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At present, the whole hospitality and tourism sector is severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and related lockdowns have been producing severe transformations in the industry. Several business reports and academic studies have highlighted that, compared to before the COVID-19 outbreak, tourists will likely choose to visit less crowded tourism destinations, and will tend to prefer accommodation facilities that can deliver their services with reduced face-to-face interactions and guaranteeing fair levels of physical and social distancing. This said, there is only a limited number of scientific studies dealing with this topic so far. This, coupled with the extremely dynamic and turbulent environment we are currently experiencing, urges scholars to further intensify the academic discussion on this area of research. Further examination would give practitioners knowledge to assist them in their decision-making in an era of tourism where everyone seems to be moving towards a ‘new normal’ of unknown duration. The present study was thus conducted to make a contribution to this debate by providing and discussing the results of a factor analysis on a sample of 200 German respondents, to dig into the criteria that travellers use to select the destination and the accommodation for their vacation. Findings contribute to deepen the scientific debate about how tourist behaviour is transformed by the COVID-19 pandemic and, potentially, by any other type of virus that could replicate a similar emphasis on hygiene and safety, as well as on social distancing. Meanwhile, our results will provide policy makers, destination marketers, and accommodation managers with useful information on effectively planning and implementing their service design in order to meet tourists' expectations and needs.

Set against the background of uncertainty and crisis generated by COVID-19, policymakers, destination marketers and tourism and hospitality managers are struggling in trying to envision how, and till when, tourist behaviour will be changed and transformed by this pandemic and how tourists will select the accommodation where to stay during their holiday.

So far, a limited number of academic studies have been devoted to analyzing how travellers will select the accommodation for their holidays. This urges academicians to fill this gap with the aim to provide practitioners with fresh and insightful knowledge to support their decision-making in a tourism era where everyone seems to be shifting towards a ‘new normality’ of uncertain duration.

This study was therefore carried out to contribute to this debate by presenting and discussing findings of an empirical investigation applying a factor–cluster analysis on a sample of 225 French consumers/travellers to profile them based on accommodation selection criteria. Further, a series of chi-square tests was run to investigate whether significant differences exist among clusters based on their sociodemographic characteristics (i.e. gender, age, level of occupation, employment status) and travel-related variables (i.e. the preferred type of accommodation and the length of the holiday).

Findings contribute to deepening the scientific debate about how tourists' behaviour is being transformed in a tourism era affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, our results will provide accommodation marketers with useful information to be used to effectively plan and implement their service design to meet tourists' expectations and needs.

Backpackers can be found all over the world, especially in urban areas where the main enclaves are established. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the operationalisation of the term “backpacker” and present a proposal to conceptualise backpackers and backpackers’ segments based on the operational criteria available in literature to avoid incongruities among researchers.

Based on a literature review, this study provides a critical review of the backpacker conceptualisation and operationalisation using a methodology divided into three phases, a quantitative analysis based on the Scopus database and a bibliometric analysis coupled with a manual analysis of documents (content analysis).

Substantial heterogeneity and complexity regarding the conceptualisation of backpacker tourism and its diversified subsegments were evident. For this reason, this paper argues that backpacker tourism can and should continue to be analysed from different perspectives, suitably framed in the theoretical instrument constructed to identify and distinguish the different subsegments through its operationalisation features.

This study provides a practical contribution to all researchers interested in the topic of backpackers proposing the operationalisation of the term backpacker and it subsegments to avoid disparate results and deviations. This contribution will enable the correct and objective assessment of the operationalisation of this concept for researchers, managers and destination management organisations, identifying exactly what phenomenon is to be studied.

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have been reported as a credit-constrained sector in the earlier literature. Amidst the available external financing options, SMEs are dependent upon banks for their financial needs, hence they offer an important profitable segment for banks. Commercial banks need to develop effective targeting strategies for this segment and ranking the priorities of SMEs in selecting commercial banks will be of great help to them. The purpose of this paper is to implement a fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP) multi-criteria decision model for commercial bank’s selection by SMEs.

The research process was carried out in two phases. In Phase I, a self-structured scale was developed to measure bank selection criteria of SMEs after an extensive review of the literature of relevant studies on the topic. A sample of 600 SMEs was selected through non-proportionate quota sampling and only 313 valid responses were received. Phase II was conducted to prioritize the extracted factors through FAHP, a multi-criteria decision-making technique. For this purpose, another questionnaire was designed in the form of pair-wise evaluation and the response was taken on the same from those 313 SMEs again.

The results showed that SMEs bank selection criteria can be categorized under six heads, namely, bank attributes, accommodation of credit needs (AC), bank personnel, financial factors (FF), service quality (SQ) and business knowledge. The research study produced a reliable and valid instrument for studying the bank selection criteria of SMEs. The results further revealed that AC is the most important factor considered by SMEs followed by FF and SQ. Going further, global weights were also calculated through the FAHP which revealed that the most important consideration (variable) viewed upon by SMEs is willingness to accommodate credit needs followed by flexible collateral requirements and absence of hidden charges.

The results of the present study offer significant insights as to the factors SMEs consider while making a bank selection decision. It is of utmost importance for banks to identify true determinant factors used by SMEs while making bank choice decisions as they offer ample profit and revenue opportunities to banks. The results of the study provide a practical approach to banks that would help them in framing strategies for SMEs customers.

