

transportation system is also not adapted to the

tourism path defined in the neighborhood.

This underscores to definition of the tourism

transportation system along with the local

transportation system in the Oudlajan

neighborhood, which is one of the five main

quarters that forms the historical core of Tehran,

and contains many architectural treasures that can

easily attract many tourists to it, causes conflicts

and chaos in the daily routine of local residents and

tourists who tend to visit the neighborhood and also

cause confusion and waste of time for tourists in

areas other than the defined tourism path, which is

passed by the most valuable treasures in the

neighborhood.

Therefore, there is not enough adaptation between

the local and tourism transportation system in

Oudallajan neighborhood.

Figure 11 - Study of the local and tourism

transportation system adaptation in the

Oudlajan neighborhood [3]

• Redefine a coherent pattern between the

local and tourism transportation system in

the Oudlajan neighborhood

Modifying the pattern of the public transport

stations in the Oudlajan neighborhood:

1. Adaptation of the local transportation system to

the specified tourism path in the neighborhood,

by defining local and tourist's common stations

(Station 1, with a slight shift will locate exactly

one of the two ends of the route, but on the

other side of the route, Station 9 should be

established between current stations).

It should be noted that the new stations defined

for the use of tourists within the site (stations 1

and 9) do not create traffic problems for the

area, because the station number 1 is located on

the right street of the site which, has a high

traffic volume than street capacity at peak

hours, due to the very short distance to the

entry of the tourism path and also the

placement at the beginning of the street,

immediately divert the tourists to the station on

the tourism path (facilitating the entry of the

tourist to the tourism path) and therefore the

traffic load resulting from the tourist traffic

towards the tourism path does not enter the

daily traffic load to the mentioned street.

Station 9 on the southern side of the site also

feels that there is no problem with traffic in the

streets, because it doesn't have high traffic

volume than the street capacity at peak hours.

2. The intermediate range of the site, which

generally includes third-class and fully local

routes, has limit and lack of access to public

transport stations, so the definition of stations

at these intervals is necessary to facilitate the

106


access of local residents to the site (station

number 2 with a slight displacement, as well as

the creation of station number 10, eliminates

the problem of the lack of access to public

transport stations and facilitates the access of

local residents to their residence area).

4. Combine local and tourism stations (Stations 1

and 9) with a new and innovative form, with

dynamic urban spaces and a five-function

performance (for adults, children, food and

drink, social events and events, and handicraft

trade booths) to changing the stations used by

tourists from the sole purpose of embarking

and disembarking people, as well as improving

the quality of the urban environment and the

public spaces of the neighborhood (Fig. 14).

Figure 12 - Modifying the pattern of public

transport stations in the Oudlajan

neighborhood [3]

3. It is suggested that, in case of presence of walls

in urban dynamic spaces and five proposed

functions, in combination with local and

tourism common stations (stations 1 and 9),

use architectural and physical elements

compatible with the physical identity of the

neighborhood, Some of these elements include:

using arches in wall motifs, using bricks as the

most common materials used in the

neighborhood and using natural elements in the

border of abandonment in the neighborhood

such as plants and water ponds, which in the

past have been an integral part of the central

courtyard of the house, and nowadays are in the

boundary of oblivion. Therefore, it is desirable

to remind people, along with passing paths and

pauses, now that they have been forgotten in

the heart of the homes (Fig. 13).

Figure 13 - Use architectural and physical elements

compatible with the physical identity of the neighborhood [3]

Figure - 14 Combine local and tourism stations (Stations 1 and 9) with a new and

innovative form, with dynamic urban spaces and a five-function performance [3]

107


Figure - 16 Modifying the penetration pattern of the routes in the

Oudlajan neighborhood [3]

Modifying the penetration pattern of the routes in

the Oudlajan neighborhood

1. Traffic calming, in the hierarchy of audience

entry from first to third grade routes in the

neighborhood, in order to further significance

the tourism path specified in the site for

tourists, and as a result revitalizing the original

bone (historical axis of the neighborhood),

contains invaluable treasures in the border of

oblivion in the heart of the neighborhood, and

local keeping of local paths for the inhabitants,

as a result.

- The priority of the pedestrian and bicycle

system (preventing the entry of vehicles into

the site, considering public parking lots around

the site, because due to the low width of the

passages in the site, the density and dominance

of the ride, especially private rides, make

insecurity and turmoil in the movement system,

except in emergency cases, such as ambulance

traffic, firewalls and etc.)

- Organizing a tourist path by providing

walkways equipping patterns with appropriate

urban furniture, for safe and comfortable

walking and cycling.

- Distinct and inviting entrance to the specified

tourism path.

References

[1] Abrishami, F. (2010). Tehrane Roozegarane

Ghadim. Tehran: Khaneye Tarikh va Tasvire

Abrishami.

[2] Habibi, M. (1999). Masire Piyadeye Gardeshgari,

Jornal of Tehran Fine Arts University: Architecture

and Urban Design, No 9, 43.

[3] Hakimian, Sh. (2018). "Tourism, Residential,

Cultural Complexes Designing in the Fabric of

Oudlajan Neighborhood with Emphasis on the

Revival of Persian Architecture Lost Heritage",

Master Thesis, Dept. Art and Architecture,

Islamic Azad University: South Tehran Branch.

[4] Shad, R., Kadkhodaie, M. (2017). Naghshe Haml

va Naghl dar Sanate Tourism va Grdeshgari.

International Conference of Urban Planning and

Management.

[5] Familnorouzi, H., Sharifi, Sh., and Sheydaie A.

(2017). Arzyabiye Gardeshgarie Shahri ba Takid

bar Toseye Zirsakht-haye Gardeshgari va

Reghabat-paziriye Shahri (Case study: Tehran),

Jornal of Urban Management, No 39, 369.

[6] Kardovani, P., Ghffari V. (2011). Tourism va

Rooykarde Nosazi dar Tarahie Baft-haye

Tarikhiye Shahri. Jornal of The Geography of the

Land, No 30.

[7] Kalantari Khalilabad, H., Derakhhani, N. (2014).

Rahborhaye Paydarie Kalbadi-Ejtemaie dar

Mahalate Tarikhi (Case Study: Udlajan

Neighborhood). Journal of The Urban Study, No

10, 3.

[8] Lotfi, S. (2011). Tabar Shenasie Bazafarinie

Shahri. Tehran: Azarakhsh.

Figure - 15 Modifying the penetration pattern of

the routes in the Oudlajan neighborhood [3]

108


Hotel’s Survival in Crisis-Ridden Cities: Evidence from Antalya Tourism

City

Hilal Erkuş Öztürk a

a Akdeniz University, Faculty of Architecture, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Antalya, Turkey e-mail:

hilalerkus@yahoo.com

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the factors influencing

the survival of hotels in the crisis-ridden tourism

city Antalya. By using firm entry and exit data from

2000 to 2017, a survival analysis of hotels is made

by using a discrete-time hazard model to analyze

the determinants of the survival of hotels in crisis

periods. While the survival of hotels in tourism

specialized region in crisis periods depends on age,

size ownership structure of the firm, entry-rate, we

find no evidence that destination size, tourism

location and diversification have a survival

advantage.

Keywords: Survival analysis, crisis, hotels, tourism

cities, Antalya.

Introduction

Crises make tourism cities fragile which makes

them a good case to explore the factors affecting

firm survival in the tourism sector, especially in

hotels case. The increasing frequency of political

shocks in 2015 and 2016 in Turkey have had

significant impacts on the economic growth of the

country’s tourism cities. Antalya, Turkey’s leading

mass-tourism city which attracted more than ten

million tourists per year till 2015, has been

negatively affected by the recent political crisis. The

aim of this paper is to explore the determinants of

hotel survival in a tourism dominated city

experiencing both global economic and political

crises.

