The Sustainability of Cruise Tourism Onshore: The Impact of Crowding on Visitors’ Satisfaction

Abstract

The sustainability of cruise tourism has been questioned in relation to its negative effects on ports of call, among which crowding has recently become more pronounced. However, an understanding of how crowdedness influences cruise tourists' experience onshore is lacking. The study analyzed online reviews on onshore experiences in the main European ports of call through Leximancer, an automated text analytics software. The results revealed that the perceived destination crowding was not always negatively evaluated by tourists, but was also discussed as a factor adding up to the authenticity of the visit under certain circumstances. Nevertheless, the evidence indicates that only human crowding might be positively assessed, while the spatial crowdedness was always reported as detracting from the enjoyment of the visit. The analysis also showed that the crowding phenomenon was represented differently in the accounts of the low, average and high satisfaction cruise tourists' groups. The role of the guide, as well as the attractiveness of the sightseeing were identified as factors that can ameliorate the negative effect of crowding on the destination visit. The findings yield relevant implications for all actors involved in the cruise tourism activity, which should manage destination crowdedness in a more sustainably innovative way.In view of the above, the purpose of this study is to explore cruise tourists' perceived crowding at the main European ports of call, and to examine its impact on destination visit satisfaction through the analysis of online reviews. This study therefore fills a major gap in the tourism literature on overcrowding by exploring the role of crowding perception in both, positively and negatively evaluated cruise destination experiences.The remaining part of the paper is structured in four parts. It starts with sustainable destination tourism models, followed by examining the concept of tourism crowding. The forth section is concerned with the methodology of the study, addressing the advantages and weaknesses of using Leximancer. The fifth section analyses the results of the study, while the sixth provides the research conclusions. Finally, the last sections address the discussion of the results, the practical implications of the study, as well as the research limitations and the future research lines.

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