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The purpose of this paper is to investigate potential barriers to deployment of information technology (IT) projects and evaluate strategies to overcome them in hotel companies.

Empirical data were collected through a series of in-depth semi-structured interviews from IT managers, chief information officers, and hotel general managers.

The research findings demonstrate that barriers to IT implementation occur in three different stages. They are pre-implementation (cost and return on investment, resistance by owners/executives); during the implementation (integration, time delays, vendor communication problems, and resistance by employees); and post-implementation (inadequate training and resistance from customers).

The research findings suggest a contingency approach where organizations should employ various specific strategies depending on the situation to overcome these barriers. Multiple theoretical perspectives should be utilized to evaluate potential barriers to IT projects and utilize specific strategies to overcome them.

This is one of the first empirical studies which provide specific theoretical and practical implications on barriers when implementing IT projects in hotels.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce and explore blockchain technology and its potential implementation to hospitality and tourism firms’ wide range of business operations and transactions from a technological and functional point of view. This study’s central interest is to produce novel and rigorous in-depth-review analysis and foundations for a broad discussion and outlook on the potential applications of blockchain technology benefiting hospitality and tourism research, as well as the industry as a whole.

This study identifies and proposes several potential areas of the adoption and implementation of blockchain technology to the hospitality and tourism industry, including payment and cryptocurrencies, tracking and service customization, the disintermediation of hospitality and tourism, innovative loyalty programs, smart contracts, integrated property management systems, verified rating and review systems, collaborative initiatives and due diligence and smart tourism, each of which represents fertile avenues for future research.

This paper provides extensive critical discussions, reviews and answers to a fundamental question: “What critical functions of Blockchain mechanisms can be implemented to the existing core operational (i.e. booking and reservation systems, guest management, etc.) and business functions (i.e. loyalty/reward programs, agent transactions, etc.) of hospitality and tourism companies?”.

Future studies should specifically delve further into various angles of this “BizTech” environment based not only on business operations and competition but also on vendor and customer collaboration.

This study intends to serve as a guidance for future research, facilitate knowledge accumulation and create a new understanding and awareness in both practice and academia. One of the most important applications of blockchain in this industry would be that pertaining to direct booking, online reservation systems (i.e. airlines and online travel agencies) and check-in/out with digital identities. With industry-wide blockchain adoption, guests’ personal information can be digitally validated, saved and secured as previously established cryptographically secured codes verify one’s identity without disclosing essential personal information.

It is obvious that the hospitality and tourism industry needs urgent technological transformation, industrial innovations and new growth avenues such as the adoption of blockchain technology and systems to maintain its global market share in the future. Therefore, the implementation of blockchain systems can promote the formation of multi-center (i.e. guest operations and customer service), weakly intermediated (i.e. loyalty programs and/or review and rating systems) areas in this industry.

The purpose of this study is to propose and test an extended version of technology acceptance model (TAM) to examine consumers’ acceptance of radio frequency identification (RFID) cashless payment systems in the hospitality industry.

A comprehensive structural model was developed by adding two additional constructs to original TAM, namely, self-efficacy and perceived risk. A self-administered online questionnaire was used to collect the data of the study from 305 respondents in the USA. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to validate the measurement model and structural equation modeling analysis was performed to test the proposed model.

Study results indicated that self-efficacy was significantly related to perceived ease of use. In addition, perceived risk significantly negatively influenced perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use. Study results further illustrated that perceived ease of use had a significant impact on perceived usefulness and both perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness were significantly associated with intention to use.

Study findings provide significant practical implications for US hospitality operators and technology vendors for identifying factors affecting users’ acceptance of RFID cashless payment systems in the hospitality industry.

By extending TAM, this study is one of the first studies to investigate RFID cashless payment system acceptance in the hospitality industry.

The purpose of this study is to empirically evaluate the influence of a hotel’s listing on the last-minute hotel booking app, HotelTonight, and average daily rate (ADR) on the hotel’s net operating income (NOI). The study examines the mediating effect of hotel occupancy rate on the relationships between ADR and hotel app usage in terms of NOI.

The data for the study was graciously provided by Smith Travel Research, Inc. for 80 hotels located in the top Florida destinations listed on the HotelTonight app. Hierarchical multiple regression with a mediation effect was used in the study to test the mediating effect of occupancy between hotel app usage and ADR with NOI.

The research results show a positive association between a hotel’s HotelTonight listing and ADR in terms of its NOI. Occupancy is found to have a full mediation effect between a hotel’s usage of the mobile app and NOI.

Mobile apps that specialize in last-minute hotel bookings have proliferated in recent years by providing hotels a mobile platform to increase hotel occupancy. However, there is a dearth of studies examining the effect these apps have on a hotel’s bottom line profitability or NOI.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of hotel property characteristics and information technology (IT) decision-maker characteristics on radio frequency identification (RFID) technology adoption in the hotel industry.

The data of the study were collected using the subscription list of Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals (HFTP). A Web survey was used to collect the data of the study. An email invitation was sent out to invite the entire list of HFTP subscribers (3,080) to participate in the survey. Approximately 3,000 emails were delivered and 154 questionnaires were returned. Of 154 questionnaires, 125 were used in the study for further analyses. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to determine whether hotel property characteristics (property size and chain affiliation) and IT decision-maker characteristics (age, education level and job tenure) differed on intention to adopt RFID technology.

ANOVA results indicated that there were significant differences on intention to adopt RFID technology by property size and chain affiliation, IT decision-makers’ age, education level and job tenure. The results indicated that larger hotels and hotels that are part of a franchise are more likely to adopt RFID technology. In addition, IT decision-makers who are young, with high level of education and with shorter job tenure are more likely to adopt RFID technology.