The impact of crisis on hotel survival in tourism

cities is not well documented or understood. Studies

focusing on the impact of crises on firm survival

have been limited, and those that exist rarely pay

attention to the relation between crises and firm

survival. While Irvine and Anderson (2004) was

paying attention to crisis in small tourism

businesses in rural areas, Falk (2013) and Kainovski

& Peneder (2008) have indirectly studied the

impacts of external shocks on the survival of

accommodation sector. Moreover, empirical

evidence of both the entry and exit of hotels that

includes geographical and firm specific variables

has yet to be studied for a tourism city that is

undergoing a crisis. This research contributes to

tourism literature by discussing the important role

of district (geographical), firm and macro-level

variables in hotel survival. To reach the aim, hotel

survival is analyzed in a tourism dominated city

(Antalya in Turkey) both using organizational

(firm), geographical (district) variables of entry and

exit of hotels (1397 hotels in total) obtained from

Antalya Chamber of Commerce and Industry

(ATSO). Survival analysis is applied to hotels by

using a discrete-time hazard model to explore the

determinants of the survival of hotels by also taking

into account crisis effect. The methodology consists

of an econometric model of hotel survival by using

semi-parametric regression done with the Cox

proportional hazards model.

The paper is organized as follows. Section two

reviews the survival literature. The third section

introduces the empirical methodology and

described the explanatory variables. The last

section presents and discusses the results of the

econometric analysis, and then concluding remarks

are made followed by the limitations and future

lines of the research.

Survival Literature

Earlier works on firm survival have been pointing to

the importance of firm size, age, human capital,

performance, ownership, as well as industry

characteristics (e.g., Agarwal, 1996; Audretsch,

1995; Boeri and Bellman, 1995; Ericson and Pakes,

1995; Littunen, 2000; Varum and Rocha; 2012).

While smaller firms can be more affected by crises

due to limited financial, technological and human

resources and greater dependence on (fewer)

customers (Beck et al., 2005; Butler and Sullivan,

2005; Gertler and Gilchrist, 1994), they can also be

less effected by crises due to their flexibility, flexible

in adjusting to downturns, being more able to

exploit market niches and activities characterized

by agglomeration economies, rather than internal

109


scale economies (Varum and Rocha, 2012). About

large firm size, it is claimed that when large firms

are not able to respond flexibly to the changing

market environment, there could be negative effects

on the survival of large firms. However, in crisis

periods, larger firms can be less sensitive to

business uncertainty due to their higher intangible

assets bundle, internal scale economies and greater

financial leverage (Bruni, et. al.,2014).

About firm age, a number of studies have found that

the probability of exit and decline may increase

with age (Hannah, 1998; Neffke et. al. 2011). On the

other side, it is claimed that younger companies and

start-ups have lower survival rates (Geroski, 1995;

Esteve Perez et.al., 2004). In general, it is stated that

the probability of survival increases with age and

size, and that it is higher for technologically

advanced sectors (Dunne et al. 1989; Audretsch

1991; 1995).

To access new technologies, foreign capital

participation is also important which in turn could

improve the performance of the foreign firm and so

raises its survival probability (Esteve Perez

et.al.2004). The empirical evidence on survival

probability and foreign ownership (Mata and

Portugal, 2002) suggests a different survival rate

among foreign and domestic firms but is explained

by differences in firm and industry characteristics

rather than ownership. In addition, export activity is

emphasized as an important factor to increase the

probability of survival (Wagner, 2013; Namini,

Facchini, and Lopez, 2013; Helpman, 2006; Kovac

et.al, 2015). The literature also points the role of

multinational firms (Helpman et al. 2003), which

have stronger capacity to cope with a recession than

domestic firms.

Some studies include also spatial variables and

proxies for agglomeration and diversification (Folta

et al., 2006; Shaver e Flyer, 2000; Bruni et.al.2014;

Basile et.al, 2017) in explaining firm survival in

crisis periods. In the regional science literature, the

characteristics of the region where the firm is

located (Baldwin et al. 2000; Basile et.al, 2017),

variables such as agglomeration level; Herfindahl

index; population density; relatedness; distance

from the nearest city are used to explain the role of

space on survival and resilience of cities and

regions. The degree of industry concentration

measured by the Herfindahl index could also

influence the survival rate during crises. Higher

market concentration may lead to higher price-cost

margins in the industry, which should increase a

firm’s performance. However, firms in highly

concentrated markets may have a strict competition

with rivals than can reduce firms’ growth (Bruni

et.al.2014).

The studies focusing both firm survival in tourism

sector are also very limited (Kainovski and Peneder,

2008; Falk, 2013; Brouder and Ericcson, 2013;

Gemar et.al, 2016) and no study has paid attention

to the effect of the crisis in firm survival besides

other factors yet. Survival literature generally

constructs a quantitative econometric model and

makes a duration analysis to analyze firms’ survival.

This paper is in line with this empirical strategy by

doing research on both entry and exit firms of

hotels in Antalya tourism city and also including the

downturn crisis effect for hotels which is

underestimated in the current literature. Although

we use a quantitative methodology in analyzing

firm survival as done in previous studies, we also

apply a discrete-time hazard models and the variety

of variables which are included in the analysis are

different, namely not only firm specific variables but

also economic geography variables. All this is new

in tourism literature.

Methodology

In assessing the effects of (economic and political)

crisis on the survival of firms located in Antalya,

Turkey, we use firm-level data from Antalya

Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ATSO). The

firm-level data represents the entire population of

all hotels located in 15 different districts of Antalya.

The database contains extensive information on a

wide range of topics, including location (districtlevel),

the date of registration, (i.e. firm entry) or

deregistration (i.e. firm exit), the date of liquidation,

current status, legal form, values of paid-in capital,

occupation as well as ownership status of the firm

(Turkish or foreign).

We rely on the date of registration and

deregistration variables to identify firm status of

hotels and we got 1397 hotels in total in sample.

By using ATSO data, firm survival is analyzed using

survival analysis. Due to the limitations of the

Standard Cox Proportional Hazard Model, we

employ more appropriate discrete-time duration

models in the analysis following the work by

Fernandes and Paunov (2015), Basile et al. (2017)

and Perez et al. (2017). In this study, we are

interested in the impact of economical and political

crises on the hazard rate of a hotel, which is the

probability of hotel exits in a given period

conditional on survival up to that period. Using the

same notations as in Perez et al. (2017), we define

as continuous, non-negative random variable

measuring the survival time of a particular hotel.

The hazard probability is then defined as the

probability of firm survival within specified time

interval

, given that failure has not

occurred prior to the starting time of the interval.

110


This conditional probability can be expressed as a

discrete-time hazard rate:

(1)

where is a vector of time-varying covariates of

firm, industry and macro-specific covariates that

are assumed to effect the hazard rate; is a vector

of coefficients to be estimated; and is the

baseline hazard rate for the the interval that

allows the hazard rate to vary across periods. A

positive (negative) sign of coefficients means higher

(lower) likelihood of firm exit and consequently

lower (higher) probability of firm survival.

