Response of travel agencies in China to COVID-19: disaster sensemaking, adaptation, and resilience

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on the tourism sector. Travel agencies, in particular, have encountered significant obstacles in conducting their business. Enhancing the resilience of small and medium-sized tourism enterprises, specifically travel agencies, has emerged as a crucial concern. Travel agencies tend to underestimate the effects of extreme events and usually lag behind other organizations in their sensemaking, adaptation, and business resilience to disasters. Therefore, this study investigated travel agencies' disaster response processes with respect to COVID-19. Using purposive sampling logic, semi-structured interviews were conducted with the owners and senior managers of 15 travel agencies from the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area-an important tourism destination and source market. A qualitative content analysis revealed three stages of disaster sensemaking, adaptation, and business resilience. The first stage was immanent sensemaking with passive adaptations. The second stage was representational sensemaking of the disaster with business continuity measures. The third stage was deliberate sensemaking with resilient measures. This study contributes to research on travel agencies' crisis management, with implications for policymakers and practitioners.