RFID technology is one of the recent technologies that gained great attention from the hotel operators in recent years. This study is one of the first studies in the hotel industry that provides valuable information to technology vendors for identifying potential RFID technology adopters in the hotel industry.

The purpose of this study was to determine the local residents’ attitudes of tourism in Kusadasi, Turkey. In addition, the relationship between residents’ attitudes toward tourism and their overall perceived happiness was analyzed.

A correlational, quantitative research technique was used in this study. The data of this study were collected from 383 local residents in Kusadasi, Turkey. Exploratory factor analysis and multiple regression analysis were conducted to analyze the data.

The results of the study indicated that local residents had favorable attitudes toward tourism in terms of its positive economic, cultural and environmental impact. Study results also indicated that negative economic impact of tourism was found to be the least favorable construct associated with residents’ attitudes toward tourism in Kusadasi. In addition, multiple regression analysis indicated that local residents’ perceived overall happiness was significantly influenced by positive and negative cultural and environmental impact and positive economic impact factors.

The findings of the study provide valuable information to tourism planners and decision makers seeking to build a resident friendly tourism destination in Kusadasi, Turkey.

The objective of this study was to examine the effects of performance and uniqueness as predictors of fundraising event quality.

This study utilized intercept surveys collected from attendees at a non-profit fundraising event organized by the tourism and hospitality industry in a major tourism destination. Factor analysis was used to explore underlying event performance dimensions. Multiple regression analysis was used to assess predictability of event performance and unique experience design as predictors of event quality.

Three salient dimensions were identified: Hedonic Event Performance, Event Design Performance and Informative Event Performance. Of the three dimensions, Hedonic Event Performance was found to significantly predict Event Quality. However, Unique Event Experience provided stronger predictability of Event Quality.

The results provide information which can be utilized by event organizers or managers to enhance the overall quality of fundraising events. The distinct attributes of event success identified in this study can be capitalized upon for improving future attendance. The use of event attendees from one particular event, which focused on a very specific cause, can be considered a limitation of the study.

This study focused on identifying different dimensions of a fundraising event which impact quality. The study provides insight into uniqueness of event experiences and their effect on event quality.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are a key player in the food services and restaurants sector; thus, the aim of this work consists in studying the previous research on ICTs in food services and restaurants in the context of tourism and hospitality through a systematic literature review.

The systematic literature review is performed on full papers published in journals included in the Journal Citation Report of the WoS in the category of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism. A total of 165 articles from 28 journals are analyzed, following different criteria, such as the research methods, perspectives, statistical techniques, geographical focus, topics, technologies, authors and universities.

The restaurant sector is more and more based on the creation of experiences and ICTs, through their multiple possibilities, can undoubtedly contribute to adding value to the simple meal and create and recreate experiences to attract and retain customers who are increasingly sophisticated and hooked on ICTs. ICTs are basic for managers taking decision at the highest level in food services and restaurants, so ICTs should not be seen as a technical tool but as an essential element for top management.

This paper examined articles from very well-known tourism and hospitality journals, leaving aside others as well as different publication formats such as books or papers presented at conferences.

A significant contribution made with this paper is the availability of a list of topics in the context of ICTs in food services and restaurants. These topics are classified into three areas (Consumers, Suppliers and Environment and Tendencies) that can serve as a future research framework. The paper also provides useful information to restaurant managers about ICTs, to researchers for their future projects and to academics for their courses.

This study aims to reveal new information about the relationship between energy consumption and economic growth for the time-varying causality.

Economic growth and renewable and nonrenewable energy consumption data of the G7 countries (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the USA) for the 1980–2016 period were used in the study. The nonasymmetric causality test developed by Hacker and Hatemi-J (2006) and both traditional and time-varying forms of the asymmetric causality test by Hatemi-J (2012) were used as the study method.

While the study favors feedback hypothesis for renewable energy consumption in the nonasymmetric causality tests in the UK economy, it favors the same hypothesis for nonrenewable energy consumption in the US economy. However, according to the results reported by Hatemi-J (2012), the feedback hypothesis, which is supported for the UK, is supported only in positive shocks, yet not for each period of analysis. Similarly, feedback hypothesis, which is supported in the USA, is supported only in the negative shocks, yet not for each period of analysis.

This study examined that the asymmetric causality relationship between variables can be analyzed in time-varying form. Therefore, whether positive and negative shocks in renewable and nonrenewable energy consumption always provide useful information in estimations about economic growth is analyzed.

The emergence of cryptocurrency has developed a new payment system that is changing how financial transactions happen in hospitality. Consumers/travelers have started experimenting with cryptocurrency payments in hotels and restaurants. However, extant research is lacking in understanding the consumer adoption intention of cryptocurrency payments. This study investigates the intention to use cryptocurrency payments in the hospitality industry.

The conceptual model in this study is based on the Behavioral Reasoning Theory, and it explores the motivating and deterring factors influencing the adoption of cryptocurrency payments in the hospitality industry. A quantitative survey was conducted among 1,080 consumers to examine and confirm the model, with data being analyzed through the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) method.

The outcome of this work showed that the “reasons for” positively influence and “reasons against” negatively influence consumers’ attitudes and use intentions. Consumers’ values of openness to change positively influence the “reasons for” and do not influence the “reasons against” and attitude toward the use of cryptocurrency payments.

This work contributes to practice by providing insights to customers (users/payee), hospitality managers (investors) and organizations/firms (receiving crypto payments) as well as to financial firms and the government.

This research contributes to cryptocurrency payment adoption and behavioral finance literature. The research uniquely provides the adoption and inhibiting factors for cryptocurrency payment in an integrated framework in the hospitality sector.