Ray Pine

Consumer behaviour in the food service industry: a review.

Abstract This article reviews the literature relating to consumer studies in foodservice, an under-represented area in terms of review papers. It is organised into four sections, discussing survey work, experimental studies, and investigations relating to economics and geography, and sociological and anthropological research. Many of these articles have been published outside the usual hospitality management journals. The review examines the scope of this research, identifying areas of commonality within it, as well as gaps and weaknesses in the body of knowledge on consumer behaviour in the food service industry.

Study of managerial job satisfaction in Hong Kong’s Chinese restaurants

Presents the results of an empirical study of work motivation and job satisfaction among managers in Chinese restaurants in Hong Kong. The findings indicated that work environment, job itself, and rewards are critical factors in predicting managers’ satisfaction in this specific catering sector. A significant relationship was found between job satisfaction and turnover intentions that has supported many studies in the discipline of social psychology. In addition, sectorial and cultural specificity is suggested to address the unique characteristic of the Hong Kong Chinese restaurant environment.

Women and men in hotel management in Hong Kong: perceptions of gender and career development issues

Abstract This study aims to examine whether Hong Kongs female and male managers perceive gender and career development issues differently than their Western counterparts. The study found that female hotel managers in Hong Kong, like their Western counterparts, are aware of the difficulties women face in a male-dominated environment. However, unlike Western women managers, they tend to downplay the difficulties, and to favour personal, against institutional, strategies to overcome them. The study also found that while both women and men prefer male supervisors, mens preference is more definitive. Male managers also prefer supervising male subordinates. The findings suggest that there is room for Hong Kongs hotel industry to review the effect of structural barriers on womens career development.

The challenges and opportunities of franchising in China’s hotel industry

Franchising develops quickly in the hotel industry with the expansion and globalization of hotel chains, as it brings about advantages and sets up a very good leverage between two parties – franchisor and franchisee. Major multinational hotel corporations have entered China, but franchising is seldom used as a tool of expansion there. The continuous increase in tourism and the structural change in the hotel industry in China afford more opportunities for the growth of franchising operations and also of indigenous hotel chains. When franchising in this specific market, quality control, ownership, connection, business tradition and franchisor‐franchisee relationships should be examined carefully in order to ensure success. A full understanding of China’s peculiar social, cultural, economic and political context is essential for foreign companies, whilst existing and new indigenous companies require greater technical and operating expertise along with the necessary business acumen to operate hotel chains.

Barriers to hotel chain development in China

This paper is based on findings from a two‐year MPhil research project that aimed to examine the development of hotel chains in China since 1978 and to recommend policy and operational guidelines for their further expansion. The study confirmed the unique nature of the hotel industry in China, existing as it does in a country moving from a centrally planned economic system that is strongly influenced by communist dogma towards a Western‐style market economy. This paper identifies and discusses four main categories of barriers to chain development, namely: economic and political systems; hotel ownership; hotel management capability and resources; and competition between local and foreign firms. Massive growth in China’s hotel industry is forecast, and this presents a great attraction for hotel companies. However, the need to understand and appreciate these barriers is recommended to any company, local or foreign, contemplating doing business in this unusual but potentially very large market place.

Service Innovation in Hong Kong: Attitudes and Practice

This research explores managements attitudes towards innovation in Hong Kongs service firms and the extent to which service firms are committed to the general practice of managing service innovation. The growth in the scale and importance of the service sector in Hong Kong together with the limited analysis of innovation in the service industries, provide a prime justification for this study. Data were examined from four service groups: retail/wholesale, financial services, hotel/restaurant, and tourism. The findings suggest that although the majority of service organisations in Hong Kong are engaged in some type of innovation, they do not have any established system to control the process. In general, managers seem to confine their development to incremental or distinctive innovations and do not attempt to develop breakthrough innovations.

Nationality vs industry cultures: which has a greater effect on managerial behavior?

Abstract A study was undertaken among 192 hotel managers in Hong Kong, Japan and Korea for the purpose of determining (1) whether national cultures, as defined by Hofstede, have a greater effect on the managerial behavior of hotel managers, than the culture of the hotel industry, and (2) whether personal work-values have a determining effect on managerial behavior. The results demonstrated more differences than similarities between the managerial practices of hotel managers from Hong Kong, Japan and Korea, indicating therefore that nationality cultures have a stronger effect on managerial behavior than the culture of the hotel industry. The findings also show that to a large extent there was a positive relationship between work-values and managerial behavior. Therefore it was possible to conclude that as hypothesized by Hofstede and others, values affect attitudes which in turn affect behavior.

The impact of SARS on Hong Kong’s tourism industry

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) first appeared in February 2002 in China’s Guangdong Province before emerging in neighbouring Hong Kong in late February. The epidemic had a negatively profound impact on tourism around the world, with particularly strong impacts on countries in South‐East Asia. This paper will present a brief SARS chronology with critical events or impacts on Hong Kong’s tourism industry.

China's hotel industry: serving a massive market.

Abstract As China ramps up to a world-class hotel industry, an amalgam of international and domestic expertise may provide the best model for success.

China’s international tourism development: present and future

International tourism as an industry is the outcome of China’s economic reform and open policy to the outside world initiated in the late 1970s, and it has become one of the important foreign exchange earners, playing an increasingly significant role in the country’s national economy. The paper explains the main stages of its development and identifies the important changes in the past two decades. It analyzes the opportunities and challenges with which China’s international tourism is confronted, and further suggests the choices of policies and strategies China should undertake for its international tourism development in the new millennium and on the threshold of joining the World Trade Organization.