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This study aims to explore the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) of the Muslim-friendly homestay business in Malaysia to help identify and recommend practical strategies to capitalize on the strengths and potentials while overcoming the current shortcomings and threats.

The Muslim-friendly business owner and operators in Sabah, Malaysia, were the subject of a series of focus groups and expert opinion interviews. The data was transcribed, and then the variables were categorized into the four SWOT categories using content and thematic analysis. Meanwhile, threats, opportunities, weaknesses and strengths (TOWS) analysis is used to identify the best strategy alternatives.

The SWOT analysis identifies several strengths (e.g. diverse and unique Islamic culture and heritage [S1], iconic Islamic landmarks [S2], rich natural beauty [S3], well-established halal tourism industry [S4]); weaknesses (e.g. limited awareness [W1], limited infrastructure and facilities [W2], limited human resources and trained personnel [W3], lack of Islamic tourism products and experiences [W4]); opportunities (e.g. growing demand for Islamic tourism [O1], increasing disposable income [O2], potential for collaborations [O3], potential for partnerships [O4], potential for expanding Sabah’s halal tourism offerings [O5]); and threats (e.g. competition [T1], political instability [T2], economic downturns [T3] and environmental and social challenges [T4]).

This paper could serve as a guideline and supplementary information for stakeholders in the homestay industry to grasp their business environment better.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of its type to blend SWOT and TOWS analysis with the sector of Muslim-friendly homestays. Hence, the findings might expand understanding of the Muslim-friendly homestays industry and aid businesses in penetrating this growing market.

After completion of the case study, the participants would be able to understand the challenges in building a sustainable homestay tourism business; develop a positioning statement for La Pinekonez which builds a unique competitive advantage; and outline elements of the business strategy to profitably sustain and grow a sustainable tourism homestay in terms of service offering, pricing, marketing and operations.

La Pinekonez Homestay, located in the beautiful region of Himachal Pradesh, India, is the subject of this case study, which explores both its successes and its difficulties. In August 2022, Arvind, the dedicated sole proprietor of La Pinekonez, grappled with multifaceted challenges, the first being the foray of established hotel chains into the homestay business. As the protagonist, was is in dilemma of preserving La Pinekonez’s unique identity amidst corporate competitors, particularly with regards to differentiating from the expanding hotel chains. The clash between customer expectations for hotel-like amenities and the homestay’s commitment to sustainable tourism presented a crucial challenge. Negative reviews questioning the authenticity of La Pinekonez’s green initiatives heightened the complexity. Adding to Arvind’s predicament were the seasonal fluctuations in tourist inflow and his aspiration to embrace immersive tourism trends. This case study facilitates exploration of strategic positioning, sustainability management and marketing strategies in the dynamic and competitive hospitality industry. It also offers insights into the complexities of balancing differentiation, customer satisfaction and sustainability while navigating the evolving landscape of tourism trends.

This case study is suitable for students of tourism and hospitality management at postgraduate level. The case study can be discussed once the basic concepts of hospitality management and service dimensions are covered.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CCS 12: Tourism and hospitality.

The main purpose of this study is to explore the effect of three dimensions of “home feeling” – home-as-practical, home-as-social and home-as-attachment – on the online rating of homestays and additionally considers the accommodation’s attribute performance and level of sharing.

To achieve the research aims, more than 9,738,335 items of user-generated content concerning 743,953 Airbnb listings covering 35 cities were collected as the study data. These data are analyzed through hierarchical regression.

The results show that all three dimensions of home feeling positively affect the online rating; all three dimensions negatively moderate the relationship between attribute performance and online rating; the size of the moderating effect of each dimension on the relationship between attribute performance and online rating gradually increases in the order home-as-practical, home-as-social and home-as-attachment; and as the level of sharing increases, the moderating effect of home feeling on the relationship between attribute performance and online rating diminishes.

This study contributes to the literatures on the role of home feeling in homestays, the online rating of homestays and the motivations of guests who choose different room types. The findings of this study can help hosts better understand the formation of online rating of homestays, make targeted improvements in rooms and services and create a home feeling for specific degrees of sharing. This in turn will help them to improve the online rating of their homestays, establish an excellent online reputation and, ultimately, increase sales.

This study advances knowledge by confirming three dimensions of home feeling not only have direct positive impacts on online rating but also mitigate the impact of attribute performance on online rating. This effect differs significantly in magnitude with the degree of sharing.

This case is mainly about the development journey of Tujia, a unicorn in China's accommodations-sharing sector, as well as the development status of the sector. On December 1, 2011, Tujia.com—China's first medium- and high-end vacation apartment booking platform—was formally launched, and it announced the first round of capital injection in less than half a year after its launch. It completed D and D+ round of financing on August 3, 2015, securing $300 million with an estimated value exceeding $1 billion. The completion of this financing round meant that Tujia formally entered the $1 billion club composed of “unicorn” Internet companies. In June 2016, it announced the strategic M&A of Mayi; in October 2016, it announced its strategic agreement with Ctrip.com and Qunar.com for the M&A of their apartment and homestay businesses. The completion of these transactions manifested the matrix with the four major platforms Tujia, Mayi, Ctrip, and Qunar. Since then, Tujia has become the absolute pacesetter in China's online accommodations-sharing sector.

