A TENTATIVE STUDY ON CONSUMERS PERCEPTION AND IMAGE ON GREEN HOTELS - WITHIN TRICHY DISTRICT

Hotels have numerous motivations for going green including: a feeling of social responsibility, governmental regulations, and economic benefits. However, as the number of green hotels continues to increase, current research about consumers' perceptions of them is lacking .The perceptions and images consumers develop of green hotels have not been studied from the perspective of hotel guests until recently (Lee et al., 2010). The present study built upon on the findings of Lee et al. (2010) by further investigating consumer perceptions in regards to their willingness to partake in environmental activities while staying in green hotels. To reduce the negative impact on the environment, the hotel sector in India has embarked on a course of implementing environmental management practices or a much formal tool called environmental management systems (EMS), an innovation which has been profoundly promoted to offer additional benefits to its adopters. Lee et al. (2010) employed a survey-based methodology; following in their footsteps this study used a similar methodology. While Lee et al. (2010) conducted an online survey distributed via a marketing research firm, and provided respondents with a description of what a green hotel is, this study sought to collect data through a survey of faculty and staff from one college within Trichy District