Search results

The role of firm attributes as a source of competitive advantage has been discussed previously in the tourism marketing strategy field. Benchmarking, a recognized learning model, is recommended as a tool to identify and improve the competitiveness of a firm. The present study employs the importance–performance analysis (IPA) to benchmark five nature- and culture-based attractions in Northern Norway. Altogether, 701 respondents participated in the on-site survey, i.e., during their vacation experiences. The present study reveals several interesting and useful managerial insights and implications for the tourist attraction industry in general as well as for the individual tourist attraction firm measured. Consequently, this study contributes to management by integrating theory and empirical data to investigate whether benchmarking, as a company learning tool, may lead to improved performance. Based on the study results, the present work suggests strategies and potential improvements for the respective tourist attractions.

The present work assesses destination and service quality attributes, in terms of exploring the stronger and weaker points within these entities. In addition, it explores the relative effect of holistic experiences of destinations and the service-specific attributes on tourists’ overall satisfaction with destinations. Building on the perception, performance, and service quality literature a survey is carried out at 5 different tourist attractions among 701 tourists from over 15 countries worldwide visiting Northern Norway. The results divulge that many destination attributes are important; however, tourists find that the destination performs correspondingly with the perceived importance of destinations. The service quality attributes are also important, but reveal a perceptual gap between importance and performance. The study finds that Northern Norway as a tourist destination should concentrate on “uniqueness” and “novelty” to enhance tourist satisfaction. Service providers are advised to keep up the good work on “giving a good impression and a nice welcome” to enhance tourist satisfaction.

This study aims to examine a creative attraction loyalty model which includes experience quality, satisfaction and motivation and to assess the model’s applicability in terms of customer attraction, namely, tourists and residents.

The data collection was conducted at four culture-based attractions in Bandung, Indonesia. Self-administrated questionnaires were distributed to visitors after they experienced the attraction. In total, 415 useful questionnaires were collected. The hypotheses developed were examined using partial least square structural equation modelling.

This study reveals a significant effect of experience quality on both satisfaction and attraction loyalty. Moreover, the effect of motivations on satisfaction and loyalty is partially supported, as only the pull motivation factor has a significant effect on satisfaction. Finally, this study reveals that the proposed attraction loyalty model is insignificant in terms of difference between tourists and residents.

Past studies have examined many of the drivers of loyalty both independently and separately. This study examines simultaneously three important loyalty drivers: experience quality, satisfaction and motivation in the context of a creative tourism attraction. To create visitor loyalty, this study suggests that attraction managers need to deliver high experience quality and develop customer pulling strategies through promotion efforts.

In response to issues and challenges facing the operators of nature-based tours, this study examines snowmobile tours in Svalbard, Norway. Specially, it posits to explore experience providers awareness of the fragile nature in which they are operating and how this awareness is implemented in their offerings. Subsequently, the chapter evaluates experience providers’ attitude of what aspects of the offerings they perceive as attractive to the tourists and the staging of the offerings accordingly. This study utilises interviews with six informants representing three different firms, a participant observation, and text analyses of the offer on the website www.Svalbard.net as the study method. The results show that the informants are aware of the fragile nature and strive to promote a sustainable behaviour during tours. In particular, they focus on informing and teaching the tourists about environmental aspects of the tour through storytelling and staging during the tour. By empowering the tourists through education and involvement they aim to make the tourists change their focus from riding the snowmobile to learning about the fragility of the nature and wildlife. Further, the informants state that the tourists may even become spokesmen for sustainable tourism due to the touring experience received. In conclusion, in a highly fragile environment like the Arctic a rise of motorised tours invites discourses on tourism development. It is pivotal to preserve the nature in a sustainable way while offering attractive tour experiences.

