Selçuk Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Dergisi (Aug 2015)
The Specific Characteristics of Entrepreneurship Process in Tourism Industry
Abstract
This paper analyzes the entrepreneurship process in general businesses and focuses on the differences unique to tourism and hospitality industry in comparison which the related literate review is inefficient as is. Thus by focusing on these differences, the study tries to recognize and distinguish the specific characteristics of tourism and hospitality industry entrepreneurship process, thus tries further, to group them under sub categories of homogeneous characteristics for effective and efficient management applications. In order to forecast the future ones, the paper also covers the real entrepreneurial processes in hospitality and tourism industry whch lead to new tourism types and applications like: local gastronomy tourism, rural adventure tourism specific to local attractions, sustainable and regional eco-tourism packages, local dark tourism examples, volunteer tourism types and applications of specific local events, etc. The study is a conceptual paper composed of a comprehensive literature review with brief examples and real life example on the topic of entrepreneurship process in hospitality and tourism. Originality and value of the paper lies in the area of the entrepreneurship process in tourism and hospitality industry as a means for innovation of new tourism products, effective marketing, efficient communication and creative small and medium sized enterprises SME applications in the industry. It is understood that tourism is one of the economic sectors in which a great degree of entrepreneurship involvement is needed due to characteristics of the industry as; high SME proportion within, motive, goal and values, attitudes, strategies and business applications. Tourism industry entrepreneurs differ from other industries’ entrepreneurs, and processes are accepted as a form of consumption rather than production. Also it is realized that the tourism entrepreneurship process is very vulnerable to rapid change in tourist behavior, tourist preferences and industry trends. Yet, it is also understood that tourism entrepreneurs seem to be highly motivated by life-style, quality of life QOL issues, locational preferences and other non-economic motives which are not common in general business entrepreneurs whose main motive seem to be profit maximization and financial independence
