Performance of the hotel industry in post-COVID-19 Tanzania: A case of Arusha City Council

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the global hotel industry, and hotels in Arusha City, Tanzania, have shown only partial recovery well after the pandemic formally subsided. Anchored in the Theory of Consumer Behaviour and the Agile Supply Chain Theory, this study assessed the performance of the hotel industry in Arusha City in the post-COVID-19 period, examining performance before, during, and after the pandemic, and identifying the challenges hindering full recovery. A convergent parallel mixed-methods design was adopted, combining questionnaires administered to 181 hotel employees (145 fully completed and retained for the descriptive analyses), semi-structured interviews with seven hotel managers, and two focus group discussions across seven hotels. Quantitative data were analysed descriptively and through a chi-square test of association using IBM SPSS Statistics, while qualitative data were analysed using a reflexive thematic approach. The findings show that before the pandemic hotels recorded high revenue, strong guest turnout, and stable employment; during the pandemic guest numbers, revenue, and employment collapsed and several hotels closed temporarily; and in the post-pandemic period, despite health protocols, business innovation, and staff training, the industry still records slow recovery linked to financial constraints, the slow return of customers, and shortages of skilled staff. A chi-square test showed a statistically significant association, not a causal relationship, between pandemic-related effects and current hotel performance (χ²(1, N = 181) = 6.495, p = .011, φ = .19, a small-to-moderate effect). Hotel owners are encouraged to invest cautiously in digital technologies, while government and other stakeholders provide financial support, favourable policies, and skills training to strengthen sector resilience; because the present data are perceptual and retrospective, these recommendations should be verified through more direct, longitudinal evidence.