The Importance of the Quality of Environmental Factors on the Tourism Product. An Application of the Kano Model

Abstract

Quality evaluation in the field of tourism services is given by the result of the comparison between what the customer expected and what he or she really received. If there is a lack of correspondence between tourists’ expectations and the managerial understanding of these expectations, the quality of the tourism service will be mediocre. The Quality Model, elaborated by the Japanese professor Noriaki Kano in the ’80s, is based on the concept of product quality and offers a framework that highlights differences among standard and personalized offers according to the way in which customers do or do not express their wishes and expectations related to the offered product. This model can be applied in the tourism field, for example for analyzing the relationship between tourism and the environment.