In order to estimate the parameters of equation (1),

it is necessary to determine the functional form of

hazard rate,

. As discussed in Jenkins

(2005), complementary log-log (cloglog) model is

the most common function specification for

estimations of models with binary dependent

variables. The cloglog model is the discrete-time

counterpart of the continuous-time Cox

proportional hazards model. Following Prentice and

Gloeckler (1978) and Jenkins (2005), the hazard

rate

is assumed to follow complementary

log-log distribution or cloglog (Prentice and

Gloeckler, 1978). Accordingly, the discrete-time

hazard function takes the following form:

(2)

Like the Cox model, the cloglog model (2) also

fails to account for potential unobserved

heterogeneity among firms because the baseline

hazard in Eq. (2) is assumed to be constant and the

same across firms over duration time. Ignoring

unobserved heterogeneity may severely produce a

bias in the nature of duration dependence and the

estimates of the covariate effects. The common way

to deal with unobserved heterogeneity is to include

random effects into the hazard function. In the

cloglog model in (2), unobserved heterogeneity

is introduced as follows:

(3)

where is the firm-level random effects that is

included through the error term ,

where the error term is assumed to be normally

distributed with zero mean and variance .

Hence, in order to estimate the effects of economic

and political crisis on hotel firm survival, we first

proceed with the discrete-time cloglog model

without frailty (unobserved heterogeneity).

111

Table 1. Definition of explanatory variables and data

sources

Variable Definition Source

Firm-level

Age

Size

Legal form

Foreign

Tourism location

District

dummies

District-level

Entry rate

Region (district)

specialization

Destination size

Herfindahl index

Macro-level

Downturn

Number of years since the firm

entry.

Takes value one if the firm is

medium or large firm, zero

otherwise.

Takes one if the company is

organized as a corporation and

zero otherwise.


owned by a foreign entity, zero

otherwise.


located in one of the following

three districts (Antalya city,

Serik, and Kemer) and zero

otherwise.


located in a specific district, zero

otherwise.

The proportion of new firms in a

given year relative to the total

stock of the previous year,

constructed at the district level.

The number of active tourism

firms divided by the number of

all active firms at the district

level.

Natural log of number of active

tourism firms at the district

level.

Reciprocal of number of tourism

firms, constructed at the district

level.

Takes value one if the year is

2008, 2009, 2015 and 2016, zero

otherwise.

Year dummies Dummy for years (2001-2016)

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

ATSO

We next consider the discrete-time cloglog model

with frailty, which incorporates firm-level random

effects to account for firm-specific variations as a

robustness check. These specifications of the cloglog

model require the underlying firm database to be

expanded into firm-period format and then

transformation of firm duration into binary

variable. Specifically, if the spell of the th subject


(firm ) is completed, then the binary dependent

variable assumes the unit value for the last time

point (

) while it is zero for the rest of time points

of the time interval. For example,

consider that a firm exists in the database from

2003 to 2007. Such a survival is regarded as having

a spell length of four years. With this information

about the firm’s spell length, the binary dependent

variable takes the value of zero from 2003 to 2006

and one for the fourth year. The advantage of this

approach is that it allows the inclusion of timevarying

explanatory variables into the regression

model (Esteve-Perez et. al., 2007).

Another issue of concern in survival analysis is the

problem of censoring which arises due to the issue

of incomplete data. There are two main types of

censoring: right-censoring and left-censoring. Leftand/or

right-censoring data could lead to bias in the

estimated hazard rate. Although the right-censoring

data can be easily handled by standard techniques

of survival analysis, the left-censoring data should

be treated differently. Following the empirical

strategy adopted in Hess and Persson (2011), this

study omits all left-censoring observations (i.e.

those firms that are already active at the first year

of the sample, namely 2000) from the econometric

analysis.

Explanatory variables

To analyze survival of hotels in Antalya region

from 2000 to 2017, this paper considers a number

of firm and district level and macro level variables

discussed in the literature section. The choice of the

explanatory variables (covariates) included in (3) is

entirely dictated by the existing studies on firm

survival and information contained in our data set.

Our vector of explanatory variables and their

measurement are as follows. The definitions,

sources, expected signs and descriptive statistics of

the explanatory variables are provided in Table 1.

(i) Firm-specific variables

We first consider the effects of hotel age on firm

survival. Many previous empirical studies have

showed that the probability of firm survival

increases with firm age (Dunne and Hughes, 1994;

Geroski, 1995; Hannah, 1998; Neffke et. al. 2011).

The main explanation for this expectation is that

younger firms are more likely to face higher risk of

failure because of shortcomings in managerial

knowledge, financial management abilities and

accumulated experiences (Kaniovski and Peneder,

2008; Esteve-Perez et al., 2017), which in turn

reduce the probability of firm survival. In contrast,

the risk of failure is more likely to be lower among

older firms because those firms have more

Table 2. Descriptive statistics for surviving and non-surviving firms

Firm-level

Total (n=1,397) Surviving (n=972) Non-surviving (n=425)

Min Max Mean SD Min Max Mean SD Min Max Mean SD

Age 1.000 16.000 5.121 3.477 1.000 16.000 5.252 3.606 1.000 15.000 4.817 3.138

Size 0.000 1.000 0.273 0.446 0.000 1.000 0.325 0.468 0.000 1.000 0.153 0.360

Legal form 0.000 1.000 0.285 0.451 0.000 1.000 0.339 0.473 0.000 1.000 0.158 0.365

Foreign 0.000 1.000 0.154 0.361 0.000 1.000 0.148 0.355 0.000 1.000 0.166 0.372

Tourism

location 0.000 1.000 0.987 0.115 0.000 1.000 0.984 0.127 0.000 1.000 0.993 0.084

Entry rate 0.077 1.315 0.166 0.110 0.077 1.315 0.151 0.097 0.077 1.315 0.200 0.128

Region

specializat

ion LQ 0.145 2.533 1.346 0.626 0.170 2.533 1.417 0.655 0.145 2.533 1.181 0.516

Destinatio

n size 0.000 8.188 7.068 1.145 0.000 8.188 7.013 1.188 0.000 8.188 7.195 1.028

Herfindahl

index 0.000 0.125 0.000 0.002 0.000 0.125 0.000 0.003 0.000 0.028 0.000 0.001

Macro-level

Downturn 0.000 1.000 0.337 0.473 0.000 1.000 0.389 0.488 0.000 1.000 0.218 0.413

Source: ATSO database and own calculations.

112


resources (capital and human) and more

accumulated experience. Moreover, older firms are

widely diversified and are therefore less vulnerable

to the business cycle (Kaniovski and Peneder,

2008). More recent studies have begun to challenge

this view, suggesting instead that older firms are

inflexible, slow to change, and less apt to adopt new

technologies, so their survival rates steadily decline

with age (Brüderl and Schüssler, 1990, Sorensen

and Stuart, 2000; Kaniovski and Peneder, 2008).

Taken together, these theoretical and empirical

studies present a rather ambiguous picture of the

relationship between hotel age and survival.

Therefore, the relationship between hotel age and

survival could be either positive or negative

depending on which effect dominates. Firm age is

measured as the number of years from the date of

establishment. Following Cefis and Marsili (2005),

we also include the squared term of age ( )

because of the recent evidence of a U-shaped

relationship between age and survival rate. This

allows us to account for non-linear effects of firm

age on the probability of firm survival.

Recent research has also shown that firm size

matters for firm survival (e.g. Disney et al., 2003;

Resende et al., 2008; Varum and Rocha, 2012, Basile

et al., 2017). According to Basile et al. (2017), firm

size accounts for scale effects. In comparison with

large firms, small-sized firms have more difficulty in

accessing capitals and skilled labor and face tougher

tax conditions. As a result, they have lower survival

rate (i.e. higher hazard rate) as they find it difficult

to reach the minimum efficient scale. In addition,

Varum and Rocha (2017) argue that small firms

may also show higher exit rates during crises. We

therefore include size variable to investigate

whether firm’s size improves the survival

probability of firm or not. Size is a dummy variable

that takes on value one for firms which are

classified as medium and large-sized enterprises

according to the values of capital-in-paid, and zero

otherwise. Thus, one would expect a positive

(negative) effect of that variable on firm survival

rate (hazard rate).

