E-Procurement as a New Trend in Hospitality Industry: A Descriptive Study in Egyptian Hotels

Purpose: This research investigates the reception for electronic procurement (e-procurement) concept by those hotels in Egypt, examines how hoteliers perceive the challenges and benefits of e-procurement in the hotel industry. Also this research focuses on identify the challenges and opportunities associated with the implementation of e-procurement.Design/methodology/approach: A self-administered questionnaire with purchasing managers was designed as the research instrument for collecting primary data. This questionnaire included items pertaining to illustrate purchasing managers’ perceptions of applying e-procurement in hotels, challenges and benefits of using e-procurement, cost involved in implementing e-procurement, the kind of materials/products procure online, and purchasing managers prediction of return on investment when using e-procurement. Fifteen forms were distributed in fifteen investigated hotels; among them 15 forms valid for analysis (100%) but between fifteen hotels are ten hotels conducted e-procurement process.Findings: The findings revealed that e-procurement impacts to supply chain management (SCM); time taking for employees to adopt e-procurement system too long; ten of investigated hotels use e-procurement between one to above four years; there are many benefits and advantages of conducting e-procurement in hotels (i.e. reducing costs, time, and staff); Furniture’s, Fixtures and Equipment and food for the restaurant are the highest percentage of the kind of materials/products implemented by using e-procurement; and return of investment when using e-procurement are short-term within one to two years.Originality/value: Egyptian hoteliers illustrated that the benefits of e-procurement implementation are quality of goods and services which will due to enhancing customer satisfaction, saving time and cost for Hotels.