New Directions for Cultural Tourism?
Greg Richards
Association for Tourism and Leisure Education (ATLAS)
Interarts Observatory, Barcelona
grichards@interarts.net
Introduction
Cultural tourism has been identified as one of the major growth areas in global tourism in recent
years. However, the amount of research on cultural tourism has not kept pace with the growth
of the market. One of the reasons for the lack of research is the diversity of culture consumed
by tourists, which makes it difficult to define cultural tourism. Because all tourism activities
involve some element of culture, whether it be a visit to a specific cultural site or event, or simply
soaking up the ‘atmosphere’ of a destination from a pavement café, there is a temptation to see
all tourism as ‘cultural tourism’. This was essentially the approach taken by the WTO and
UNESCO in developing their ‘broad’ definition of cultural tourism in 1985, which includes ‘all
movements of persons……….because they satisfy the human need for diversity, tending to
raise the cultural level of the individual and giving rise to new knowledge, experience and
encounters’.
Perhaps recognising that such a broad approach to cultural tourism makes it extremely difficult
to decide what cultural tourism actually is, the WTO also proposed a ‘narrow’ definition, which
covered ‘movements of persons for essentially cultural motivations such as study tours,
performing arts and cultural tours, travel to festivals and other cultural events, visits to sites and
monuments, travel to study nature, folklore or art, and pilgrimages’. The key phrase in this
definition is that cultural tourism involves ‘essentially cultural motivations’. Not all cultural
consumption by tourists is stimulated by cultural motivations – many trips to cultural events and
attractions have culture as a secondary objective. If it rains, sun and sand tourists may forsake
the beach for the museum. Tourists on a city break may stumble across a local festival during
an exploratory walk. These ‘accidental’ cultural tourists may be very different in terms of
motivation and behaviour from those ‘culture vultures’ who set out from home with the intention
of consuming specific cultural manifestations.
A further complication is that our views of ’culture’ are also changing. In the past, cultural
tourists might have travelled mainly to see the ‘high’ culture of a destination, particularly
museums, monuments and arts festivals. These days, however, the tourism product is
increasingly being enhanced with elements of ‘popular’ culture, such as gastronomy, film, sport
and television. In Barcelona, for example, the Museum of FC Barcelona attracts more visitors
every year than the Picasso museum.
These ambiguities about the form and content of cultural tourism go a long way towards
explaining the widely differing estimates of the scope of the cultural tourism market. Some
researchers have claimed that cultural tourism accounts for 70% of the global tourism market, or
500 million international trips. WTO estimates, however, put the size of the market at 37% of
global tourism, or about 265 million international trips in 2003. These estimates are clearly
based on the ‘broad’ definition of general cultural tourism, whereas more conservative estimates
of ‘specific’ cultural tourism from the ATLAS surveys (covering those people travelling for
specific cultural motivations) indicate that cultural tourism accounts for about 5-8% of the total
tourism market, or around 60 million trips. Local surveys tend to confirm the scarcity of real
‘culture vultures’. In Hong Kong, for example, about a third of all international tourists visit a
cultural attraction or event during their stay, and might be classified as general cultural tourists.
However, only 10% of tourists indicated that culture had played an important role in their
decision to visit Hong Kong.
This shows that extreme caution has to be exercised in evaluating the cultural tourism market,
and that it is very important to be clear what definition is being used. Very rarely do people
seem to be talking about the same thing when they talk about ‘cultural tourism’. There are
countless conferences and seminars being held on cultural tourism across the world, and many
universities are now developing undergraduate and masters programmes in cultural tourism.
But there is still no single widely-accepted definition, and still remarkably little hard data on the
market.
It was in order to try and find out more about the phenomenon of cultural tourism that the
Association for Tourism and Leisure Education (ATLAS) developed its Cultural Tourism
Research Programme in 1991. Since then, the programme has undertaken more than 30,000
interviews with visitors to cultural attractions, with the express aim of understanding more about
the motivations, profile, behaviour and attitudes of cultural tourists. The programme started with
studies in Europe, but in recent years has included other areas of the world as well.
