What shapes perceptions in sustainable luxury hospitality? Investment or collaboration

This research investigates the impact of different communication strategies (investment-oriented vs. collaboration-oriented) on luxury perception (LP), consumer value (CV) and willingness to pay (WTP) in luxury hotels. Employing a two-cell between-subjects survey experiment with 242 participants, the study shows how investment-oriented strategies, featuring technological and environmental investments, improve LP and consumers’ WTP more significantly than collaboration-oriented strategies. The results reveal that higher perceived luxury from investment-oriented strategies increases CV and WTP, particularly among leisure consumers with lower environmental concern (EC). The findings emphasize the importance for luxury hotel managers to focus on credible, high-cost sustainability initiatives to boost CV and WTP, while also considering varying levels of EC among their clientele. This research bridges the gap between sustainability and recreational luxury, offering practical insights for improving consumer perceptions and driving premium pricing strategies.

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Tourism Recreation Research on 1 Jun 2025, available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/02508281.2025.2498960.
It is deposited under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.