In addition to age and size, the legal structure of the

firm may also affect a firm’s survival. Mata and

Portugal (2002) hypothesized that firms operating

under limited liability face lower probabilities of

exit than those of unlimited liability. The general

argument put forward is that limited liability firms

will exit later than will those of unlimited liability

due to the fact that the owner is not personally

responsible for the debts of the firm. Unlike limited

liability firms, sole proprietorship, unlimited

liability company or limited partnership, on the

other hand, remain personally liable for many types

of obligations owed to business creditors, lenders

and landlords. As a result, the risk of such firms

exiting the business increases. Consistent with the

expectation, Mata and Portugal (2002) find that

unlimited liability firms are more likely to exit than

limited liability ones. Similarly, Esteve-Perez and

Castillejo (2008) found that limited liability

companies survive longer. On the other hand,

Harhoff et al. (1998) showed that limited liability

companies have higher solvency rates than those

with full liability. Thus, a measure is introduced in

order to account for the effects of the legal form of

the firm. In our analysis, the legal structure of firms

is captured through the dummy variable

corporation, that takes one if the company is

organized as a limited liability company,

corporation cooperative, limited partnership and

some other legal form, and zero otherwise if the

firm is organized as a sole proprietorship and

unlimited liability company. We expect this

variable to show a positive effect on hotel survival.

The other firm-specific variable included in the

cloglog model regressions is foreign, which is a

dummy variable that equals to one if the firm is a

foreign company and zero otherwise. Most of the

studies report that foreign firms are more likely to

exit the market than domestic firms (for example,

Görg and Strobl, 2003; Wagner and Gelübcke, 2012;

Ferragina et al., 2014) while in other studies

foreign-owned firms are found to have higher

chances of survival than domestic ones (for

example, Baldwin and Yan, 2011). Several studies,

on the other hand, have found that foreign firms and

domestic firms do not exhibit different chances of

survival (for example, Mata and Portugal, 2002 and

Taymaz and Özler, 2007). Based on the literature

reviewed, we thus expect a complex and ambiguous

relationship between the variable foreign and firm’s

survival.

Tourism location is taken as another variable which

takes value one if the firm is located in one of the

following three tourism districts in Antalya (Antalya

city center, Serik, and Kemer) and zero otherwise.

This variable would be important for understanding

the role of taking place in a tourism location in hotel

survival.

District level variables

The survival of a firm also depends on district level

conditions that are related with industry dynamics.

These are entry rates at the district level, destination

size, region (district) specialization and district

diversification (herfindahl index). The first variable

is relating to the intensity of competition is the

entry rate in a given industry at the district level. A

relatively high entry rate reflects tougher

competition and may reduce the likelihood of

survival for firms (Mata and Portugal, 2002; Taymaz

and Özler, 2007; Resende et al., 2016). A negative

113


impact of this variable on firm survival is confirmed

by a large number of studies (Mata and Portugal,

2002; Taymaz and Özler, 2007; Varum and Rocha,

2012; Varum et al., 2014). The entry rate is

computed as the proportion of new firms in a given

year relative to the total stock of the previous year,

constructed at the district level.

The second variable is destination size which is

represented as natural log of number of active

tourism firms at the district level. This is also a new

variable trying to test whether tourism size of the

destination matter in hotel survival or not? Indeed

this variable represents indirectly agglomeration in

tourism and its influence on hotel survival. This

variable also shows how agglomeration economies

in tourism contribute to the hotel survival. Basile et

al. (2017) suggest that firms within an

agglomerated cluster benefit from positive

externalities including the availability of a

specialized labour market pooling, easy access to

intermediate inputs, higher chances of knowledge

spillovers, a broader supply of local public services

as well as higher local demand etc. All these factors

may thus result in lower costs or higher

productivity, which in turn facilitate higher survival

rate for firms. However, a larger number of firms

also means tougher competition and firm selection

and therefore is expected to increase the propensity

to exit. There is a rich stream of empirical literature

investigating the impact of agglomeration

economies on firm survival (Varum and Rocha,

2012; Varum et el., 2014; Randelli and Ricchiuti,

2015; Cala et al., 2005; Resende et al., 2016; Basile

et al., 2017.). Unexpectedly, most of these studies

with the exception of Randelli and Ricchiuti (2015)

conclude that firms operating in more agglomerated

locations have lower survival rates. Typical measure

of agglomeration economies includes the number of

firms in the industry, the share of an industry’s

employment in total manufacturing employment,

and population density. In this study, we use the

logarithm of the number of hotels in the industry to

proxy in our regressions, following the study of

Randelli and Ricchiuti (2015) and Resende et al.

(2016).

The third variable is region (district) specialization.

Specialization refers to the concentration of the

same type of tourism firms in a cluster (Erkuş-

Öztürk, 2009). We use location quotient (LQ) index

which tries to unveil the basic association between

two categories such as hotel firms and different

districts. LQ is a ratio of the hotels of their clusters

to whole clusters: cluster industry is share of total

clusters firms over regional (Antalya) industry is

share of total regional firms. It is inferred that three

observations are seen for each LQ value; ‘‘LQ < 1, LQ

=1 or LQ>1. If LQ> 1, it means that the respective

item exhibits a specialization in that cluster (Erkuş-

Öztürk, 2009) such as hotel specialization according

to the different tourism cluster in Antalya.

We also use another district variable, Herfindahl

index, to test the effects of industry concentration

(lack of diversity) on firm survival. The degree of

industry concentration is measured by the

Herfindahl index, which is computed as the

reciprocal of number of tourism firms, constructed

at the district level. When there is only one firm in

the industry, the maximum value of the index equals

to one (i.e. monopoly). The index falls as the

number of firms rises (as the industry becomes

more competitive and diversified). Varum et al.

(2014) states that the presence of strong

competition may have a negative impact on the

survival of incumbents. However, it may also raise

the probability of surviving since incumbent firms

have enough power to prevent new firms from

entering an industry. Cala et al. (2005) also point

out that the Hirschman-Herfindahl index, which

indicates a lack of diversity in the region, may have

a negative effect on survival, since firms located in

less diversified environments are more vulnerable

to external shocks. The prior empirical research

reports mixed relationship for the impact of

industry concentration. For example, Basile et al.

(2017) found a significant and positive effect of the

industry concentration (lack of diversity or

competition) on survival in services while found a

negative effect in manufacturing. On the other hand,

Kaniovski and Peneder (2008) report that

increasing market concentration has negative effect

on firm survival. In line with this, some works

(Keeble and Walker, 1994) claim that the exit is

more likely in less diversified, non-concentrated

environments. Similarly, Resende et el. (2016)

report that industry concentration negatively

affects the chance of survival of SMEs. There are

some studies that report insignificant effects (for

example, Varum and Rocha, 2012; Varum et al.,

2014; Cala et al., 2005). Hence, both positive and

negative signs are possible for the industry

concentration variable Herfindahl index.

Macro-level variables

The objective of this study is to assess the effect that

economic and political crisis will have on the

likelihood of hotel survival in Antalya region.

Macroeconomic conditions will also have an impact

on firm’s survival prospects (Varum et al., 2014).