The latest research was conducted in 2002. This paper presents some results for 2002, based
on sample of 6000 tourists at 70 cultural sites and events across Europe, Asia and Australia. In
addition, some comparisons are made with previous years, to identify basic trends in the
market. The research attempts to answer basic questions about the behaviour of cultural
tourists and to shed light on important issues such as marketing and management of cultural
tourism.
Who are the cultural tourists?
One of the most important points to make about cultural tourism is that not all visitors to cultural
sites are tourists. About 36% of the 2002 ATLAS survey respondents lived in the local area.
Less than one third were foreign tourists. This emphasises the point that apart from a select few
sites or events where the majority of visitors come from abroad, the domestic market is of vital
importance for most cultural tourism attractions. The importance of the domestic and local
markets for cultural attractions is also supported by other studies. In the USA the Travel Industry
Association estimated that there were 92 million US adult travellers who had visited a cultural
site or event in 1998, or 46% of all domestic trips.
As with most other areas of cultural participation, women make up the majority of visitors. Of the
tourists surveyed in 2002 only 45% were males.
In contrast with the traditional view of cultural tourism, younger people are a very important
segment of the total audience. The single largest age group is between 20 and 29, and almost
40% of visitors are under 30. This matches the findings of other research, such as a recent
study by the AFIT in France, which indicated that 40% of visitors to historic sites were under 35.
In addition, research conducted on the youth tourism market by ATLAS and the International
Student Travel Confederation (ISTC), indicated that ‘discovering other cultures’ was the single
most important motivation for young travellers. The youth market is important for cultural tourism
not only because people visit cultural attractions when they are young (and many use youth
discount cards to do so), but also because the cultural experiences they have in their youth may
influence their future tourism behaviour as well.
One of the reasons that youth travellers, and particularly students, are important for cultural
tourism is because of the strong link between cultural consumption and education. Highly
educated people tend to consume more culture – not just high culture, but popular culture as
well. One of the major reasons for the growth of cultural tourism in recent decades has therefore
been increased participation rates in higher education. The visitors in general and the cultural
tourists in particular are very highly educated. Over half have had some form of higher
education, compared with about one third of the EU population.
Higher education levels tend to lead to better jobs and higher incomes. It is not surprising,
therefore, that cultural tourists tend to have professional (34%) or managerial occupations
(18%) and have salaries about one third higher than the EU average.
One of the seemingly contradictory aspects of cultural tourism is the fact that people working in
jobs connected to the cultural sector tend to engage in cultural tourism more frequently. 24% of
cultural tourists have an occupation connected with culture, compared with about 3% of the EU
population. It seems that people who work in museums also visit other museums when they are
on holiday. This is one of the clearest cases of a ‘busman’s holiday’ we have come across in
our research.
Why do they come?
One of the most important questions for the point of view of cultural tourism marketing and
management is the motivation of cultural tourists. Again, it is important to realise that not all
visitors to cultural sites are motivated by culture. Less than 20% of cultural visitors would
consider that their normal holiday was a cultural holiday, and just over 20% of the tourists
interviewed would characterise their holiday as cultural. So even the tourists visiting cultural
sites would not generally consider themselves to be cultural tourists. The ATLAS surveys have
consistently found more visitors to cultural sites who are on a ‘city break’ (25%) or ‘touring
holiday’ (28%). The proportion of cultural tourists in 2002 was slightly higher than in the 1997
and 1999 ATLAS surveys, and the proportion of visitors indicating that they ‘usually’ take
cultural holidays (29%) was considerably higher than in 1997 (21.5%).
When we look in more detail at the reasons why they go to a particular place, it is clear that the
main motivation is a combination of atmosphere, local culture and history. People want to learn
something during their visit, particularly about the unique character of the place they are visiting.
The basic motivations for visiting cultural sites has changed little over the years. The most
important motivation has consistently been to ‘learn new things’. However, in 2001
‘experiencing the atmosphere’ of the attraction was almost as important. It seems that cultural
tourism is becoming an experiential product, in which the visit is judged in terms of all attributes
of the attraction, and not just its cultural value.
What do they gain from their travel?
Recent research by ISTC and ATLAS has highlighted the particular benefits that tourism has for
the traveller. When asked what they had gained from their last major trip, young independent
travellers emphasised cultural factors, including gaining an ‘appreciation of other cultures’ and
‘more interest in learning about other cultures’.
