Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Consumer purchase intention towards Sharia Compliant Hotel (SCH)
N.S.N. Muhamad-Yunus, N. Abd-Razak & N.M.A. Ghani
Faculty of Business Management, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Malaysia
ABSTRACT: The notion of sharia compliant has been widely known to various areas especially in
the profit making industries. A progressive Muslim country such as Malaysia has merged the concept to
areas such as banking, business, hospitality and tourism. Sharia compliant is defined as an act or activity
that follows with the requirements of Islamic law. With the flock of Middle Eastern tourist, the need to
implement Sharia compliant hospitality and tourism activities is essential. To no avail, the concept has
yet to fully established and in sporadic development. The aim of this study is to discuss on factors that
contributed to the consumer purchase intention and its relationship. The awareness on Sharia Compliant
Hotel (SCH), brand image and expected service quality are considered as critical factors that possibly pro-
vide empirical evidence in relation to consumer purchase intention which measured through the Theory
of Planned Behavior (TPB). The study is aligned with Malaysia current tourism agenda that highlights
sharia compliant as one of the strategies to attract visitors from Muslim countries to visit Malaysia.
Keywords :
Awareness, brand image, purchase intention, service quality, Sharia Compliant Hotel
1 INTRODUCTION
In reality, there are number of hotel that offers
the full SCH in Malaysia but it is still inadequate
(Suhaiza, Azizah & Simon, 2011). The number
of Muslims tourist to Malaysia increased, but
there is lack of services and facilities provided to
them as to meet their expectation (Bogas, 2013).
Majority of the hoteliers in Malaysia do not see
that there are big opportunities in the implementa-
tion of Islamic hotel concept as with the growing
number of Muslim population and Muslim travel-
lers. This market segment is expected to grow fast
especially in attracting travellers from the middle
east that have lots of demanding in Islamic hotels
(Abuznaid, 2012). Therefore, if Malaysia applies
the SCH principle and be able to create a centre of
attention to those tourists from the Middle East,
it is not impossible Malaysia can produce most of
the income from the tourism industry using SCH
as an attraction. Based on the given statement, it
can be assumed that the SCH in Malaysia are still
oblivious and further studies should be carried out
(Razali, Abdullah & Hassan, 2012).
Therefore this study discussed the factors that
influenced consumer purchase intention towards
Islamic hotel in Malaysia. The first discussion
is understood the concepts of SCH and theory
of planned behavior that discuss on consumer
intention to purchase. Next, this study discussed
three factors (i) awareness, (ii) brand image, and
(iii) services quality that influence the individual
intention to purchase. This study highlights that
the consumer intention behavior will be strategic
Malaysia has been successful in trying to attract
Muslim tourists from all over the world to visit
and gain new experience. Due to that, the oppor-
tunity for local hotels to provide some facilities and
activities in line with the Islamic values indirectly
has come into existence. Basically, Sharia Compli-
ant Hotel (SCH) is not a new concept in Malaysia.
According to Zakiah and Fadilah (2013), there are
few hotels that serve basic facilities to fulfil the
Muslim tourists' needs so-called as friendly Mus-
lim hotel. However, the existence of SCH itself is
still less being exposed around Malaysia as not all
Malaysian knows about it. Obviously, the SCH
concept requires further explanation in terms of its
definition and attributes that constitutes of what
SCH is (Zakiah & Fadilah, 2013).
One of the hotels that practice SCH is De Palma
Hotel. De Palma hotel where located around
Malaysia have standardized the operation and
management based on SCH. De Palma hotel was
chosen as the first hotel to offer services that con-
form to Sharia principles. Among practices are;
level 6 is design specifically to locate Islamic room
type, large prayer rooms with a full time Imam to
lead all prayers, Halal food in their hotel restau-
rants and the restaurants are certified Halal by
Selangor Islamic Religious Department. In addi-
tion, all staff especially female is compulsory to
wear the dress code that compliant with the Sharia
principles.
 
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