Environmental and Social Practices in Luxury Hotels: Customers' Perceptions

Abstract

There is growing interest among the customers all over the world for protection of the environment. This research aimed at evaluation of customers' attitude towards environmental and social practices applied at luxury hotels. Customers' perceptins and satisfaction with such practices were also investigated. A questionnaire was carried out covering sample of luxury hotels' customers (4and 5 star hotels) at three tourist distinations (Cairo, Sharm El Sheikh and Hurghada cities) as vital areas where the big presence of luxry hotels in Egypt (Egypt hotels guide, 2016). For structure validity of the questionnaire, factor analysis test was used. For reliability of questionnaire statements, Cronbach's alpha coefficient was calculated. The Cochran's formula was used to determine the optimal sample size based on the pilot study results. The data collected from the sample was non-normal, so the researcher used non-parametric tests to analyze collected data such as chi-square, Mann-whitny and kruskal-wallis tests to analyze the validity of the hypothesis of the research. The main results of the study were, there are significant differences between three regions of the research with regard to customers' perceptions about hotels' environmental practices, there is no statistical significant correlation between environmental practices at luxury hotels and customer satisfaction, there are significant differences between hotel grades with regard to applying environmental practices and there is statistical significant correlation between environmental practices and social practices at luxury hotels. The study tested the significance of the study model and suggested some recommendations.