Enhancing customer happiness through green practices, engagement, brand experience and attachment in South Africa’s hotel sector: a mediation approach

Green hotels attract environmentally conscious customers who claim to find happiness in them. Environmentally conscious customers derive happiness from the idea that brands contribute immensely to the environment’s well-being. The study investigates the impact of hotel green practices on customer happiness through engagement, brand experience, and attachment. A quantitative research methodology was adopted, and it followed a causal design. A mall intercept technique was carried out, where 270 environmentally conscious guests completed self-administered questionnaires. Using PROCESS model 6, serial mediation was performed to test the study’s hypotheses. The study’s results reveal that green hotel practices alone do not contribute to customer happiness. However, when customer engagement, brand experience and attachment are added to the equation, customer happiness is enhanced exponentially. The results underscore the important role customer engagement plays in green hotels efforts to sustain customer happiness. Therefore, allocating significant financial resources towards implementing innovative and sustainable green initiatives at the firm level while paying special attention to customer engagement will enable hotels to compete better in an environment characterized by environmentally conscious customers and increase their market share.