Managing visitors’ dining and retail experiences in South African national parks

Abstract

In the light of the issue of declining government funding of South African National Parks (SANParks), as well as the negative influence of the poor service levels in shops, restaurants and eating facilities in these parks on visitor spending, SANParks needs to improve the retail and dining experiences at these facilities. This research attempts to provide guidelines for SANParks management in addressing these issues, by determining visitors’ retail and dining preferences and the relationship between these constructs. Quantitative research was conducted in 2011 using a web-based survey on the SANParks’ official website for two months (1st October – 30th November). This method resulted in obtaining 5 464 usable responses for the study. Factor analyses identified three relevant dining experience factors: Quality, Variety and value and Nature ambience and four retail experience factors: Goods and services, Pricing (consisting of two separate constructs: Expensive shops and Pay more inside Park) and Quality. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this was the first time that research was conducted with regard to addressing visitors’ retail and dining preferences at any South African national park, thereby contributing significantly to literature regarding visitor experiences in a nature-based context.

There is no fuzziness when it comes to measuring service quality in national parks

“…A correcting managerial process to standardize more of these services should be introduced in the near future. Research by Engelbrecht et al (2014) and Kruger et al (2015) has also alluded to some of these variables that require more attention from park management, thereby confirming the areas that require more intervention.…”

Exploring divergent aspects of middle-of-the-pyramid consumers’ dining experience

“…Item Q13 'Food is freshly served', which fell under the restaurant health factor, was moved to the food factor because of its applicability to that category. A similar procedure was performed in the study by Kruger, Saayman and Slabbert (2015), where some factors were retained as part of the alternative possibility. The resulting internal consistency remained acceptable for all the factors, as shown in Table 2.…”

Antecedents of Rural Tourism Experience Memory: Tourists’ Perceptions of Tourism Supply and Positive Emotions

“…For example, Simon took Canadian brand promotion activities as an example and proposed that tourists’ perceptions of destination information and promotion had a significant impact on tourism experience memory [ 41 ]. Kruger et al found that tourism experience memory was affected by the quality of information about food and entertainment, and of promotional material [ 42 ]. Papyrina proposed that advertising information is used as an external stimulus to resonate with consumers’ imagination, arouse tourists’ emotions, and convey specific memories of the pre-visit experience [ 43 ].…”