The aim of the project is to identify changes in the provision of services in cross-border tourism caused by the pandemic and to propose a solution that will be presented to service providers via TRJH.
Using primary research, it will be possible to compare the offer of services before and after the pandemic. The comparison will cover changes in the offer of service providers according to marketing tools, specifically in the area of product offerings, price changes, place of service provision, method of promotion, number of employees, offer of packages, number of employees and service delivery processes.
Part of the research will be to find out whether providers want to implement these changes in their offer in the long run or only in period after the pandemic, whether the changes are technological (virtual tours) or non-technological (price change). This information will be statistically evaluated and interpreted. The research and the obtained data are the content part of the project, which will involve two universities, whose faculties deal with tourism and are located in the CZ-PL border area. This content should reach four groups: students and educators, service providers, the government supporting tourism and visitors to the region. The project team will try to get the information obtained to these groups through a streamed conference, an online collection of papers published on the project website and TRJH website. The project will be further publicized through regional chambers of commerce, regional authorities, information centres, newspaper articles and radio spot.
If the project is supported, it will have a long-term positive impact primarily on providers of tourism services in the Jizera Mountains and thus a positive impact on the economy of both participating regions. This is not only a positive impact on companies, but also a positive impact on the jobs of employees in services that are at risk. The research will provide information on which changes in services in the region have been successful and which have failed depending on the field of accommodation, catering and transport services. The information obtained will also be interesting for people from the state administration engaged in the support of tourism in the region and will be distributed to them. Ultimately, the improvement of services will also have a positive impact for visitors to the region. Although the project is designed for the Jizera Mountains, it is beneficial for all V4 countries. Borders are often formed by mountains, such as the Czech Republic vs. Poland, Czech Republic vs. Slovakia, Slovakia vs. Poland, which are centres for tourism, and the results obtained will be applicable to most mountainous border regions. In addition, the government restrictions were applied nationwide and affected the entire territory not only of individual states, but also globally the entire territory of the V4. Likewise, the methodology of the project with planned outputs can be used for all border regions, because all service providers had very similar problems to those on the Czech-Polish border.