How restaurants' adherence to COVID-19 regulations impact consumers' willingness-to-pay.

The impact of COVID-19 restrictions on restaurant consumer behavior remains largely unexplored. The current paper examined how adherence to COVID-19 restrictions impacts willingness-to-pay by restaurant consumers. We examined the results of a survey of 634 participants with choice-based conjoint analysis. The results found that employees in masks, customers in masks, and seating capacity significantly impacted willingness-to-pay by restaurant consumers. Employees in masks had the largest increase on WTP while employees not wearing masks had the largest decrease on WTP. Additionally, consumers dining behavior and changes based on COVID-19 restrictions were the most accurate predictors of their post-vaccine dining behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]