Favorable economic conditions are expected to

result in higher demand and price-cost margins, and

would possibly improve the survival of firms, as

incumbents do not have to act aggressively against

new entrants (Basile et al., 2017). On other hand,

during economic downturns the survival chances of

firms could be adversely affected, resulting in a

negative relationship. A large number of studies

(e.g. Kaniovski and Peneder, 2008; Holmes and

114


Stone, 2008; Varum et al., 2014; Resende et al.,

2016) investigated and supported the positive

effects of industry or market growth on the

likelihood of firm survival. In addition, several

recent studies has shown that economic downturns

had a detrimental impact on the survival of firms

(Varum and Rocah, 2012; Varum et al., 2014).

In order to properly take into account the effects of

economic and political crisis on hotel survival, we

employed a downturn dummy for whether the

economy is facing a period of economic and political

crisis or not. When we use the word “downturn” to

indicate all sorts of crisis period in the Turkish

economy, we can identify at least two types of crisis

period in the analysis. One is the economic crisis

period, which can be seen as a year in which the

economy experiences a severe decline in GDP.

Another type is political crisis period, which can be

seen as a year in which the country suffers from

various political crisis, such as war, coups and

terrorism. Turkey’s GDP declined by almost 5%

between 2008 and 2009 following the 2008-2009

global financial crisis. In addition, Turkey’s

economy, particularly tourism industry,

experienced major loss following repeated terror

attacks and coup attempt in 2015 and 2016.

Consequently, we consider the following years as

the downturn periods in the Turkish economy:

2008, 2009, 2015 and 2016. Thus, we measured the

impact of downturns by adding a dummy variable

to the discrete-time analysis, which took one when

Turkey was in downturn, and zero otherwise.

Regression Findings

Results are obtained using discrete-time

proportional hazard model with a complementary

log-log hazard function (cloglog). The dependent

variable for the cloglog models is binary or

dichotomous, which is equal to one if the hotel is

exited and zero otherwise, and regressed on a set of

hotel, district and macroeconomic variables. The

results reported in Table 3 correspond to the two

different specifications of the cloglog models. In

column 1 of Table 3, the results are presented for

the basic model without considering any potential

unobserved heterogeneity (model 1). The second

column of Table 3 presents the cloglog estimates

when the unobserved heterogeneity is taken into

account through random effects (model 2). To check

whether the model controlling for unobserved firm

heterogeneity should be preferred to the basic

model, we should look at the estimate of the

likelihood ratio test of rho ( ), which is the

fraction of error variance that is explained by

variation in the unobserved individual factors.

When the rho parameter is zero, we should reject

the null hypothesis that unobserved individual

heterogeneity is not relevant. Before moving to a

detailed interpretation of the results, it is important

to note that reported coefficients in Table

3 represent hazard ratios. A positive coefficient for

an explanatory variable means that the hazard rate

is increasing, equivalently the survival rate is

declining. Conversely, a negative regression

coefficient implies a decreased hazard and

increased survival rates.

First of all, starting with firm-specific variables, the

results of Model 1 show that hotel age has a positive

and significant effect on the probability of exit.

Contrary to our expectations, this finding indicates

lack of a non-linear relationship between hotel age

and survival. This is a rather surprising result given

the fact that younger firms have liabilities of

newness and one may expect to see a higher hazard

rate among them (Mata and Portugal, 2002).

However, our results seem to suggest that the

hazard rate increases in the years immediately after

entry and keeps increasing as firm age increases

(monotonically). This may be attributed to the fact

that new hotels exhaust their available financial

resources-not readily available in developing

countries- before building strong linkages with their

customers and suppliers. Another explanation could

be less innovative and diversification tendency of

higher aged hotels in Antalya which contrasts with

the claim of Kainovski and Peneder (2008) on older

age and diversification relation. Low level of

diversification in older aged hotels makes them less

attractive to tourists due to giving standardized

service and products compared to newly construct

differentiated hotels.

The second firm-specific variable, the firm size

variable, exerts a negative and significance

influence on the hazard rate, suggesting that larger

hotels are more likely to survive. This finding is also

consistent with the findings of Kainovski and

Peneder (2008), Holmes and Stone (2008) and

Basile et al. (2017), who provide a positive

relationship between firm size and firm survival.

This relation explained by Bruni et.al. (2014) that in

crisis periods, larger firms can be less sensitive to

business uncertainty due to their higher intangible

assets bundle, scale economies and greater financial

leverage. Kainovski and Peneder (2008) explains

the higher survival rate of larger hotels by having

more market power and endurance. Finding for

Antalya also confirms arguments on small hotels

that may face cost disadvantages and greater

difficulties in having access to capital and labour

markets compared with large firms (Grilli et al.,

2010; Pérez et al., 2004; Varum and Nocha, 2012).

Larger sized hotels are more innovative and serving

more diversified services (Erkuş-Öztürk, 2009;

2010) which make them less vulnerable to crisis

and still attract tourists. Another explanation can be

less mobile character of larger sized hotels which

115


does not allow them to exit easily in the first years

of downturn. This explanation is given by the

managers of hotel associations in Antalya explaining

less exit tendency in large sized hotels especially in

crisis periods.

Other variable, business structure (proxied by the

corporation variable), decreases the hazard and

increases the probability of survival in hotels. It

suggests that having limited assets or resources

leads to higher hazard rates. In addition, our

analysis shows that the foreign ownership and

taking place in a tourism location has no statistically

significant relation on hotel firm survival.

About district level variables, entry rate and

regional specialization seem significantly contribute

the survival of hotel firms. Supporting the claims of

the literature (Mata and Portugal, 2002; Taymaz

and Özler, 2007; Resende et al., 2016) on increasing

competition by entry rate, entry rate in hotels

shows a positive influence on hazard rate and

negative influence on hotel survival in crisis.

It is also found that the higher the regional

specialization in tourism in a district, the higher the

hazard rate and the lower the survival of a hotel.

Finding verifies that concentration of hotels in a

tourism place negatively affect the survival which

could give hints to the strategies of policy makers

and planners on the possible positive effects of

diversification instead specialization on sustaining

development even in crisis periods.

Last explanatory variable is downturn variable,

which has been incorporated in the estimation

models to estimate the effects of economic and

political crisis on firm survival in Antalya region.

The Downturn variable is expected to have a

negative effect on the probability of survival, or

equivalently a positive effect on the hazard. The

results verify that downturn periods lower the

survival prospects of hotels, in line with the findings

of Varum and Rocha (2012) and Varum et al.

(2014). Hence the result is generally consistent with

the previous findings that exists of firms are more

common during unfavorable macroeconomic

conditions.

Table 3. Estimates of the complementary log-log

model for hotels and similar accommodations

Model 1 Model 2

Age 0.0612*** 0.0612***

(0.000) (0.000)

Size -0.9138*** -0.9138***

(0.000) (0.000)

Legal form -0.4063*** -0.4063***

(0.002) (0.002)

Foreign 0.2224 0.2224

(0.108) (0.109)

Tourism location 11.3553 11.3553

(0.321) (0.265)

Entry rate 16.3062** 16.3063**

(0.044) (0.019)

Regional

specialization LQ 2.4258** 2.4258**

(0.016) (0.012)

Destination size -2.9311 -2.9311

(0.191) (0.141)

Herfindahl index -1078.6935 -1078.6948

(0.211) (0.155)

Downturn 19.8006** 19.8007**

(0.039) (0.014)

District dummies Yes Yes

Year dummies Yes Yes

0.0001

(0.495)

Observations 8,813 8,813

Log likelihood -1,440 -1,440

Notes: The table reports estimated coefficients and the corresponding p-

values (in parentheses). *,**, and *** indicate significance at 10%, 5%, and

1% confidence levels, respectively. The dependent variable is a binary

variable that takes the value of one in the year of exit for firms and 0

otherwise. The covariates are defined in Table 3. Models 2 includes an

unobserved heterogeneity that is accounted for through the use of firm

random effects. is the fraction of error variance that is explained by

variation in the unobserved individual factors. All models include also

district dummies and year dummies. All left-censored observations are

excluded from the data used in the estimations. a Estimates are not

reported but can be provided upon request.

