Exploratory understanding of the Korean-Chinese tourists to Korea

Abstract

Purpose This study aims to explore the characteristics of the Korean-Chinese outbound tourism to South Korea by particularly focusing on VFR market. The vast majority of the ethnic group reportedly visit South Korea to see and reunite their families, friends and/or relatives. Despite the significance of Chinese inbound tourism market in South Korea, academic understanding of the heterogeneous segments in the market is still lacking.
 Methods Online and offline surveys which were conducted in 2019, for adults and college students group and young students group, respectively.
 Results It showed that VFR is the ethnic group’s main purpose of traveling to South Korea (average 75.1%), which is consistently true to all segments including adults, college students, and young students in this study. They also collected travel information from reference groups including families and relatives alongwith the Internet and commercial travel information, and, in contrast to general Chinese outbound tourists, different destinations in Korea were preferred by the target groups (e.g., Incheon) and their travel behavior is different in terms of the length of staying and expenditure behavior.
 Conclusion Findings contribute to better understanding Chinese VFR tourism market and accommodating the unique needs of the segment. In particular, this study will prompt timely actions to deal with the recovery and resilience of the travel and tourism sector after the COVID- 19 pandemic.