Inspiring winery experiences to benefit destination branding? Insights from wine tourists at Yantai, China

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to explore the impact of service quality on the formation of destination brand equity through customer satisfaction at a winery, from the perspective of Chinese wine tourists.Design/methodology/approachThis study utilized a survey research design. A convenience sample of 311 visitors to a major winery located in Yantai, China, was surveyed, and 265 useable questionnaires were analyzed. To analyze the data, the study used partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).FindingsThe results of the study reveal that service quality at a winery is a significant determinant of winery satisfaction among Chinese wine tourists, which in turn affects the brand equity of a wine tourism destination.Research limitations/implicationsThis study contributes to the growing body of literature focusing on identity-based branding in the context of wine tourism. As such, this study brings together knowledge of a place branding dimension (i.e. destination brand equity), satisfaction and tourism experience at a winery.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that the road to favorable assessments of a wine destination brand (macro level) go through a satisfying experience at a winery (micro level). Therefore, the need to co-create the wine experience through various stakeholders' involvement is crucial for the success of wine tourism.Originality/valueExtant wine studies often highlight western wine tourists' behavior and examine central behavioral constructs such as winery service quality and satisfaction. This study extends previous research by: (1) investigating the issue from Chinese wine tourists' perspective and (2) integrating the destination brand equity of a wine region to current investigations that commonly focus on the service quality of a winery and wine tourists' satisfaction.

Hotel customer segmentation according to eco-service quality perception: the case of Russian tourists

“…The hotel managers can also motivate the active participation of the staff and the customers in eco-friendly practices, such as recycling and reuse. The involvement of various stakeholders in eco-friendly practices and the role they play in the co-creation of tourism experience are crucial for the success of companies and destinations (Lee et al , ahead-of-print).…”

The destination marketing and media profile – travel motives nexus amid tourism crisis: the mediating effect of the nation brand

“…A notion also hypothesised by Pawaskar and Goel (2016) posits that information symmetry touchpoints influence the extrinsic travel motives of tourists by attracting them to specific destinations based on their attributes. The extant of literature (Avraham, 2020;Lee, 2021b;Lee et al, 2022;Matiza and Slabbert, 2020) also corroborates the NB's direct effect on tourist's travel motives, submitting that public perceptions of a country [via the NB] are a significant antecedent to tourists' conative behaviour, including their travel motives. This evidence aligns with the demand-oriented The destination marketing and media profile TE-A perspective of NB theory which supports the notion of inherent organic perceptions towards countries potentially exerting a direct predictive effect on consumptive decisionmaking.…”

Brand cocreation and immersion: the link between sense of brand community and attitude toward a brand

“…Šerić and Mikulić, 2020), theme parks (Godovykh et al , 2019; Milman and Tasci, 2018; Milman, Tasci, and Wei, 2020; Milman, Tasci, and Zhang, 2020), wine tourism (e.g. Lee et al , 2020) and tourism destinations (Tasci, 2016a, b, 2017, 2018, 2020).…”