Le rôle des traités hôteliers dans les trajectoires d’innovations de l’industrie hôtelière française depuis 1918

While the French hotel industry appears to be one of the most recognized today in the collective imagination, some professionals are wondering about its ability to renew and modernize. Innovation quickly appeared as a necessity in a sector where competitive pressure is significant both nationally and internationally. The objective of this article is to identify the links that may exist between the innovations found in the hotel industry in France and the dissemination of hotel treaties, study manuals or practical books on this sector of hospitality activity. While customers are the first players to have favoured the emergence of innovations related to their changing expectations, hotel treaties have also played an essential, even structuring, role in this trajectory, because professionals in the sector use them as an essential toolbox to optimize their equipment and services. Have hotel treaties then contributed to the dissemination of innovations within the hotel industry in France? Our article covers a period from the end of the First World War in 1918, which saw the publication of the first hotel Treaty, the Traité d’industrie hôtelière [Treaty of Hotel Industry] by Louis Leospo, until today when these works take new forms, in particular with consulting firms.