116


Conclusive Remarks

For analyzing the impacts of crisis/downturns on

the firm survival in Antalya tourism city, we have

used a complementary log-log model (cloglog), a

discrete time version of the Cox proportional hazard

model. This paper presented an empirical analysis

of the impact of variety of variables ((i)firm-specific

variables (age, size, legal structure, foreign

ownership, tourism location), (ii) industry-specific

variables (agglomeration, herfindahl index, regional

specialization entry rate, and (iii) macroeconomic

variables (downturns) on firm survival in different

crisis periods.

According to our findings, the most significant

findings of survival in hotels are their age, size,

being a corporation, downturn periods, entry-rate,

taking place in tourism specialized region. Among

the features that do not make any difference on the

survival are the owner type, and some geographical

attributes such as taking place in a tourism location,

size of destination and diversification. Because of

taking hotels as a unit of analysis, sensitivity of

tourism and sensitivity of tourism related firms in

our case hotels was clearly observed. According to

the findings, firstly, we can clearly say that even

though there is a high sensitivity of the tourism

sector to crises, big sized hotels seem to survive

more strongly. Secondly, we can clearly say that

hotels in tourism districts make hotels more

sensitive. This could be related with high

competition between companies. Competition

between big sized hotels stimulates diversification

and innovation in services and products they serve

(Erkuş-Öztürk, 2009) which makes them strong in

firm survival.

These findings would contribute to adaptation

strategies of hotels managers, city managers, and

development specialists to make a tourism city

more sustainable and stronger to respond crisis.

Future work could make comparative cases for

hotels and other related tourism companies from

different tourism regions of different countries on

defining the factors of firm survival and to develop

strategies to respond crisis in tourism cities.

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118


The Effect Of Tourism Sector On The Agriculture Sector: An Assessment On

Turkey-Russia Aircraft Crisis On The Supply Chain Of Herbal Products

Şerife Betül Çetinkaya a and Hilal Erkuş Öztürk b

a Akdeniz University, Faculty of Architecture, Department of Urban and Regional Planning

Antalya, Turkey Tel: (0242) 227 44 00

s.betulcetinkaya@gmail.com

b Akdeniz University, Faculty of Architecture, Department of Urban and Regional Planning

Antalya, Turkey Tel: (0242) 227 44 00

hilalerkus@yahoo.com

Abstract

In recent years, the tourism sector has a significant

economic impact on agricultural sector. Vegetables

and fruits that are heavily consumed in the tourism

sector are obtained from agriculture sector through

brokers and suppliers. Therefore, tourism and

agriculture sector are in a close input-output

relationship. The sector has an important customer

potential especially for herbal products suppliers.

Therefore, (economical or political) crises negatively

affecting tourism sector also affect agricultural

sector. The aim of this study is to examine the impact

of tourism sector on the supply chain of herbal

products in agricultural sector in the crisis period. As

a case study area, Antalya is selected due to being the

center of tourism and vegetable production. Face-toface

interviews are applied to companies (tourism

suppliers) selling fruit and vegetables to tourism

companies to answer “how do crises affect the

relationship between the two related sectors, namely

tourism and agriculture? The results show that

negative effects of a political crisis on the tourism

sector are also affected the supply relations in

agriculture sector.

Keywords: Tourism Sector, Agriculture Sector,

Crisis, Supply Chain.

Introduction

Tourism sector is affecting for continuous growth in

countries and destinations [1]. Tourism activities

have started to increase especially after World War

II. Technological developments, diversification of

transportation types, decreasing costs and

increasing people's quality of life and expectations

have been effective in spreading touristic activities.

As a result of widespread tourism activities, the

sector has become one of the largest economic

sectors in the world. The sector is seen as a

powerful tool for development, especially in

developing countries [2, 3]. Because, the sector

revives many sub-sectors such as accommodation,

transportation, food, culture, arts, sports, recreation

[4], agriculture, textile and health. Thus, the sector

contributes significantly to the local economy [2, 5,

6]. One of the most important sector is the food

sector which constitutes one third of all tourism

expenditures. In addition to meet the nutritional

needs of tourists, interest in local delicacies

increased the need for food sector in tourism

companies. Therefore, it can be stated that tourism

and agriculture sector have a strong input-output

relationship.

As being complementary sectors, they constitute a

driving force for local and regional development [7,

8]. However, it is emphasized in many studies that

the two sectors compete with each other in some

cases. This competition stems from the low quality

of local products, the dependence of tourism on

imported products [9], the lack of direct links

between tourism enterprises and agricultural

enterprises, the loss of agricultural land with the

development of tourism over time and the two

sectors competing with each other in terms of

employment [10, 11]. However, inter-sectoral

relations have positive results in cities whose

leading sectors are tourism and agriculture as seen

in Antalya.

Antalya, fertile soil and as the country's politics in

the 1980s thanks to the encouragement of

greenhouse vegetable and fruit production, has

become Turkey's fresh fruit and vegetable

production center. On the other hand, city is a

world-famous tourist attraction destination due to

its natural beauty. Tourism Incentive Law enacted

in 1982 and has experienced massive growth in

tourism in Turkey [12]. In this way, the tourism

sector in Antalya has started to develop. Nowadays,

Antalya is a leading tourism and agriculture city in

Turkey (Table 1).

119


Table 1- Accommodation unit, number of beds

and crop production value of Antalya [13, 14]

Number of

accommodatio

n

units

Number of

beds

(pcs)

Crop

Production

Value

(thousand TL)

Turkey Antalya % Rank

3967 790 19.90% 1

979934 453525 46.20% 1

135.226.039 10.091.217 7.46 % 1

Tourism and agriculture sector, in terms of

specialization, seperate the city into two regions,

namely East and West. Agriculture sector has been

dominant more in Western Antalya and the role of

tourism is comparably smaller. Tourism in this

region is mainly on a daily basis and

accommodation units appear as a hostel and a

boutique hotel rather than a big sized hotel. In the

center and east of Antalya, the leading sector is

tourism. Big sized luxury hotels in created tourism

centers, in which many local and foreign tourists are

hosted, have been developed in the Eastern part of

Antalya by the State Centered Tourism development

Policies. In addition to tourism, there is also some

crop production in this region (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Number of beds and size of greenhouse

area of Antalya districts [15, 16]

Note:(Aksu data is not given because it is the central

district. Due to the fact that vegetative production is

carried out in greenhouses in Antalya, the size of the

greenhouses is shown).

Due to the geographical structure of city, the

varying distributon of tourism and agriculture

sectors as East and West Antalya prevents the

competition between two sectors. Therefore,

negative effects discussed in the literature such as

the loss of agricultural lands with the development

of tourism and the competition of two sectors in

terms of employment are not the case for Antalya.

On the contrary, the increase in the number of

tourists, positively contributes to the agricultural

sector with the increase in product sales. Due to the

fact that vegetable and fruit production can be

obtained from within city, positive contribution of

this complementarity are seen such as decrease in

transportation costs and access to products in a

shorter time. The combination of these two sectors

in the same city has positive effects on economic

development. However, the association of these two

sectors is negatively effect each other in crisis

situations that stem from external factors such as

political situations. Antalya’s economy generates

the highest income from Russia from both tourism

and agriculture sector. This situation affects both

sectors negatively during an unexpected political

crisis such as seen in Turkey-Russia Aircraft Crisis.

