Pathways, Strategies, and Conditions: A Resource Reservoir Framework for Tourism Startup Ecosystems

Tourism startups are increasingly positioned as agents of renewal, yet existing theory offers limited insight into how these ventures navigate external resource environments they depend on. Resource-based perspectives privilege internal capabilities, while ecosystem approaches treat entrepreneurial contexts as relatively undifferentiated. Drawing on 57 in-depth interviews, conducted in 2025, with founders and ecosystem coordinators across 26 countries, this study develops the Startup Ecosystem Resource Reservoir (SERR) framework. This framework theorizes tourism entrepreneurial environments along three analytical layers: a pathway layer distinguishing Endowed-Access Resources (allocated through gatekeeper selection) from Ambient-Access Resources (worked out through participation and relational labor); a strategy layer identifying three founder postures (substantive engagement, performative conformity, and pathway avoidance) through which ventures engage these pathways; and a conditioning layer in which a structurally bifurcated legitimacy regime (investor-track and industry-incumbent-track) and infrastructural conditions shape availability and posture viability across the reservoir.