Three Essays on Package Tourism and Sustainability

This dissertation consists of three related essays on package tourism and sustainability. While the first two essays might be referred to as companion essays and use the same dataset, the third essay uses a different dataset. The first dataset consists of 307 package tourists interviewed in Dominican Republic; the second dataset is composed by 204 tour operators worldwide. The two datasets are complementary, in order to investigate sustainability in the package tourism both from supply side (including destinations and tourism businesses, such as hotels and tour operators) and demand side (package tourists.) Mass package tourism is one of the main causes behind the ecological problems of many coastal destinations. It was initially considered incompatible with the notion of sustainability, but it is now recognized as potentially being able to incorporate more sustainable policies and practices. The first essay introduces a set of sustainability practices in package tourism and tests their role in explaining the competitiveness of a “sun and sand” tourism destination. The essay presents the results of research undertaken in Dominican Republic, one of the world’s leading markets for mass sun and sand tourism. A survey questionnaire was designed including items related to the sustainability of the vacation, and submitted to package tourists. To reduce the large set of items to a smaller one, a principal component analysis (PCA) is performed. Then, the relationship of dependency between the dependent variables measuring destination competitiveness and the components resulting from PCA is analysed by performing a regression analysis. The empirical result shows that sustainability is positively associated to the competitiveness of the tourism destination. It supports the hypothesis that sustainable tourism development is not only good for preserving the local ecosystem, but also for improving destination competitiveness. It is well established that tourists’ overall satisfaction is partially determined by the assessment of different attributes. Although there is wealth of literature on the growing interest of tourists for an intact environment and authentic culture, a direct test on the relationship between sustainability of package tourism and tourists’ satisfaction has never been performed; therefore, the second essay is aimed at examining whether there is a relationship with: i) overall tourists’ satisfaction; ii) intention to rebook. A principal component analysis was performed to reduce the large set of variables regarding the sustainability assessment to a smaller one; then, the relationship of dependency between the two dependent variables and the components resulting from the PCA is analysed by estimating two ordered logit models. Empirical results show that a sustainable offer could improve customers’ satisfaction and increase their fidelization. The essay is also aimed at understanding if package tourists are aware of sustainability issues and demanding more sustainable travel experiences. Hence, a descriptive statistical analysis and an importance-performance analysis were performed. Competitive pressures, changes of consumer preferences, new distributions channels and technological innovations have produced a change in the characteristics of tourism packages. Tour operators have progressively recognized that tourists have become increasingly aware of sustainability issues. Some tour operators have started to undertake corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives in order to avoid the menace of being seen as irresponsible firms. Studies on CSR in tourism to date have largely focused on hotels rather than tour operators. In the third essay, an empirical study was conducted with a sample composed by 204 tour operators worldwide, for a better understanding of the CSR initiatives in the tour operating business. This study proposes and tests a framework to assess CSR understanding and implementing by tour operators. A questionnaire has been designed listing the most relevant dimensions of what is currently referred as CSR practices in tour operating business. Through a principal component analysis and a subsequent binary logistic regression analysis it was tested if there is a relationship between CSR practices and profits’ growth. Empirical evidence supports the relevance of CSR practices as a determinant of profits’ growth. Moreover, sustainability seems to embody visions and values of most of tour operators interviewed. No insurmountable obstacles on adopting CSR initiatives have been detected.