The Relevance of Cultural Tourism as the Next Frontier for Small Island Destinations

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to apply the cultural tourism typology of McKercher and to estimate the economic relevance of cultural tourism to the context of a small island destination tourist market. Small island destinations may be confronted with environmental constraints that restrain the traditional small island tourism development model, which is based on sun, sand, and sea. The cultural tourism typology is used in order to determine whether the typology may be used to segment tourists thereby allowing researchers to determine the economic impact of different cultural tourist segments. This study draws attention to some of the foundational issues that researchers face when attempting to quantify the economic impact of cultural tourists. The results of the study indicate that McKercher’s typology may provide more refined results when incorporating the purpose of a trip; and, that cultural tourists may be a lucrative market for destinations to pursue given the results of an economic input–output model.

Are they all “serendipitous”?

“…First, a relatively high number of visitors (41.9%) in the Serendipitous category had in fact visited the Bay of Islands previously (Table ). This was similar to research done in Aruba by Croes and Semrad (). Why did these repeat tourists visit a cultural site?…”

“…This was similar to research done in Aruba by Croes and Semrad (2013). Why did these repeat tourists visit a cultural site?…”

“…However, our findings from the Bay of Islands do have parallels in the research that has replicated McKercher's work in other locations. In the Aruba Island case study (Croes & Semrad, ), the majority of Serendipitous tourists were repeat visitors; a similar result occurred in the Macao replication (Vong, ). Likewise, we found that the level of knowledge about cultural sites was higher than expected.…”

“…Other researchers have subsequently used McKercher's typology to analyse destinations by identifying the distribution of each subtype (Croes & Semrad, 2013;Lynch, Duinker, Sheehan, & Chute, 2010;Nguyen & Cheung, 2014;Niemczyk, 2013;Vong, 2016). This body of research has shown that the distribution ratio of the subtypes is a function of the destination context.…”

Advancing the 5E's in festival experience for the Gen Y framework in the context of eWOM

“…However, the international tourist market is vast and may be lucrative providing that the marketing acquisition cost to attract these tourists is not exceedingly expensive. Second, as most SIDs are considered to be developing countries or states with scarce resources (Croes & Semrad, 2013;Srinivasan, 1986), it becomes difficult to fund an international festival marketing campaign. Thus, the relevance of eWOM as a variable of interest for analysis in this study is deemed appropriate, as eWOM is a form of communication that is especially cost effective in acquiring the Gen Y market and extending market reach into international markets (Dellarocas, 2003;Litvin, Goldsmith, & Pan, 2008).…”