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The aim of the paper is to assist hospitality business, operating in a sharing economy model and responding to coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) crisis. It is argued that the creation of a strategy to face COVID-19 crisis should be focussed on what the guests valued most. The paper focusses on the Airbnb service, which is the leading platform in accommodation inside the sharing economy, to explore the consumer profile and analyse its motivations to use hospitality service, based on socio-demographic characteristics and user experience.

The research uses a questionnaire survey targeting tourists who have experience using the Airbnb service. A total of 380 valid responses were analysed with statistical package programme for the social sciences (SPSS), performing a multivariate variance analyses (MANOVA) and univariate analysis (UNIANOVA), which corresponds to five of the main motivations regarding Airbnb booking.

The results show a motivation increase towards the sharing economy and benefits of the sharing economy for customers between 41 and 60 years of age. It was also observed that consumers with a monthly income below the average salary level are less keen to prefer the sharing economy philosophy. Controversially, the results also show that more than 80% of the guests do not want to share the room with people they are not related to.

The paper contributes to the understanding of consumers' behaviour by discussing the potential of the accommodation sharing model for the post-COVID recovery of the hospitality sector.

The purpose of this article is to critically review the contributions made by the global trends issue participants on how tourism will impact people and planet and so provide answers to the strategic question defined for this global trends issue.

A content analysis of the papers selected was performed to identify the most significant ideas and proposals and how they may contribute to knowledge and/or professional practice.

As the tourism industry prepares to reach new records, there is a clear need to rethink tourism in the post COVID-19 era. The option of following a traditional pre-pandemic model of tourism development and growth is no longer productive, instead organizations and destinations must take the opportunity to develop a model where society takes center stage, the resources are used in a sustainable way and the results are distributed amongst all those involved in the tourism value chain.

In this concluding article the authors, supported by the views and proposals of the entire writing team, provide answers to the strategic question, thus demonstrating how tourism will affect people and planet in the short and medium terms.

In this article, the authors introduce the strategic question and demonstrate its relevance to society and for organizations. They also profile the articles selected for the annual global trends issue and explain how they illustrate the various angles on how tourism is impacting people and the planet.

The authors draw on a review of their previous research and other available information and on the articles selected to identify how tourism is impacting people and the planet. A brief explanation of the positions and proposals presented by the global trends issue authors as well as their key contributions is also presented.

From the analysis undertaken by the authors, it is clear that there is a need to rethink tourism in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is even more important as the tourism industry has already recovered to 2019 levels (pre-pandemic performance) and is expected to break new records by the end of 2023. As the authors reach this milestone, the choice now is either to continue to follow the traditional pre-pandemic model of tourism development and growth or to take the opportunity to rethink where the tourism industry is heading and how it will impact people and the planet. The authors advocate for the second option, supported by research undertaken by the authors in recent years that clearly shows the favourable impact of tourism and why it must be treated and developed with society in mind. This involves use of resources in a sustainable way and distributing the outcomes among all those involved in the process.

In this introductory article, the authors contextualize the strategic question and demonstrate its relevance to society and for organizations. They also analyze the context of growth that the tourism industry has gone through since the end of 2022 and highlight the perspectives offered by a team of experts invited to reflect on the theme underlying the strategic question.