In this study, it is aimed to examine the effect

political crisis on the supply relations between of

tourism sector and agriculture sector. In the first

part of the study, the literature on the relationship

between tourism and agriculture sector is given. In

the second part, the presentation of the data

indicating the significance of the study area, the

applied methodology are given. Lastly findings will

be discussed and possible policy proposals are

given.

Complementarity between tourism and

agriculture sector

In the literature, it is stated that there are positive

and negative relations between tourism and

agriculture. When these two sectors works

complementarily, they become a driving force for

local and regional development. It is claimed that

tourism cannot be a trigger for local agricultural

economic development without inter-sectoral

cooperation [9, 17]. According to Bowen et al. [18],

when the tourism sector takes place in a geography

where the agricultural sector is located, it may

positively contributes on agriculture sector.

According to Torres [19], linking food tourism

demand with local agricultural production is critical

to maximizing host country benefits. Increasing the

linkages between the representatives of agriculture

and tourism offers important opportunities for

promoting local production, preserving the gain in

local tourism and improving the distribution of

tourism economic benefits in rural areas [19]. The

tourism sector supports agriculture sector at local

level [20, 21, 22, 23, 24] by increasing quality and

market share and offering local people nonagricultural

employment [19, 25] strengthens ruralurban

links [20] and plays an important role in

ensuring agricultural diversity by increasing

demand for different products [26]. According to a

study by Liu et al. [27] in around Lake Lugu in

China, farmers have diversified their products in

line with tourism demand to produce high-priced

agricultural products.

120


Tourism supplier companies play a significant role

in establishing the connection between the two

sectors. Because it is difficult for the producer to

establish contact with tourism enterprises and to

ensure the control of the grown products [3].

Therefore the broker buys the product from the

farmer. This relation sometimes occurs when the

farmer sells the product to the broker, but usually

buys the product from the broker farmer. The

broker sells the product received from the farmer to

the tourism supplier and distributes the products to

the tourism enterprises (Figure 2).

has canceled their tour. As a result of these

sanctions has been a serious decline in the number

of tourists coming to Turkey and tourism revenues

(Graph 1). On January 1, 2016, imports of many

food products imported from Turkey is forbidden.

These products, tomatoes, cucumbers, oranges,

apples and so on. Following these sanctions of

Russia, a negative impact on the GDP change is

observed. This effect caused a stagnation in the

services sector which included tourism and the

agricultural sector in 2015-2016 (Graph 2).

Graph 1. The number of tourists and tourism

revenue by Turkey of the year [14]

Graph. 2- Turkey’s GDP changes by sector in years

[29]

Figure 2- Tourism and agriculture sector supply

relationship

In the procurement process, the link between

tourism supplier companies and tourism

enterprises should be strong. Factors affecting this

link are defined as spatial proximity [28], trust [19],

intermediaries, government policies and lack of

credit [3]. Tourism suppliers tend to buy products

from regions that are close to tourism enterprises

due to the short lifetime of fresh fruits and

vegetables [28]. Trust plays a major role in the

selection of the companies where tourism suppliers

sell their products. Suppliers choose the companies

they sell their products according to their trust

relationships. This concerns suppliers' concerns

about being able to provide for the price of the

products they sell. This is related to concerns that

suppliers may be able to provide for the price of the

products. On the other hand, government policies

play a major role in strengthening the relation

between the two sectors. These factors often have a

positive impact on sectors. However, in some cases,

crisis effecting one sector can also influence the

complementing sector negatively such as seen in

Turkey-Russia Aircraft Crisis and its influence to

both tourism and agriculture sector in Antalya.

Heavy sanctions were applied such as; restrictions

on Turkish companies to the cancellation of some

flights to Turkey, the abolition of visa-free travel to

Turkey, stopping the import of certain food stuffs

from Turkey is stopped and tourism to Turkey.

Russia, the Russian citizens in Turkey, has a return

call and all tour companies in the country, Turkey

As a result of the sanctions imposed, Antalya's

exports of fresh vegetables and fruits to Russia

decreased significantly between 2015-2016 and this

decline continued in 2017 (Graph 3). The sanctions

also caused a serious decline in the tourism sector

and tourism revenues from Russia have reached its

lowest level in 2016 (Graph 4).

Graph 3- Antalya's fresh fruit and vegetable

exports to Russia ($) [30]

YSM İhracatı

$; 2012;

84264911

YSM İhracatı

$; 2013;

226541631

YSM İhracatı

$; 2014;

220973516

YSM İhracatı

$; 2015;

228119009

YSM İhracatı

$; 2016;

60146386

YSM İhracatı

$; 2018;

72956043

YSM İhracatı

$; 2017;

41702145

121


Graph 4- Tourism income from Russia ($

thousand) [31]

Graph 4. The number of tourists coming to

Turkey by country, distribution of the provinces

most accommodation and tourism spending [14]

Source: Prepared from TÜİK’s data (2019).

Methods

This research apllies both qualitative and

quantitative tools for exploring the case. Frequency

and percentage analysis methods were used for

data analysis; the answers of the interviewed

suppliers were classified according to their

repetition in terms of meaning. The data of the

study was obtained by using semi-structured

interview form. The data of interview results were

analysed by content analysis.

Research questions of the study is:

• How do crises affect the relationship

between tourism and agriculture, which

have complementing relation in Antalya?

Sub-questions of the study are:

• Do crises affect the type of sales firm?

• How do crises affect product sales?

• Do central and local governments, NGOs

and banks provide help, support and/or

encouragement during the crisis?

Study area selection

In the study, the reason for choosing the case study

area, Antalya, was the most significant decrease

observed in terms of number of Russian tourists in

the city which consists of more than 50 % of

tourists in the city. In addition, significant amount of

export cancellation was observed on vegetables to

Russia from Antalya in those years. Since the food

sector constitutes 26.3% of tourism expenditures, it

is aimed to examine the effects of tourism on the

agricultural sector in the crisis period (Figure 4).

Also with Antalya's tourism and agricultural sector

that ranks first in Turkey it has also been effective

in the selection area.

In this context, as the analysis unit, tourism

suppliers in Antalya which provide the link between

tourism and agriculture sectors were selected. It is

found that there are 22 companies which are

members of Antalya Tourism Suppliers Association.

16 of these companies are located in Antalya

Vegetable and Fruit Market which is taking place in

Antalya center. Within the scope of the study, 8

tourism suppliers from 16 companies agreed to

have in-depth interviews in Antalya Vegetable and

Fruit Market. Firstly, telephone interviews were

made with suppliers and 8 tourism suppliers

accepted to make face-to-face indepth interview. A

total of 8 questions were asked to suppliers within

the scope of the interview. All of the interviewed

suppliers sell products to hotels in Manavgat.

Together with Manavgat, 6 suppliers sell products

to Kemer, 3 suppliers to Kundu, 4 suppliers to

central district and 1 supplier to tourism companies

in İzmir and Kuşadası (Table 2). All interviewed

suppliers receive their products from brokers.

122


Table 2. Districts where suppliers sell products

F1

F2

F3

F4

F5

F6

F7

F8

Alanya, Manavgat, Kundu, Merkez,

Kemer, İzmir, Kuşadası

Manavgat, Kundu

Manavgat, Merkez, Kemer

Manavgat

Manavgat, Kemer


Manavgat, Kundu, Kemer


Findings

We have evaluated the effect of crisis on suppliers

by asking the following questions; which type of

tourism firms they sell products before, during and

after the crisis, how they coped with crisis, what is

the most difficult issue during the crisis, what

depends on success in crisis periods, from which

type of actors they received assistance, expectations

of firms from the government during the crisis.

