Effect of Health and Wellness Values on Festival Visit Motivation

Abstract

Understanding the motivation to visit particular tourist destinations and festivals is important for building effective tourism marketing strategies. This paper explores the effect of existing health and wellness values on the motivation to visit a festival using a field survey at the Goomeri Pumpkin Festival, a typical Australian festival which uses the natural environment, traditions and local produce to provide 21 events during the festival. The study focused on establishing the relationship between health and wellness values and festival attendees' motivation. Qualitative research with random sampling was selected to collect the data. The results revealed high levels of health and wellness values among the participants as well as social interaction, family togetherness, cultural exploration, novelty, natural environment, relaxation, previous food festival experience and food as motivations. Findings of this paper can contribute to festival tourism marketing especially to demonstrate that health-related interests can be significant catalysts for attracting festival attendees.

The promotion of health tourism products for domestic tourists

“…The increasing commodification of health care and therapeutic options has led health providers, tourist enterprises, and holiday destinations to develop products and services to cater to this growing demand (Cohen, ; Erfurt & Cooper, ; Hjalager & Flagestad, ; Kucukusta & Heung, ; Lin, ; Yoo, Lee, & Lee, ). Health tourism has become a trend in the international travel and tourism industry, and a fashionable tourist product for a number of reasons including an increased concern about health issues among the middle and upper classes, the promotion of physical, mental, and/or social well‐being, the growing need to cope with work stress, and a perceived need to get away from the routine of everyday life (Chen, Chang, & Tung, ; Hritz, Sidman, & D'Abundo, ; Huijbens, ; Y. C. Lee, ; Stace, Brown, Purushothoman, Scharl, & Weichselbraun, ).…”

Analyzing the influence of electronic word of mouth on visit intention: the mediating role of tourists’ attitude and city image

“…Recent tendency of tourists towards eWOM have increased researchers' attention to online travel WOM, including online travel review, or travel blogs (Leung et al, 2015). eWOM utilizes large scale, anonymous, ephemeral nature of the Internet and introduces a new way of capturing, analyzing, interpreting, and managing the influence of communication in hospitality and tourism marketing (Yoo et al, 2015;Filieri and Mcleay, 2014). Many studies have examined e-WOM's effects on non-service products (Sotiriadis and Van Zyl, 2013;Yolanda and Ngai, 2011;Jason et al, 2010).…”

Visitors’ Motives for Attending a Healthy Food Exhibition

“…Accordingly, healthy foods have become increasingly desired as consumers' food selection criteria have shifted from taste and price to health-related food information such as nutrition and food materials and ingredients [4]. In line with this trend, consumers' desires for more information about healthy food products, services, and/or manufactures drive them to attend food exhibitions [5].…”

“…Maintaining existing visitors and attracting new ones are useful strategies for exhibition organizers to succeed in an increasingly competitive marketplace [5,9]. As exhibitions have become an important source of information for consumers, and exhibition visitors tend to attend an exhibition with different motives [12], understanding visitors' motives for attending the exhibition and gratifying their needs are crucial for exhibition organizers and managers to plan exhibition programs [13,14].…”