Investigating Loyalty Before and After Renovation in Wellness and Spa Tourism Using TPB, Perceived Value, Quality, and Switching Costs

This study investigates the behavioral mechanisms that drive loyalty intention in tourism; in this regard, a longitudinal study was conducted in which customers’ perceptions were compared before and after a major renovation of a hotel complex that includes wellness and spa facilities. Within this study, we identified as suitable study bases the Theory of Planned Behavior, the service value theory and the switching cost theory, by creating a model that analyzes the way in which perceived value, perceived service quality, attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and perceived switching costs can have an influence on the loyalty intention manifested by the consumers of tourism services from the analyzed sample. Among the variables used in the model, attitude is approached as a mediator, while switching costs and service quality were approached as moderators.

The results from PLS–SEM showed us that perceived value predicts attitude before renovation, after renovation and over the entire interval, and the indirect effect of value on loyalty through attitude was strong after the modernization of the complex, while a moderate negative effect of switching costs on the relationship between attitude and loyalty was identified only before renovation.

The design of this study is longitudinal, because in this way loyalty could be evaluated more clearly in the context of a major renovation; thus, a connection of the Theory of Planned Behavior with perceived value, service quality and switching costs was proposed in order to examine the way in which these factors shape loyalty before and after a renovation of the facilities, and thus, the study tries to clarify the way in which visitors’ evaluations and their loyalty intentions can change when wellness and spa facilities are renovated, modernized and improved.