With the rapid growth in the hospitality industry, its owners and managers are also facing serious challenges. The industry is becoming more and more competitive. Managers are pressed to find the balance between cutting cost to increase profit and improving the quality of the service/product to increase the value their customers’ experience. Customers are nowadays more aware of the quality of the service or the product provided to them and more than ever before, hospitality owners and managers need to focus on improving their quality. The main objective of the research was to establish whether the implementation of selected Six Sigma principles would result in a measurable improvement in the quality of a hospitality establishment. An analysis was done based on three different feedback systems, some Sig Sigma-inspired changes were made and a post-measurement was done to establish the effect of the changes. The study concluded that the implementation of selective Six Sigma principles, can improve the quality of services and products in hospitality establishments, as well as reducing their process waste in such establishments. / MBA, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Tourism in Libya is considered to be the best long-term alternative as a source of national income to the oil industry upon which the country's economy has long been heavily dependent. Hotels are a key element of the tourism industry. This study focuses on obstacles to foreign direct investment (FDI) in the Libyan hotel sector, because FDI is a necessary element to support the development of Libya as an internationally competitive tourism destination. Specifically, the objectives of this study are developed on page five. This study was carried out in four main stages. The first stage involved an extensive literature review to generate a background and develop a theoretical framework for the research. This study adopted a case study approach (Yin, 2003), incorporating semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire, with a sample population consisting initially of foreign hotel managers, and government officials as a second stage. The third stage involved conducting a further questionnaire and a series of semi-structured interviews with hotel managers, Corinthia hotel staff and government officials to identify key FDI issues within the Libyan hotel sector. The fourth stage provides recommendations intended to help solve the existing foreign investor problems facing the hotel sector and Libya's tourism implementation strategy. The study concludes that there are some major FDI issues facing the Libyan hotel sector, including: economic, administrative, and legal and institutional barriers in areas such as recruitment and selection; skills gaps; inadequate practical training; minimum opportunities given to foreign companies; restriction on the role of the public and private sector in the development of the Libyan Tourism Master Plan (LTMP); shortage of qualified academic staff; outdated curricula; inadequacy of the LTMP; lack of funding of Libyan tourism education; and the lack of co-operation between the hotel sector, tourism education and the government's LTMP. The main contributions of this study include: an understanding of the obstacles that confront FDI in the Libyan hotel sector; the application of factor analyses to build consensus on the essential elements of FDI obstacles within the Libyan hotel sector and the development of a best practice LTMP model. Note: It is important to note that the field work for this thesis, as well as the data analysis and conclusion, was carried out prior to the popular uprising in Libya which began on February 17th 2011.

This article describes a library workshop for freshman hospitality management students enrolled at New York City College of Technology, CUNY, which features a focus on critical thinking. An active learning experience uses an element of surprise. Students evaluate the website of a bankrupt company where information about the company’s situation is hidden or not present. When the instructor guides the class to find unbiased information from newspapers, many students begin to think critically about sources.

The continued growth of the UK dining out industry, and the unceasing trend in popularity for customers to spend time and money eating outside the home, has led to an increase in the number of dining out establishments, and competition between businesses. Although there have been studies examining aspects of the restaurant industry and food consumption outside the home, very little research has looked specifically at customer expectations. Therefore, this thesis examines customer expectations associated with the meal experience in relation to the varying costs of dining out opportunities. In addition, the study reflects on customers’ socio-economic characteristics combined with their perception of differing anticipated costs in order to provide customer typologies, each with varying expectations of the dining out experience. It is intended that by focussing on and amalgamating the areas of expectation, cost and socio-economic factors, the conclusions obtained will contribute to a new understanding relating to customer expectations. The study invited e-subscribers of Delicious Magazine’s national website, to participate in quantitative research regarding both expectations of dining out and social factors. By examining the data from a large cohort study (2200 participants) evidence of behavioural patterns and opinions has emerged. The research established that there are four types of customer that can be identified through their initial choice of restaurant owing to the restaurant’s perceived cost classification. Each customer group identified, not only has overarching expectations of the dining out experience, but through identifying socio-economic characteristics of each group, it is also possible to have insight into their collective behaviours. The original contribution outputs that have been generated from the research are a practical typology and a theoretical model. Although dining out establishments are facing pressure from the emergence of increasing numbers of competitors and the current economic climate, it has been established, through the research, that, in particular, restaurants often bestow little attention on customer requirements, instead ‘food’, ‘aesthetics’ and ‘staff’ often take precedence. However, aspects relating directly to customers, such as, ‘repeat business’ and ‘positive word of mouth’ are core components to a hospitality organisation’s success. Understanding customers further can only enhance and provide structure and direction for restaurant businesses. Therefore, implementing the practical customer typology could focus a restaurant business on considering their customer group and their anticipated requirements. This research is a foundation into an original combined study area and has induced further research concepts that may also encourage other academics to embark on this area of study. This research may then develop as a subject field and cascade into understandings that could be beneficial to the hospitality industry.

