Can beauty save service failures? The role of recovery employees’ physical attractiveness in the tourism industry

Physical attractiveness, an important factor in tourism service encounter, has received increased attention recently. However, less attention has been devoted to its effects on tourism service recovery. The current research fills this gap by systematically examining whether, how, and when a recovery employee’s physical attractiveness affects tourists’ attitudes toward the recovery employee and the firm. Three experiments are carried out. Results show that a recovery employee’s physical attractiveness can positively improve tourists’ attitudes toward the recovery employee and the firm, and this effect works by decreasing tourists’ social distance perceptions. Moreover, the effect of recovery employee’s physical attractiveness is conditioned on gender congruence between the tourist and the recovery employee as well as the severity of service failure. This paper contributes at explaining the mechanism and mixed results of physical attractiveness in tourism service recovery. The managers can benefit from the findings for effectively managing employees’ physical presentation in service recovery.