The first section will be the introduction which discusses the global scenario of wellness tourism after the pandemic. The second section of this study is wellness tourism after the pandemic in Sri Lanka. This title is an overview based on the homestays which are practicing wellness tourism at the Veludvara Wellness Stay, 98 Acres Resort and Spa and Ella Yoga Hub, and it examines the tourist perspective on wellness tourism after the pandemic. The third section discusses global best practices and policy development in this regard. The fourth section of this study focuses on demand and trends that can be promoted to future wellness tourism and conclude with recommendations. This study followed a qualitative method which is carried out with interviews, observation and secondary data such as books, websites, research papers, articles and other published materials. The impact of this research work is focused on stakeholders in wellness tourism, such as service providers, entrepreneurs, policymakers and other relevant authorities to fulfil gaps in the wellness tourism sector. Furthermore, this will be a good overview for tourists who are willing to get the experience of wellness tourism after the pandemic and identify its future values and demands.

After each of the COVID-19-induced lockdowns, an unprecedented surge in leisure travel was observed, resulting in tourists flocking to places of tourist interest. This phenomenon was termed revenge travel in popular literature. The purpose of this study is to explore the phenomenon of revenge travel in detail through an academic lens. It examines the psychological and emotional motivations for revenge travel while studying the differences in travel behaviour pre- and post-pandemic.

The study applies an interpretive phenomenological approach to explore post-pandemic travel behaviour. Data were collected via personal in-depth semi-structured interviews. Thematic analysis of the transcripts was conducted to arrive at discussion themes.

Drawing on the established theories, the findings of the study indicate that lockdown fatigue coupled with mortality salience induced individuals towards leisure travel. This in turn led to mood alleviation and compensation for the deprivation undergone.

The study reveals important insights into post-pandemic preferences of travel destinations (off-beat locations near urban clusters), accommodation options (more travellers choosing home stays and stand-alone properties) and vacation itineraries (a gradual shift towards slow tourism with more focus on immersive experiences). Further, there are indications that hotels may develop “workcations” and “staycations” as a new line of offering.

The study adds to the small body of knowledge on revenge travel. It adopts a phenomenological approach, thereby capturing the “lived experiences” of the participants and providing an in-depth look into the psychological and emotional motivations of revenge travel that have not been explored previously. The study provides insights into the travellers' psychology post a period of withdrawal and restraint.

According to the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy, there are 7,275 indigenous tourism enterprises in Indonesia. However, only 0.5% of these are certified as a sustainable tourism village. One of them is the Karangrejo village in Borobudur, Indonesia. This village is able to sustain their enterprise, which is a unique and rare context. This study aims to address this gap by examining the sense of place value created from the collaboration between actors, mapping the actors and their resources who have crucial roles in indigenous tourism enterprise, and examining the relations between actors, mapping the characteristics and efforts made by the indigenous tourism enterprise. The novelty of this research is the unique context that it takes place, and the use of comprehensive theoretical perspectives combining architecture, sociological social psychology and marketing/business theories in tourism context, which is uncommon for research in this area.

Participants in this study were 17 individuals, comprising Village Chief, accompanying state-owned enterprises, tourists, owners of micro, small and medium enterprises, village economic center manager and village-owned enterprises manager. Data were collected from interviews and field recordings using purposive sampling technique. The study design was a case study. The data were coded in two steps: first cycle and second cycle coding. Member checking with research participants was conducted to ensure data credibility.

This study revealed several novel findings. First, sense of place value was not merely perceived as material and nonmaterial components, but also as networks between actors that were involved in creating such components within (value) exchange framework. Second, the actors involved in the exchange were provider actor, external supporter actor, internal supporter actor, collaborator actor and consumer actor. Each of these actors owned one or a combination of material and nonmaterial values that are exchangeable. Mapping of the actors involved was discussed using a combined perspective of consumer-centric and balanced network. Third, exchange relations that occurred between actors could be balanced or imbalanced, depending on the amount of resource owned by each actor. Nonetheless, imbalanced relations because of discrepancies in the value contributions could still have positive impact because it was motivated by the intention to help others. Fourth, this study identified the importance of having characteristics as resource integrator/gatherer for indigenous tourism enterprise (provider actor) to ensure the economic sustainability of their business.

This study was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, where governments imposed strict travel restrictions. Consequently, data from tourists were limited in particular, the lack of perspectives from international tourists. During the data collection, the government were still limiting international travelers to visit the country, hence only domestic tourists were able to visit. The perspectives of international tourists would have added valuable data. Because of pandemic, the data collection process was initially conducted online, which was then followed by in-person data collection. Online data collection is common in research; however, in-person data collection would have been more preferred, where possible, so that the researchers could directly observe the situation in context. Future research could be conducted after the pandemic ends. Furthermore, findings of this research asserted the importance of actors’ motives, situations, quality of the values and relational attributes, but had not discussed these in detail, especially from the perspective of each actor. Future research could address this limitation.