This thesis examines hotel food supply chain management practices and hotel food supply chains. The study is informed by qualitative data from 20 hotels of different characteristics. The results show three models of strategic sourcing strategy for affiliated hotels (chef-centred sourcing, centralised sourcing and flexible-centralised sourcing) and two models for independent hotel (chef-centred sourcing, and chef and owner sourcing strategy). Chef-centred sourcing can be a sourcing strategy for any type of hotel regardless of their affiliation; this sourcing strategy, however, is common among small group hotels, independent hotels and high-end hotel restaurants. Group hotels, however, are likely to employ a centralised-sourcing strategy with a degree of flexibility regarding supplier selection at property level. It was found that the higher the level of service, the more flexible the centralised sourcing strategy. These sourcing strategies have a strong, direct effect on how individual hotels source their food and therefore their food supply chain network structures. It is apparent that hotel food sourcing practice is complex and dynamic, and hotel business format is the main factor influencing individual hotel sourcing strategies. Hotel foodservice is characterised by low exploitation of information technology and manual-based supply chain activities with a high level of dependency on head chefs regarding supply chain performance. There is low level of implementation of supply chain initiatives among hotels in this study and the reason for this may be the products and production characteristics which differ from those in the retail sector. Although supplier cooperation and relationships between head chef and suppliers were found, there was an overall low level of collaboration between buyer and supplier. Consumer - ii - usage information was underutilised and under cultivated. Traditional arms-length buyer-seller relationships were commonly found in group hotels at both company level and property level. Overall hotel food SCM practice still displays traditional management characteristics and price-led decisions being apparent. An exception was found in high-end foodservice outlets and some outlets with chef sourcing strategies, where close long-term relationships between chefs and suppliers were found. The originality of this research lies in its attempt to fill a significant gap in hospitality management literature as well as to synthesise literature in the realms of supply chain management and hospitality management.

This study investigated demographic characteristics of 240 Chamber of Commerce members in terms of their expectations for customer service in hotels. Subjects reported their age, gender, marital status, race, educational level, income level and ethnicity, and completed a 26-item questionnaire which measured expectations for customer service. Principal components analysis was used to reduce the 26 items to five dimensions of service quality, and multivariate analysis of variance was used to evaluate the effect of the demographic variables on those dimensions. Gender of the customer was found to have a significant effect on the combined dimensions of service quality; other variables were not significant.

One hundred forty-nine hospitality and culinary programs located in the U.S. and 49 hospitality and culinary programs located in other countries were examined to identify the differences of nutrition topics taught and teaching methods/resources used in undergraduate hospitality management and culinary programs.

The hospitality industry in recent years has become intensely competitive. Better communication between industry professionals and educators is important for university programs to provide relevant learning experiences for students. The purpose of this study was to determine competencies that hotel and restaurant professionals deem necessary for the success of graduates in the industry. Thirty supervisors of hotel and restaurant management majors who graduated from the University of North Texas from 1990 through 1992 responded to the research questionnaire. The supervisors were given 36 competencies and asked to rate their level of importance. Percentages were used to identify the most important competencies. The skills most frequently identified as important by the industry professionals surveyed were leadership skills, professional ethics, personnel management, and understanding the different laws that affect hospitality operations and management.

For a physical space to have an emotional impact on those who experience it, we must consider the connection and relationship between objects and experience, and how people make individual connections to insentient places. It is this symbiotic relationship that allows a building or space to attain a “soul”. Through the adaptive re-use of a Richmond, Virginia building, this thesis project explores strategies of staging physical interaction and organic experiences through art and culture in the context of a mixed-use niche hotel.

This study was conducted to investigate the impact of restaurant facilities, belonging to a B&B and leased to a professional restaurateur, upon the revenue of the B&B. This study assessed the physical demands placed on the B&B operator by an on-premises restaurant. Lack of sufficient data precluded proving the premise that an on-premises restaurant leased to a restaurateur would increase the income of the B&B without placing undue physical demands on the B&B operator. However, many contributing factors support the importance of a B&B having an on-premises restaurant that is leased to a professional restaurateur.