The awareness of farm tourism as an alternative form of holiday destination has been gaining an increasing momentum in Germany and many other countries. This article deals with the market of organic farm tourism in Germany which is a subset of farm tourism. Whereas farm or agri-tourism refers to guests accommodation at (various types of) overnight accommodations at a working farm, organic farm tourism requires guests’ lodging at only those farms which apply organic farming techniques such as restriction of the use of artificial fertilisers, high standards of animal welfare and husbandry (McIntosh and Bonnemann 2006). Both concepts are, in turn, segments of rural tourism (Wilson et al. 2001), which includes additional forms of tourism such as eco-tourism, rural adventure tourism etc. (Roberts and Hall 2001).Although there have been increasing awareness of organic tourism as a form of holiday destination, to the best of our knowledge, there is no reported research on market segmentation of the organic farm tourists in Germany. This implies that holiday marketers do not have adequate knowledge about this form of tourism and their customers in order to enable them to design appropriate marketing strategies based on the needs and wants of thevarious tourist groups who embark on organic farm tourism in Germany. The aim of this contribution is to segment the potential organic farm holiday makers in Germany in order to identify consumer groups with high interest in specific goods and services. This will enable travel marketers and farm operators to understand the needs and wants of different potential travel groups and to efficiently communicate with them in order to satisfy their needs (Jang et al. 2002).The remaining sections of the article are organised as follows: First, we provide background information about organic farm tourism in Germany and identify factors which influence the choice of organic farm tourism as a holiday destination. Following, we discuss how the data for the survey was collected and which type of statistical analysis was used to analyse the data. Next, the results of the study are presented and discussed. The final part of the article highlights the limitations of the study and delineates areas for further research.

La consapevolezza del turismo in fattoria come una forma alternativa di vacanza sta crescendo in Germania e in molti altri paesi. L’obiettivo di questo contributo è di fornire una segmentazione del mercato delle vacanze in fattoria in Germania, allo scopo di identificare gruppi potenziali di consumatori e le loro caratteristiche come una guida per determinare i loro specifici bisogni e interessi.Applicando la cluster analisi dai dati ottenuti attraverso interviste con 600 potenziali clienti in Germania, sono stati ottenuti quattro principali gruppi con variabili demografiche e attitudinali, nei confronti del turismo nelle fattorie biologiche.Lo studio raccomanda l’uso di un differenziato mix di prodotti e di attività promozionali per diversi gruppi di turisti delle fattorie biologiche, per promuoverne la crescita del settore

The ins and outs of organic farm tourism in Germany: market segmentation of potential customers based on stated interest

Sidali KL
;
2009-01-01

Abstract

The awareness of farm tourism as an alternative form of holiday destination has been gaining an increasing momentum in Germany and many other countries. This article deals with the market of organic farm tourism in Germany which is a subset of farm tourism. Whereas farm or agri-tourism refers to guests accommodation at (various types of) overnight accommodations at a working farm, organic farm tourism requires guests’ lodging at only those farms which apply organic farming techniques such as restriction of the use of artificial fertilisers, high standards of animal welfare and husbandry (McIntosh and Bonnemann 2006). Both concepts are, in turn, segments of rural tourism (Wilson et al. 2001), which includes additional forms of tourism such as eco-tourism, rural adventure tourism etc. (Roberts and Hall 2001).Although there have been increasing awareness of organic tourism as a form of holiday destination, to the best of our knowledge, there is no reported research on market segmentation of the organic farm tourists in Germany. This implies that holiday marketers do not have adequate knowledge about this form of tourism and their customers in order to enable them to design appropriate marketing strategies based on the needs and wants of thevarious tourist groups who embark on organic farm tourism in Germany. The aim of this contribution is to segment the potential organic farm holiday makers in Germany in order to identify consumer groups with high interest in specific goods and services. This will enable travel marketers and farm operators to understand the needs and wants of different potential travel groups and to efficiently communicate with them in order to satisfy their needs (Jang et al. 2002).The remaining sections of the article are organised as follows: First, we provide background information about organic farm tourism in Germany and identify factors which influence the choice of organic farm tourism as a holiday destination. Following, we discuss how the data for the survey was collected and which type of statistical analysis was used to analyse the data. Next, the results of the study are presented and discussed. The final part of the article highlights the limitations of the study and delineates areas for further research.
2009
Market segmentation; organic farm tourism; stated interest
La consapevolezza del turismo in fattoria come una forma alternativa di vacanza sta crescendo in Germania e in molti altri paesi. L’obiettivo di questo contributo è di fornire una segmentazione del mercato delle vacanze in fattoria in Germania, allo scopo di identificare gruppi potenziali di consumatori e le loro caratteristiche come una guida per determinare i loro specifici bisogni e interessi.Applicando la cluster analisi dai dati ottenuti attraverso interviste con 600 potenziali clienti in Germania, sono stati ottenuti quattro principali gruppi con variabili demografiche e attitudinali, nei confronti del turismo nelle fattorie biologiche.Lo studio raccomanda l’uso di un differenziato mix di prodotti e di attività promozionali per diversi gruppi di turisti delle fattorie biologiche, per promuoverne la crescita del settore
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11562/991840
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