Consumer Behaviour in Tourism

Susan Horner, John Swarbrooke

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780367495633
• eBook ISBN: 9781000290875
• Edition: 4
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Now fully revised and updated, the fourth edition of this bestselling text provides students with a vital understanding of the nature of tourism and contemporary tourist behaviour. It also shows them how this knowledge can be used to manage and market tourism effectively in a variety of sectors of tourism including tour operations, hospitality, visitor attractions, transport, retail travel, cruising and airlines.

This fourth edition has been updated to include:

• new material on the impact of Information Communication Technologies (ICT) developments in tourism including social media, AR and VR, the links between climate change, sustainability and tourist behaviour, and the impact of crises and natural disasters on tourism and the cruise industry
• thirty brand new international case studies about topical issues such as Airbnb, travel blogs, overtourism, Covid-19, the flight-shaming movement, wellness tourism, hunting and tourism, terrorism, dark tourism, the solo traveller, volunteer tourism, second home ownership, music festivals, pilgrimage tourism, film- and TV-induced tourism, and tourism in Antarctica
• new online resources including PowerPoint slides and a case archive.

Each chapter features conclusions, discussion points, essay questions and exercises to help tutors direct student-centred learning and allow students to check their understanding of what they have read. This book is an invaluable resource for students studying tourism.

PART I Context

Through the first three chapters, Part I sets the scene for the rest of the book.

• 1 Chapter 1 includes key definitions and explores the importance of consumer behaviour in tourism as a subject.
• 2 Chapter 2 provides a history of consumer behaviour in tourism, in terms of both different types of tourism and various regions of the world.
• 3 Chapter 3 discusses the main concepts in consumer behaviour that have been suggested in general, and more specifically in the sector. It closes with a brief consideration of the specific characteristics of tourism that make it difficult to apply general consumer behaviour concepts and markets to tourism.

1 Introduction

In this chapter we set the scene for the rest of the book, beginning with a critical evaluation of the field of consumer behaviour in general. We then switch our attention to tourism and define its scope for those who may be unfamiliar with the sector, noting the blurred boundaries between tourism, leisure and hospitality. Finally, we briefly introduce a number of key concepts which are discussed in more detail later in this book.

The subject of consumer behaviour is key to the underpinning of all marketing activities which are carried out to develop, promote and sell tourism products. Clearly, if we are to optimise the effectiveness and efficiency of marketing activities, we must try to understand how consumers make their decisions to purchase or use tourism products. If we understand their behaviour patterns, then we will know when we need to intervene in the process to obtain the desired results. We will know who to target at a particular time with a particular tourism product. More importantly, we will know how to persuade them to choose certain products which we will have designed more effectively to meet their particular needs and wants. An understanding of consumer behaviour is therefore crucial to make marketing activities more successful.

The problem with the academic discipline of consumer behaviour, however, is that while many general models of consumer behaviour have been advanced, there has been little empirical research conducted to test these models against actual behaviour patterns. This is especially true in the tourism sector, where research on consumer behaviour is very much in the early stages of development. Despite a lack of empirical research, however, several models of consumer behaviour in tourism have been suggested. It is important that, in this book, we consider these models and the stage that the development of the subject has reached. This will allow us to identify further areas of research and will offer the reader some judgements as to how useful the research is to date for application to practical marketing activities.

Consumer behaviour is a fascinating but difficult subject to research. This is particularly relevant in the tourism field, where a consumer’s decision to purchase is of emotional significance. Purchase of a holiday, for example, involves consumers in a large spend. The holiday that the consumer buys will probably provide them with the major highlight of their year – a chance to escape from work and grey skies and to revitalise the spirit. Consumers are influenced in their decision-making processes by many internal and external motivators and determinants when they choose products. It is very difficult to research how these many motivators and determinants affect consumers as they make their choices. They may be affected in different ways according to the type of product or service they are purchasing. The experience of purchasing a holiday, for example, will be very different from the experience of purchasing an everyday food item in a supermarket. It is likely to take much more time and involve more careful consideration and selection, particularly as the purchase of a holiday usually involves a high proportion of income.

Before we get into the detail, however, we need to define some of the key terms. We can start with a definition of tourism. Definitions of tourism are explained by Horner and Swarbrooke (2007) as having several components and considerable overlap with hospitality and leisure.