We have observed that suppliers sell their products

to hostel, hotel and chain hotels. While all

companies sell products to hotels, 62.5% of them

sell to pensions and 75% of them sell to chain hotels

(Table 3). The first sub-question of this research is

whether the types of hotels where the companies

sell products before and after the crisis have

changed. When the change rates of the answers

were evaluated (see Table 3), it is found that there

is no change in the companies selling products

before, during and after the crisis. It is seen that

there is no change in the type of firms they work in

before, during and after the crisis. When companies

are asked about the reason for this, they said that it

is important to be able to get the price of the

product they sell rather than sell it, so they prefer to

work with the tourism companies they trust. This is

in line with the finding that the trust relationship in

the supply process strengthens the link between the

supplier firms and tourism enterprises (Torres,

2003). When the suppliers were asked which type

of firms they trust, they stated that they trust the

owner or branded enterprises (chain hotels) more.

However, small tourism firms are more fortunate to

adapt to crises than big tourism firms [32].

Table 3- Tourism firms where supplier companies

sell products

Before the

crisis

During

the crisis

After the

crisis

Hostel %62.5 %62.5 %62.5

Hotel %100 %100 %100

Chain hotel %75 %75 %75

The second sub-question of the research is how the

product sales of the supplier firms changed during

the crisis and how they handle the loss. It was found

that all firms interviewed decreased their product

sales during the crisis and could not cover this loss

(Table 4). The suppliers stated that they were very

desperate during the crisis and that they expected

to go through the process and that they lost a lot of

money and borrowed from the banks. The firm,

namely F2, explained the crisis “The crisis was very

difficult for us. Hardly any tourists did not come and

we could not find the hotel to sell the product. We

waited and prayed that our relations with Russia

would improve. We had to make savings, and so we

had to lay off some of our employees ”.

Table 4- The answers of the suppliers to the

question of how you coped with the crisis

We couldn't

handle the

damage

F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 f %

√ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ 8 100%

We lost money √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ 8 100%

We made

savings

√ √ √ 3 37.50%

Lay off some of

the staff

√ √ √ 3 37.50%

Taken loans

from banks

√ √ √ √ 4 50%

When the suppliers were asked what was the most

difficult issue during the crisis, they stated that, as

expected, the sales of all the products decreased

during the crisis and even came to a halt and that

the most difficult issue was to not be able to sell the

product (Table 5). The firm, namely F7, explained

the most difficult issue during the crisis: “We

predicted that the day the Russian plane was shot

down, things would get worse, but we didn't think it

would grow that big. We could not sell products to

tourists in hotels. We did not receive the product from

the broker, the broker did not receive from the

farmer. Everyone was a victim. Product sales stopped,

we could not even get the money of the product we

sold previously. At that time, we couldn't afford to

stop making profits.”

Table 5- The answers given by suppliers to the

question of what is the most difficult issue during

the crisis

Make

money

Product

sales

Getting

price of the

product

F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 f %

√ √ √ √ √ √ √ 7 87.50%

√ √ √ √ √ √ √ 7 87.50%

√ √ √ √ √ √ 6 75%

When asked what depends on the success of

companies in times of crisis; It is stated that there is

a variety of customers, to host local guests as well as

foreign guests and sell products to trusted

123


companies. The firm, namely F5, explained to be

successful in the crisis period “Most tourists come

from Russia. So when there was tension with Russia,

tourism came to an end. Tourists from other

nationalities should come alongside Russia. It is also

very important to work with businesses you trust. We

were already selling very few products at that time

and we couldn't even charge the products. For

example, the owners of the hostel or hotel owners

suddenly disappeared. That's why we no longer work

with non-proprietors.”

Table 6- The answers given by suppliers to the

question of what depends on success in crisis

periods

Work with

the company

you trust

Variety of

tourists

Host local

tourists

F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 f %

√ √ √ √ 4 50%

√ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ 8 100%

√ √ √ √ √ 5 62.5%

As another sub-question, firms were asked whether

they received any assistance, support or

encouragement from the government, nongovernmental

organizations, municipalities or

banks before, during and after the crisis. In line with

the answers of the firms, it was concluded that they

did not receive any assistance, support or

encouragement from the government, nongovernmental

organizations and municipalities in

any period. In the crisis period, it is observed that

all firms have taken loans from banks and after the

crisis, 75% of them have taken loans from banks

(Table 7).

Table 7- Organizations in which firms received

assistance, support or incentives during, before

and after the crisis

Before the During the After

crisis crisis crisis

Government 0% 0% 0%

Non-governmental

organizations

0% 0% 0%

Municipality 0% 0% 0%

Banks 0% 100% 75%

Finally, when asked what are your expectations

from the government during the crisis period; Its

firstly stated that government behaviour should be

ensured more positively in times of crisis. Secondly

it is claimed that local tourists should be attracted

to the region as well as foreign tourists to ensure

the diversity of tourists (Table 8). The firm, namely

F2, explained the situtation “Hotels are preferred by

foreign tourists because domestic tourists spend less

than foreign tourists. But in the time of crisis,

domestic tourists came on vacation. I think a certain

place should be reserved for local tourists in hotels

every term.The state should guarantee domestic

tourists. Because if foreign tourists do not come, we

the

will earn money from domestic tourists. The state

should attract local tourists to the region with

various campaigns.”

Table 8- Expectations of firms from the

government during the crisis

More

positive

Attract

local

tourists

Not

exacerbate

the crisis

Create a

diversity of

tourists

F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 f %

√ √ √ 3 37.50%

√ √ √ √ √ 5 62.5%

√ √ 2 25%

√ √ √ √ √ √ √ 7 87.50%

Evaluation and Conclusion

In this study, whether the effects of the crisis

experienced in the tourism sector is also affected

the agricultural sector were examined by selecting

the working period of the Russian Aircraft Crisis

period through tourism supplier companies. As a

result of the interviews with tourism supplier

companies, it has been empirically revealed that the

agricultural sector is also adversely affected as a

result of the negative impact of the tourism sector

on the crisis. In this context, due to the decrease in

the number of tourists visiting the hotels, the

product sales of the suppliers have declined

considerably and thus the farmer's product could

not be sold. It is observed that single market

oriented strategy in tourism cities can create some

vulnerabilities in the economy of the city if there a

problem occurs between that market and that city’s

connected sectors. Antalya is leading foreign

tourists stay city in Turkey, however this city is

dominated by Russian and German market. Findings

showed the negative effect of crisis happened

between leading foreign tourist markets (Russia

and Germany) and Antalya.It is seen how important

to create diversity in international markets and to

support the domestic market in terms of providing

diversity and reducing economic risk. Therefore,

diverse market attracting strategy, the diversity of

tourists, diversification in tourism and

diversification of the urban economy should be

stimulated. It is important that planning and policy

strategies supported by policy makers and planners

to increase market diversity in tourism cities.

Thanks to these supports and encouragements, the

resilience of sectors and tourism cities can be

increased. In addition, the interaction of the

prominent actors in the tourism city at national,

regional and local level, and the preparation of

tourism development policies and plans in which

non-governmental organizations are integrated,

besides central and local institutions, will increase

the resilience and sustainability of tourism cities.

This situation is especially important for the actors

who play a role in the sectors after the crisis to

124


express their problems, suggestions and requests to

reach policy makers.

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