Prioritizing hotel lobby design factors: perspectives of hotel operators in China

Abstract

The hotel lobby is where a guest forms his or her first impression of a hotel’s brand image and quality; hence, integrating appropriate design criteria into hotel lobby design is a value creation act. The novelty and aim of this study is to identified and categorized 15 hotel lobby design factors and ranked their importance and satisfaction levels from hotel operators’ perspective to achieve value innovation and sustainable operations management. For this purpose, it systematically developed a questionnaire based on the Kano method and conducted a questionnaire survey on 30 hotel operators in China. Yang’s importance-satisfaction model was applied in data analysis. The study found that economic advantage and value creation are must-be and one-dimensional aspects, and considerations such as modular design, appropriate construction management and cost control, ease of maintenance and repair, and atmospheric design methods are important economic advantage criteria. Strategies involving these considerations facilitate value innovation and sustainable operations and guarantee a comfortable and environmentally friendly stay to hotel guests. The findings not only clarify hotel operators’ insights regarding the use of attractive factors in hotel lobby design but also serve as a reference for international hotel operators to develop possible business models with lobby design strategies.