Tourism is defined as a short-term movement of people to places some distance from their normal place of residence to indulge in pleasurable activities. It may also involve travel for business purposes. Horner and Swarbrooke (2007) continue to discuss the reasons for tourism not being a simple concept:

It does not encompass the lucrative field of business tourism where the main purpose of the trip is for work rather than play. We also have difficulty in deciding how far you have to travel to be a tourist or how many nights you have to stay away from home to be classified as a tourist.

Tourism can be described as an activity which is serviced by a number of other industries such as hospitality and transport. The rise of the mass package tourism business with the development of package holiday companies and retail travel agencies is probably the nearest that tourism comes to being an industrial sector.

Tourism also incorporates the hospitality sector. Collin (1994) defined hospitality as ‘looking after guests well’. The term ‘hospitality’ is becoming increasingly used in Europe to replace more traditional terms such as hotel and catering. This is because the word ‘well’ suggests a qualitative dimension which is a fashionable concept in a time when quality management is growing in importance as a discipline. Hospitality therefore includes all organisations that provide guests with food, drink and leisure facilities. Not all hospitality is concerned with tourism, however. It may just involve people going to a leisure centre, or out for a drink.

Horner and Swarbrooke (2007) also suggest that tourism incorporates leisure. According to Collin (1994), leisure as a noun means ‘free time to do what you want’. He also defines the leisure industry as ‘companies which provide goods and services used during people’s leisure time’. This includes holidays, cinema, theatres, visitor attractions, etc. This shows that, like hospitality, not all leisure organisations are concerned with tourism.

The distinctions between tourism, leisure and hospitality are blurred. A number of examples are suggested by Horner and Swarbrooke (2007) and are shown in Figure 1.1. The best example of the blurring of the distinction between tourism, hospitality and leisure is an American import, the resort complex concept.

Figure 1.1
Examples of the blurring of tourism, leisure and hospitality organisations

Source: Horner and Swarbrooke (2007)

The tourism market is very diverse and incorporates a range of market segments, each of which has its own demand characteristics. We will return to this in Chapter 10 when we consider the nature of demand in different segments of the tourism market. It is sufficient here to define the different market segments of tourism as follows.

• Business tourism is a tourist trip that takes place as part of people’s business occupational commitment, largely in work time, rather than for pleasure, in people’s leisure time (Horner and Swarbrooke, 2007). It incorporates individual business trips; attendance at meetings, training courses and conferences; visiting and organising trade fairs and exhibitions; undertaking product launches; and incentive travel. There is a blurring of business tourism with leisure tourism, particularly when a business person takes their family with them on business, or extends their business trip to incorporate a relaxing holiday after their work is finished.
• Hedonistic tourism involves the tourist in seeking pleasurable activities. The tourism experience is based on physical pleasure and social life. The hedonistic tourist is often younger and often travels in a group with other like-minded people.
• Educational tourism involves the tourist travelling for education. This form of tourism is not a new phenomenon, but is still an important segment of the tourism business.
• Religious tourism is one of the oldest forms of tourism and involves people travelling often as a sense of duty rather than for pleasure and leisure.

We will expand this analysis of different market segments in tourism further in Chapter 10.

Let us now turn our attention to defining consumer behaviour. Horner and Swarbrooke (2007) have defined consumer behaviour in tourism: ‘Consumer behaviour is the study of why people buy the product they do, and how they make their decision’.

Before we consider definitions and models that have been adapted for the tourism sector, it is important to consider the general definitions developed by researchers when considering consumer behaviour as a general topic.

The process by which a consumer chooses to purchase or use a product or service is defined as the consumer behaviour process. Consumer behaviour has been defined by Engel, Blackwell and Miniard (2001) as ‘those activities directly involved in obtaining, consuming, and disposing of products and services including the decision processes that precedes and follows these actions’. This definition emphasises the importance of...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of cases
• Preface to the fourth edition
• Acknowledgements
• About the authors
• Part I Context
• Part II The purchase-decision process
• Part III Typologies of tourist behaviour
• Part IV Tourism demand and markets
• Part V Consumer behaviour and marketing
• Part VI Topical issues in tourist behaviour
• Part VII Conclusions and the future
• Glossary of terms
• Index