This paper responds to the lack of visitor engagement in many culture-based World Heritage sites and conceptualises a “Cuteification-Value Nexus” for the discussion of the communication of heritage values through “cute” or aesthetically pleasing popular culture elements. It reflects on observations in Macao to argue for a greater engagement of culture-based World Heritage sites through a combination of popular culture inspired motifs and truthful heritage messages. Specifically, it identifies a form of “cuteified heritage” – a hyperreal cultural zone that happens away from the actual heritage sites, but which articulates the heritage significances of those sites. This draws on concepts on themed spaces and insights from postmodernistic hyperreality and tourism to examine how the “completely real” becomes identified with the “completely fake” in the staging, consumption and negotiation of experiences with World Heritage and their utility in the management of World Heritage tourism sites.

The challenges of both community-based and heritage tourism result in significant impacts that have occurred in many tourist areas. These negative effects are the main problems that damage indigenous communities and are involved with cultural heritage preservation and economic development. This study aims to apply a qualitative method to scrutinize the problems and their causes in a community.

This study applied a qualitative method to scrutinize the actual data. The 50 informants from the relevant stakeholder groups of Ban Wangka village were interviewed with 22 themed questions based on the indicators of sustainable cultural heritage destinations.

Results indicate that tourism development at Ban Wangka village faces significant challenges due to the conflict between economic development and cultural heritage preservation.

The limitations also exist. First, the Mon people use their own language which resulted in the need for an interpreter during interviews. Therefore, sometimes it was impossible for the researcher to access the informants’ actual emotions. Second, this study is based on the concept of sustainable tourism development, which is an abstract idea to the local people, and thus Mon people understand it but are never concerned. Finally, this study focused only on the Mon community, which is not enough to fully achieve sustainability. Therefore, the community from the Thai side of the river must also be involved.

Such challenges have a direct impact on the sustainability of tourism operations. This indicates that the problems will lead to serious conflicts in the future unless they are resolved gently. The Ban Wangka Mon village is faced with problems that are not very different from other tourist attractions in Thailand, especially the intense growth during this time, which has brought significant changes to the destination. Subsequently, conflicts arose easily and quickly because of the motivational power of income. To overcome these problems, the community needs to be strong in fighting against the influence of tourism income.

The challenges of the destination have a direct impact on the sustainability of tourism operations. This indicates that the problems will lead to serious conflicts in the future if they are not resolved. Ban Wangka Mon village is faced with problems that are not very different from other tourist attractions in Thailand, To overcome these problems, the community needs to be strong in fighting against the influence of tourism income. In addition, good tourism planning that places importance on all stakeholders equally and providing a balanced income management plan and a fair share of income will surely eliminate many of the conflicts.

This case study of Ban Wangka Mon Village is based on the theory of sustainable tourism development, which contains three dimensions: environmental, economic and social and ethical. All impacts from tourism at Ban Wangka Mon village can be summarized into four challenges consisting of severe tourism growth, economic growth conflict, identity deterioration and behavioral changes. Some of these challenges are similar to other destinations such as the Vlorë Region.

The purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between culture-based tourism development and cultural sustainability in the established tourism destination of Gold Coast, Australia. It seeks to contribute to the debate on local development and tourism through evaluating the development of the newly-born Gold Coast Chinatown.

Two types of analysis were developed for this study. The first one aims at assessing the general features of the case study site. It was done by the urban analysis of the precinct, the count of the shops associated with the identification of their function (e.g. retail, services, etc.), street visual survey, and the assessment of ethnic expression/representations. The second analysis aims at assessing place-attachment, development impacts and cultural attitude. It was done by questionnaire surveys.

The analysis evidences mainly two findings. First, tradition, authenticity or ethnicity are not perceived as key drivers, and tangible pre-requisites do not appear as a priority for a culture-based tourism development. Second, correlation studies show the longer the length of residence the higher is the attitude towards positive perceived economic impacts and positive cultural attitudes. It is the opposite of what is usually found in literature review. As such, it challenges the concept of cultural sustainability, and helps us to reconsider the weight of the evaluative factors of community attachment, development impact and cultural attitude in tourism development.

The recent creation of the Gold Coast Chinatown not only raises the question of the rationale of what is usually recognised as a community-based settlement, hence its cultural foundation and the legitimacy of transfer of cultural models, but also the processes at stake between cultural sustainability and tourism development. To the knowledge, no publication exists on this case study.

