To Örebro University

This report explores the application of Experience Accounting (EA) to enhance strategic decision making in a rural resort, focusing on improving profitability through customer-centric financial management. This study addresses the challenges faced by small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the hospitality industry, particularly the lack of tailored information systems for effective decision-making. By integrating the Resource-Based View (RBV) and the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) paradigm, EA aligns cost accounting with customer-perceived value, optimizing resource allocation to enhance customer experience and willingness to pay. The case study of a rural upmarket resort demonstrates the practical implementation of EA, revealing insights into resource consumption and customer value across various service components. The findings highlight the inefficiencies in the current service provision and suggest strategic reallocations to improve customer satisfaction and profitability. The results indicate that reallocating resources to enhance service quality rather than infrastructure can lead to greater customer satisfaction and profitability. The adaptability of the EA framework across different hospitality segments underscores its potential for widespread application, offering a valuable tool for the continuous optimization of expenditures and prices based on real-time customer feedback.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, participation in outdoor recreation increased in several countries, with nature taking on an expanded role as a social space for meetings and activities with food. This development may have created opportunities for nature-based hospitality providers to navigate the pandemic crisis. This review examines how food and eating were part of outdoor recreation and nature-based tourism during COVID-19, focusing on hospitality providers in rural Sweden. A literature search was performed for research articles, newspapers, and magazine articles. The results show creativity in adapting to new outdoor and nature tourism situations. The main findings that emerged focused on local and national guests, preventing the spread of infection, food as part of the experience in nature, experience packages, comfort, local food, food trucks and takeaway food, and other hospitality industry changes. Trends observed before COVID-19 but accelerating during the pandemic were also highlighted. Further research is needed to improve our understanding of food as part of outdoor recreation and nature-based tourism and how this knowledge can support sustainable thinking in the hospitality sector while contributing to resilient rural development.

This study examines the relationship between revenue and profit drivers and long-term financial performance in the hotel industry based on 17-years data (2004–2020) of six US hotel chains. The analysis creates, tests, and analyzes a cross-level model that examines the complex endogenous relationships, underlying long-term financial performance of hotels. Specifically, we examine the interaction of room price (ADR) and customer satisfaction (ACSI) within a sales-volume-driver framework that impacts financial performance through profitability, measured at both the operating and accounting levels. This study seeks to advance our understanding of these relationships, their characteristics, and their implications for long-term financial performance in the hotel industry. The findings reveal that customer satisfaction is more important than price in achieving long-term financial success in the hotel industry, whereas room nights sold is significant positive driver of all performance levels.

This study investigates the intricate relationships between overall cruise rating and various experience attributes by leveraging a comprehensive dataset of consumer reviews from two major online platforms. The analysis revealed that the core elements of hospitality, particularly dining and service, are critical for overall cruise satisfaction, perceived value, and ship quality perceptions. A major finding of this study is the critical role of perceived value for money in shaping the satisfaction narratives expressed by cruise patrons in online reviews in all market segments. The originality of this study lies in its examination of various market segments and review samples, which illuminate the complex and multidimensional aspects of customer satisfaction. The results indicate that hospitality strategies should vary significantly across segments, further emphasising the need for a nuanced approach because of the varied expectations across these markets. Furthermore, the study reveals a pattern suggesting that cost-cutting efforts, when involving food costs, result in lower satisfaction levels in dining and multiple categories, ultimately opposing potential savings. This insight emphasises the need for cruise lines to balance cost-cutting measures carefully while maintaining high-quality dining experiences to enhance overall customer satisfaction. These findings underscore the importance of utilising diverse review metrics to develop a multidimensional framework for customer-centric performance management across all hospitality sectors. 

This study examines shifts in consumer dining preferences among cruise passengers in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Utilizing text-mining techniques applied to a collection of online reviews, the discourse analysis in this study is guided by the restaurant-management tool, Experience Accounting (EA), which represents an integrated marketing-accounting analytical framework. We further extend the experiencescape model to the cruise dining context by subcategorizing the sensory component as a more instrumental approach for the food service industry. Our findings indicate a significant shift in cruise ship passengers’ dining preferences away from utilitarian meals toward the fine-dining setup, representing significant challenges for the hospitality industry.

In this chapter, the authors conceptualise the importance of service in restaurants. While the hospitality sector has always had service high on the agenda, several factors now indicate that less attention is placed on this vital characteristic. Based on a review of existing knowledge, this chapter highlights factors and resources necessary to ensure that service is appreciated for its full value. Albeit devastating, the Covid 19-pandemic presented an opportunity for the whole sector to adjust its set-up, its offerings, and its business models to be better prepared for the future. Consequently, a thorough analysis of the fundamental parts of the offering would then be required – what matters to the customers and consequently what the customers are willing to pay for. Additionally, the aim of the chapter is to pave the way for measuring service using theoretical frameworks such as there source-based view (RBv) of the firm and concepts like experience accounting (eA).

While the Swedish hospitality industry is experiencing substantial growth, this growth comes with a cost, as the industry has neither the knowledge nor the incentive to pay enough attention to human resource development. This continuous growth will therefore impose challenges and erect obstacles once the industry begins expanding again after the pandemic. Insofar as attracting, engaging and retaining talent are the biggest challenges, it might be time to go back to the drawing board and identify a possible shift to an employee-based approach to developing businesses. Based on interviews with managers and owners representing 28 predominantly seasonal restaurants in the Swedish coastal region of Bohuslän, this study identifies current obstacles and challenges facing the Swedish restaurant industry with a clear focus on the concept of human capital. The results of the study clearly indicate that human resource development (HRD) is by far the most critical factor in addressing staffing issues and overcoming the difficulty involved in attracting, engaging, and retaining not only enough staff but more importantly staff with basic knowledge, experience, and interest. The aim here is to initiate a shift to a more direct and sustained focus on human capital in the hospitality industry, from the perspective of human capital theory, by highlighting some of the most highly relevant factors associated with this perspective. According to an employee-driven restaurant analysis (EDRA) approach, a shortage of human capital could pose the biggest obstacle to further development, as restaurants find it increasingly difficult to attract, engage and retain employees for all positions.

In this chapter, the authors aim to conceptualise human resources within the hospitality sector to better understand how to address the significant challenges currently faced in this field. The hospitality industry, still grappling with the fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic, faces a challenging future marked by ongoing manpower shortages and rising costs. The traditional economic model, where firms tightly controlled all processes and resources, is no longer viable. The industry’s focus is now shifting toward human capital as a critical asset, requiring innovative strategies for effective utilisation. Additionally, by developing a clear understanding of human capital, it is possible to make a strategic shift from a cost-based perspective to an asset-based perspective. Here, theoretical frameworks such as there source-based view of the firm and human capital theory can be useful.

This study investigates the drivers of profit inefficiency in the restaurant industry. Assuming that restaurants operate under monopolistic competition, we first present a characterization of the factors that explain restaurants’ departure from the profit frontier, focusing on the role of business experience, number of outlets, service model, restaurant typology, and COVID-19 shock. Based on Stochastic Frontier Analysis, we estimate how these factors explain the differences in profit inefficiency across firms using a panel dataset of 4128 restaurants in Sweden in the period 2017–2021. We find that the average level of profit efficiency is low (46%). Inefficiency increases with years in operation and is significantly higher among limited-service restaurants and single-outlet firms. Interestingly, no significant difference in profit inefficiency is detected during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our findings provide valuable insights for profit efficiency management.