Consumer Cost or Reward for Using Green Hotels
According to Jauhari and Manaktola (2007), consumers’ attitudes and behaviors toward
who should pay for these “green” changes in the hotel industry vary from one consumer to
another. A study found that, “11 percent were willing to pay 25 percent of the costs, 40 percent
felt hotels should pay 50 to 100 percent of the costs, and 40 percent felt that they could pay 4 to 6
percent more while staying at green hotels” (Jauhari and Manaktola, 2007). Research in the U.S.
indicated that customers were not willing to pay extra to fund green policies (Kirk, 1995).
According to Yesawich (2008), 8 out of 10 Americans claimed to be green by turning off lights
and composting. Yesawich (2008) also stated that 4 out of 10 leisure travelers would pick an
environmentally friendly hotel over one that was not. However, it seemed that only half were
willing to pay more to the environmentally friendly hotel as compared to its non-green
competitors. This reluctance to pay more led Yesawich to believe that the consumers only
followed through with green practices because they felt it was more of an obligation besides
being important for the environment (Yesawich, 2008).
There has also been some discussion as to whether or not consumers should be rewarded
for using a green hotel over a normal hotel by providing benefits such as hotel reward points and
discounts. A study in Scotland found that “71 percent of the respondents felt that they should be
awarded more frequent guest reward points. These consumers expected rewards for patronizing
“green” hotels (Tzschentke, Kirk and Lynch, 2004). With regard to this study, it was clear that
the consumers in Scotland wanted something in return for their good deed of using a “green”
hotel. However, it would be interesting to see if the feeling was the same with consumers in the
United States. Thus, this study intends to explore consumers’ perception on rewards for using
green hotels.
Based on the above literature review, the perceptions of consumers in regard to green
concepts varied from one part of the world to another. Hence, the main purpose of this study was
to conduct a pilot study to investigate consumers’ perceptions of “green” hotels in the United
States. The objectives of this study included the following:
1. Explore consumers’ perceptions of the actions taken by hotels to be considered green
hotels.
2. Examine what consumers were willing to endure to patronize green hotels.