Green hotels and generation Y in Greece – is it on board?

GEORGE KARAVASILIS, DAFNI-MARIA NERANTZAKI, DIMITRIOS PASCHALOUDIS, PANAGIOTIS PANTELIDIS and VASILIKI VRANA
Department of Business Administration, Technological Education Institute of Central Macedonia, Greece
Purpose: Environmental awareness causes positive attitudes to the public towards eco-friendly activities, and engages people in ecological behaviours in their everyday lives. In this vein, hotel customers’ are becoming more and more ecologically conscious and preferring eco-friendly products and services and firms that favour environmental practices. The paper aims at exploring eco-friendly decision- making processes and intentions to choose a green hotel.
Design/methodology/approach: A structured questionnaire has been used to investigate environmental concerns, eco-friendly attitudes and activities, awareness, overall image, intention to pay more and intention to visit a green hotel.
Findings: Findings revel that even potential customers’ are highly environmentally conscious, they are not fully aware about green hotels and do not always intent to visit a green hotel. Hotels should communicate more, green hotel practices.
Originality/value: Customers’ attitudes towards intention to visit a green hotel are different among various geographic locations. Moreover, age plays a significant role. Thus, the study focuses on attitudes of generation Y in Greece. Hotels should be aware of customers buying behaviour towards green practices.
Keywords: green hotels; intention to visit; eco-friendly attitudes and activities; intention to pay more; awareness; overall image.