This is the first study of its kind which has not only focused on the hierarchy of factors measuring bank selection criteria of SMEs rather on the hierarchy of single variables also through the calculation of global weights. As banks cannot focus on all the dimensions of the criteria, they can focus on the spirit of that particular criteria.

The understanding of the factors that influence the selection of accommodation by guests is an important issue for international accommodation providers. The purpose of this research is to gain a greater understanding not only of the factors that influence the selection of motel accommodation by guests, but also of when and under which situations these factors become trigger points for decision making, focusing in particular on the influence that the length of stay has on the trigger points that impacted the selection process.

To undertake this research, five focus groups were conducted, involving participants who had previous experience in staying in motel accommodation either for business, on vacation or a combination of the two. Participants were selected and invited from a large variety of occupations and backgrounds.

Three levels of trigger points were identified for different lengths of stay. For overnight stays requirements were “minimalist”, convenience being the prime trigger point, and visitors felt they could tolerate most situations. For stays of two‐four nights there were certain requirements, “essentials”, that provided the necessary requirements for sleeping, eating and relaxation, while for stays longer than four nights, additional requirements that enhanced the stay, “enhancers”, were sought, raising the provision of the “essentials” to a higher level of sophistication and comfort.

This research, although conducted in New Zealand and in a specific part of a market, illustrates how complex the process of accommodation selection is by guests and in particular how the trigger points for selection change with the length of stay. It indicates how the physical facilities provided need to be tailored to the market in relation to the length of the visitor's stay.

This paper aims to examine the causal models that predict disabled tourists’ behavioral intentions to use peer-to-peer (p2p) accommodations. This study also explores the causal models through complex combinations of demographic factors, host attributes and the levels of perceived charm, convenience and other service features of the accommodations as a means of describing disabled tourists’ behavioral outcomes.

A questionnaire was administrated to measure the study variables. Using the convenience sampling technique, the questionnaires were distributed among disabled individuals with orthopedic disorders who reside in North Cyprus in May 2016. The five respondents were later interviewed about their needs and expectations from p2p accommodations. A set of preliminary tests (for both reliability and validity) was conducted, and descriptive statistics were used based on the scale items. Fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) was used to test the proposed research model, which revealed sufficient and consistent conditions leading to behavioral intentions of disabled tourists in their use of p2p accommodations. The predictive validity of the model was then tested. Finally, the results of the fsQCA were evaluated based on the key tenets of complexity theory.

The findings reveal under which conditions disabled tourists tend to use p2p accommodations. This empirical study has relied upon the use of causal models integrating combinations of demographic variables and host and accommodation place attributes (i.e. charm, convenience and service features) which were put forth as sufficient predictive configurations of the behavioral outcomes of disabled tourists within the context of a sharing economy. Ultimately, this study finds that p2p customers are not limited to travelers with low income levels.

The views of people with orthopedic problems in North Cyprus were obtained for testing the configurational model, which means that the results do not necessarily represent a large range of customers’ perspectives. Although this limitation was addressed through the application of a powerful compensatory analytical approach (fsQCA), it is advised that data from tourists with various types of disabilities in other countries be collected for future studies.

The results of this study provide practical implications for hosts on how to combine accommodation place characteristics (e.g. charm, convenience and service) with their own personal attributes (e.g. knowledge and eagerness) to bolster the disabled tourists’ intentions to use p2p accommodations. It is hoped that the results of the fsQCA using the demographic variables presented here will guide businesses toward performing target marketing. This is useful for hosts who wish to attract more disabled tourists, a profitable segment of the market.

This study draws social attention to the disabled tourists as potential customers in the sharing economy. Conducting an empirical study that considers the social inclusion of tourists with disabilities in the emerging version of hospitality business is helpful to both the supply and demand sides.

To the best knowledge of the authors, this is the first empirical study that investigates the indicators of disabled tourists’ intentions to use p2p accommodations. This study also adds to the current literature by modeling the behavioral intentions of disabled tourists within a sharing economy using a pragmatic and set-theoretic approach (i.e. fsQCA in conjunction with complexity theory).

The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors affecting supplier selection in food and beverage divisions in the Greek hotel industry. This research aimed to (1) examine the factors affecting supplier selection in food and beverage divisions of the Greek hotel industry, as these were perceived by the Greek purchasing managers themselves; (2) investigate the underlying factors when changing a supplier.

A survey was conducted using a closed-ended type questionnaire. Data collection met the following three criteria: hotels with a fully operational food and beverage division could participate in the research, the research population comprised all the hotels located in 13 regions of Greece, the sample represented over 10% of the total hotels in each region. Finally, 653 valid questionnaires were collected.

Exploratory factor analysis showed that six broad sets of factors affect supplier selection in the food and beverage divisions: those related to raw materials, financing, environment, services, origin-nutrients and people. Regarding the factors considered in changing a supplier, three factors were found: service and product quality, economic policy change, food quality and safety management systems.

Greek hotel managers could use the findings of the study to effectively create a supply chain management strategy that will lead to improved firm performance. Understanding the importance of the selection criteria for the supply chain performance and the need to build strong relationships with stakeholders, suppliers could also create a proper supply chain.

The study adds to the knowledge regarding the perspectives of the Greek purchasing managers in food and beverage divisions in hotel industry and the body of much-needed research. Using exploratory factor analysis, a sort of grouping of the variables seems beneficial for simplifying how to present and understand the factors affecting supplier selection in food and beverage divisions within the Greek context.