Supplier Partnerships and Customer Satisfaction. A Case Study of the Sarova Hotels

Abstract

The main purpose of this study is to assess the impact of supplier partnerships on customer satisfaction. Effective supplier partnership has become a potentially valuable way of satisfying customers and improving the customer delivery services in organizations today. In the past competition was mainly between organizations but now it is among supply chains. The study looks at the extent of supplier partnerships in Sarova Hotels and the effect of supplier partnerships on customer’s satisfaction. The objective of the study was to establish the extent of supplier partnerships and determine the effect of supplier partnership on Sarova Hotel. The study used field data to derive findings. The research involved a descriptive research study design that was carried out, whose sample was of 28 participants were selected from a target population of 50 in Sarova Hotels.Simple random sampling was used to come up with the sample size since the population was drawn from different departments in the hotel. Questionnaires were used to gather data and also descriptive analysis was used to analyze the data which was used to analyze the data and was presented in terms of frequencies, mean, graphs, pie charts, tables, percentages and standard deviation.. The demographic information results indicated that most of the staff had worked for the firm for a period between 1 – 5 years with a percentage of 75% and 3.6% of staff that worked 16 years and above. This however was not the expectation of the researcher since the firm has been in existence for over 50 years and older staffs were expected to be working in the firm and provide in depth information to the researcher. The results provide evidence of a positive and significant of supplier partnership on customer satisfaction in Sarova Hotels. The study also shows that most of the patrticipants agreed that supplier partnership has led to increased customer trust, improved service delivery and increased number of customers received having a level of agreement of 4.385 with 0.885 having deviated from the mean, on the other vi hand, a mean of 3.923 with 0.755 having deviated from the mean which is the lowest mean compared to other mean indicating that the high number of response of neutrality in the improvement of sales after the hotel entered into partnerships with the supplier’s. The study also showed the response of the respondents basing on the extent they agreed or disagreed on the effect of supplier partnership on customer satisfaction. The results of the study showed that the highest mean is 4.385 with 0.885 having deviated from the mean which indicated that most of the participants agreed that after partnering with the suppliers Sarova Hotels marked increase on the number of customers it is receiving, whereas, the lowest mean is 3.923 with a standard deviation of 0.755 which indicated that most of the respondents strongly disagreed with the statement of Customers having become loyal toSarova Hotels despite other upcoming competitors due to the partnership.