This paper aims to extend understanding on how the tourist experience at dark heritage sites is directed and consequently influences the narratives of cultural heritage. By discussing the way dark heritage sites are projected by suppliers, the paper anticipates to advance knowledge on the nexus between dark tourism and heritage and to offer insights into the management of dissonant heritage sites.

The cases of two opposing national museums in the divided island of Cyprus are presented and discussed in an attempt to illustrate how dissonant heritage interpretation in a post-conflict context is often the product of political direction, commemorating the past and to a great extent influencing the future of a society.

National struggle museums represent dark heritage sites, which evoke emotions pertinent to ethnic identity reinforcement. Evidently, the management of such sites is in opposition to peace-building efforts taking place in a post-conflict context. The paper concludes that visitation to dark heritage sites is culturally driven rather than death-related and suggests that efforts consolidate to target specific segments of visitors, if the reconciliation potential of dark tourism is to be unleashed.

Insofar, minimal attention has been paid on the conditions of the supply of dark heritage sites and the role of suppliers in influencing culture-based issues including collective memory and national identity. This paper addresses this gap in literature and advances understanding on the developmental elements defining dark heritage tourism, by identifying and discussing trajectories between dark tourism and politics.

The chapter focuses on rural-urban food links in the context of governance. We seek to understand a rural-urban innovator mechanism is emerging through the food system and the renewed question of proximity and relative autonomy in the alimentary supply of this type of space and local society. We present case studies from Paris and Budapest metropolitan rural areas exploring institutional and private actors of governance, their power networks, food and related cultural components of rural-urban relations, the function of food links and the way in which they are governed. We have found several differences in governance methods between the Paris and Budapest metropolitan ruralities. The areas surrounding Paris are characterised by multi-level governance methods. However, an isolated form of rural governance of the rural-urban local food link can be identified in Budapest’s rural areas. Understanding the complex and dynamic interaction of food links and related activities within metropolitan areas offers the possibility of a far greater understanding of the complex and multiple links between sustainability, renewal of social interaction and cohesion.

Zimbabwean tourism, whose draw-card is wildlife, has been on the decline since land invasions that occurred in 2000. Due to the farm invasions, wildlife-based tourism is no longer a viable option. In cases where traditional industries are declining, cultural tourism has been found to be an effective alternative source of revenue. Cultural and heritage tourism represents a growing special interest market whose demand is very high; however, this sector is yet to be sufficiently explored in the empirical context of Northern Zimbabwe. The purpose of this paper is to explore the development potential of the sector.

A quantitative methodology was applied in this study. Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire that was distributed to 500 international tourists who visited Northern Zimbabwe’s cultural and heritage attractions between October 2013 and February 2014. Statistical Package for Social Sciences Version 19.0 was employed in data coding and analysis. Descriptive statistics, independent t-tests and one way analysis of variance were used in this study.

On the whole, the study found that there is potential to develop cultural tourism as an alternative for tourism growth in Northern Zimbabwe. Results showed that there exists a certain demand for cultural and heritage tourism in Northern Zimbabwe and should be developed. Cultural and heritage tourists’ spending is high per visit, despite the fact that Zimbabwe is an expensive destination. The intention to repeat visitation was found to be significant with the age, level of qualification and nationality of respondents.

The findings provides insights for cultural and heritage tourism managers in Northern Zimbabwe and similar places around the country to invest in this special interest tourism. The development of cultural and heritage tourism will contribute towards the diversification of the seasonal and threatened nature-based tourism in Zimbabwe. With a better understanding of the motivations, trip behaviour characteristics and perceptions of Northern region, this paper presents insights that are important in developing the cultural and heritage tourism sector. Research on tourism growth in Zimbabwe has predominantly focused on nature-based tourism, suggesting a clear relegation of the contribution that cultural and heritage resources can make towards tourism growth; thus, this study provides a significant contribution in the Zimbabwean context with regards to literature.