Enhancing material and nonmaterial sense of place value would involve multiple actors. Therefore, mapping of the resources owned by these actors as well as their roles is critical. To create sense of place value, synergy between actors is essential and could not be achieved by a single actor. Every actor is influenced by motives and circumstances when interacting with the other actor. Awareness of such motives and circumstances where the exchange takes place is necessary, to ensure that the cultivated relationship aligns with the goals and expectations. As exchange relations could be balanced or imbalanced, every actor also needs to be aware of their position and continuously evaluate it to avoid being constantly in a powerless position. Indigenous tourism enterprise could not singlehandedly provide every resource needed. Therefore, developing a character as a gatherer/resource integrator becomes crucial to gain access to all necessary resources. Currently, there are no tools available for identifying actors, resources and relational attributes. This could be a potential avenue for academics in this area. Further, the government should identify the best practice from the successful indigenous tourism enterprises, not only giving recognition awards or certifications to these enterprises.

Findings from this study have several contributions; among others, it discussed sense of place value of indigenous tourism enterprise more comprehensively, as the essential actors who exchange resources were identified. This study also underlined positive power imbalance, which had been generally seen as a negative dynamic. Moreover, this study highlighted that indigenous people, despite living by communal value (non-transactional) in their daily lives, would need to engage in transactional relations and develop resource integrator characteristics to maintain tourism enterprise. Indigenous people have often been seen from their communal side, while their transactional (non-communal) side has been rarely seen.

Peer-to-peer accommodation (P2PA) has witnessed remarkable growth across the globe recently. However, acceptance of P2PA among residents in developing economies is still fraught with several challenges. The paper aims to extend the constraint–negotiation framework to examine the motivations, perceived constraints, negotiation strategies and the role of learned helplessness of local residents to host tourists.

The data was collected through a self-administered questionnaire by using cluster random sampling technique. In total, 454 usable questionnaires were collected through on-site research. The structural model was tested by using survey data by applying PLS-SEM 4.0.

The results suggest that while perceived constraints can inhibit residents from hosting, negotiation strategies can reduce helplessness and encourage residents to host tourists.

Theoretically, this study advances P2PA literature by integrating learned helplessness in the constraint–negotiation framework and it offers insights for the P2PA providers as well as policymakers.

This is a pioneering study to examine the role of learned helplessness using constraint–negotiation framework in the context of P2PA, thus paving the way to advance P2PA-related research from the residents’ perspective.

This chapter considers the current situation of community-based tourism (CBT) in Sri Lanka, available potentials to promote this for the future tourism industry in Sri Lanka and demand and global trends of CBT. This chapter consists of an introduction examining CBT in the global scenario. This chapter's second title discusses the potential of CBT in Sri Lanka. The third topic concerns the demand and trends of CBT in a changing economy. The fourth topic is discussing global best practices and policies for CBT development. Finally, it concludes with recommendations and suggestions for CBT development in Sri Lanka.

This case study was conducted through qualitative analysis, and data will be collected with primary and secondary data. Primary data will be collected through interviews with industry stakeholders, tourists and other relevant interviewees. In addition, it will be carried out observation on selected community-based destinations. Furthermore, the secondary data will be gathered through books, articles, research papers, websites and other materials. This chapter conducted an empirical study on CBT in Sri Lanka. It brings the values of CBT to a changing economy. Furthermore, this study identified problems, potentials, demands and trends for future tourism development by evaluating global best practices and policies.

This case study aims to stimulate the students’ thoughts about the introduction of sustainability and its importance in the travel and tourism industry and introduce the concept of resilience and building of dynamic capability of a venture from the perspective of an entrepreneur.

Established in 2009, India Someday was a fledgling travel company based in Mumbai, India. The team comprised passionate travellers who provided planning assistance for those willing to explore India independently. The company offered customised, personalised and tailor-made trips to create a memorable travel experience for travellers with differing budgets and age groups. Upon the launch of Asia Someday, an extension of the travel venture India Someday, Mr Asif Munshi shared a moment of relief as he shook hands with his co-founder, Mr Harsh Shirodkar. The pandemic significantly impacted the tourism industry, yet it fortified their entrepreneurial spirit and inspired them to bounce back with a dynamic and vigorous comeback and further strengthened the foundation of the endeavour. The expansion of their entrepreneurial venture marked the initiation of the second innings of their enterprise. Although the company had managed to stay afloat because of savings, it was soon depleted. But the withdrawal of the no-fly list and the gradual opening of borders brought a ray of hope for India Someday. Munshi was preoccupied with his thoughts about the future steps of his dream venture. With emails from his previous clients regarding travel plans to India, he could see that the prior impact of India Someday had not gone in vain. Although relieved with the commencement of people travelling, the future was uncertain and the founders knew that they had to be prepared to successfully operate their venture.

Tourism and hospitality courses/entrepreneur courses

Beginner

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 12: Tourism and hospitality.