Dogan Gursoy is the Taco Bell Distinguished Professor in Hospitality Business Management at Washington State University in the School of Hospitality Business Management and the editor of Journal of Hospitality Marketing & Management. He is also the recipient of the 2021 ICHRIE Lifetime Research Achievement Award and the 2019 University of Delaware's Michael D. Olsen Research Achievement Award. Dr. Gursoy is recognized as one of the leading researchers in the hospitality and tourism area. He is consistently ranked as one of the top 10 hospitality and tourism researchers in the world based on the publications in top hospitality and tourism journals. Dr. Gursoy's research has high impact and is widely cited. Dr. Gursoy also receives frequent invitations to give keynote speeches at international hospitality and tourism conferences. He is also an active member of several industry and academia associations.

Francis Buttle taught marketing to hospitality management students at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and the University of Surrey. He became a full professor of marketing, relationship marketing and customer relationship management in graduate schools of management in the UK and Australia. He has published 14 books and over 150 peer-reviewed articles. He continues to mentor academic colleagues, consult for businesses and not-for-profits and serve as an expert witness in legal cases.

David Bowie, MBA, worked in the hospitality and tourism industry for over 30 years as a manager, a director and then as a marketing consultant. He taught undergraduate and postgraduate marketing at the School of Hospitality Management, Oxford Brookes University for 21 years. His research interests include hotel branding and destination marketing.