Developing a Country‐wide Tourist Loyalty Scheme: A Barren Landscape

Abstract

Loyalty programs, popular in today's competitive business environment, have been capturing the attention of the tourism industry since the mid 80's. While many segments of the industry have successfully utilized loyalty programs, the development of a country‐wide loyalty scheme still poses major challenges. Reflecting the findings of an extensive mixed methods research, the paper set out to empirically investigate tourists' willingness to participate in a country‐wide loyalty scheme, define the incentives they expect from such a scheme, and, explore the perceptions of hospitality stakeholders towards this potential development. Findings are of interest to both academic scholars and industry stakeholders. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

It's all in the recipe: How to increase domestic leisure tourists' experiential loyalty to local food

“…Unlike vertical or horizontal loyalty, experiential loyalty is neither enterprise nor destination specific, with tourists transferring loyalty to an experience or preferred style of holiday to new destinations ( McKercher et al, 2012 ). Understanding experiential loyalty benefits both enterprises and destinations that may not attract repeat tourists from outside of a region ( Murray & Kline, 2015 ), assists in strategic decision making at macro and micro levels ( Pearce & Kang, 2009 ), and helps with the development of loyalty schemes ( Zopiatis et al, 2016 ). As tourists may exhibit loyalty to local food, but not to destinations, further understanding of experiential loyalty in this context would be beneficial.…”

“…Finally, as tourists with experiential loyalty have an increased propensity to join a loyalty scheme ( Zopiatis et al, 2016 ), destination planners may consider this option. Whilst a country-wide scheme would be beneficial for tourists who may visit multiple destinations within a number of states, the complexities in developing and implementing a scheme including the coordination and commitment of stakeholders, and costs of implementing a program ( Zopiatis et al, 2016 ) may act as an impediment. However, a loyalty scheme may be viable for state or regional planners to target tourists with experiential loyalty.…”

“…Local food consumption is considered an essential element of the tourism experience ( Hjalager & Richards, 2002 ) and provides economic benefits to local economies ( Madaleno, Eusébio, & Varum, 2018 ; Zepeda & Nie, 2012 ). Despite the growing number of research papers examining local food consumption within the tourism literature ( Ellis, Park, Kim, & Yeoman, 2018 ), and the significance of experiential loyalty ( Murray & Kline, 2015 ; Zopiatis, Theocharous, Kosmas, Webster, & Melanthiou, 2016 ), a current gap in understanding experiential loyalty in the context of local food exists. Since tourists seek experiences in new destinations to satisfy the need for novelty ( Pearce & Lee, 2005 ), this knowledge gap has implications for local food producers and destination planners.…”