Re-imagining delightful experiences in “New Normal” conditions: A systematic critical review and future research agenda

Disasters and crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic, have created an uncertain and challenging environment, particularly for the hospitality and service-based industries, forcing managers to seek effective approaches in designing and staging delightful experiences in post-crisis conditions. This paper aims to advance research in delightful customer experiences in the hospitality and service-based industries in the post-crisis “new normal” conditions by (1) systematically and critically reviewing non-crisis and pre-pandemic findings on customer delight, (2) updating and structuring new findings in times of crisis and during the pandemic, and (3) thus suggesting new ways of conceptualising customer delight in the “new normal” conditions. Several conceptual gaps are identified based on this systematic critical review, which eventuates the development of a dual-pathway framework in the "new normal" context. Following this, several future research directions and practical implications for more effective delightful experience management are provided.