Culture appears to play an important role in the satisfaction that people get from travelling,
which is not surprising given that ‘exploring other cultures’ was the most important motivation.
Those with more travel experience in particular said they gained more appreciation of other
cultures through their travel and were more likely to be motivated by interaction with local
people. The fact that visits to historical sites and monuments were the most frequent activities
underlines the importance of culture in the travel experience, but tends to indicate a fairly
traditional view of cultural experiences.
However, self knowledge and awareness as benefits of travel were scored highest by those
visiting Central America, Central / South Africa and the Indian sub-continent, and self
confidence as a benefit was scored highest by those visiting North and Central / South Africa,
the Indian sub-continent, Central America and South East Asia – all of which are relatively
‘difficult’ and ‘exotic’ destination regions with more distinctively ‘different’ cultures to the average
Western country. This suggests that the consumption of ‘difference’ by young people and
students is linked to confidence-building.
Where do they go?
The ‘traditional’ attractions, such as museums, galleries and monuments are still the most
important sites visited by tourists. In 2002, more that half the ATLAS respondents had visited a
museum (other than the site they were interviewed at), while 43% had visited a monument and
32% a gallery. However, there is evidence of a trend towards greater dispersion of visitors
among different cultural attraction types in the destination, and in particular a shift from
‘heritage’ attractions towards ‘arts’ attractions. The figures for 2001 show museums having no
growth in the proportion of visitors since 1997 and monuments losing share. On the other hand
art galleries, performing arts attractions and festivals have all increased their share of visitors in
recent years.
Another area of cultural tourist choice we have studied over the course of the survey is the cities
that people consider to be most attractive as cultural destinations. In terms of the cities that
cultural tourists consider being attractive cultural destinations, there have been few changes in
the major destinations in recent years. Paris, Rome and London are always present in the top
three, in the case of London and Paris probably because of their undisputed position as ‘world
cities’ and in the case of Rome because of the depth of history and richness of modern culture
of the Italian capital. A fairly consistent group of cities contests the second rung on the ladder,
including Athens, Florence and Barcelona. These cities in fact compete more fiercely with each
other than they do with London or Paris.
The relative position of Spanish cities in the list provides some interesting insights into the
relationship between policy, development, marketing and image as a cultural destination. Spain
has made significant progress in a number of fields since the death of Franco in 1975, and has
managed to transform itself from a poor relation of Western Europe into one of its leading
economies and a centre of cultural production. There has been an explosion of cultural
expression and cultural development since the restrictions of the Franco era were lifted. The
result has been that Spanish cities such as Barcelona, Madrid and Salamanca, have caught up
with their main rivals, particularly Italian cities such as Florence. This has been reflected in the
programming of Spanish cities by cultural tour operators in Northern Europe.
One of the strategies used by cities such as Barcelona to position themselves in the cultural
tourism market is the staging of major cultural events or theme years. The recent Gaudí Year,
for example, attracted an estimated 2 million visitors to Gaudí sites in Barcelona. The effects of
this theme year could also be seen in the visitor experience surveys, which showed large
increases in the scores for architectural and cultural tourism products in 2002. Other European
cities have competed fiercely for the honour of being named ‘European Capital of Culture’ by
the European Commission. The event has been particularly popular with industrial cities that
lack a clear cultural image. Glasgow started this trend in 1990, and was followed by other
industrial and port cities such as Antwerp (1993), Rotterdam (2001) and Porto (2001). ATLAS
research carried out in the latter two cities indicated that they had managed to attract many first
time visitors with the event, as well as improving their image as ‘cultural’ cities.
How do they gather information?
The main source of information for cultural tourists is personal recommendation from friends or
family (46%). Guide books are the most important source of published information (27%), but
the Internet is rapidly becoming a major factor, already being consulted by 17% of tourists in
2002, the same proportion as those using tour operator brochures and more than tourist board
information (14%). More people are also booking their travel or accommodation via Internet (8%
in 2002).
An important aspect of information gathering is the stage at which cultural tourists make the
decision to visit a site or event. The ATLAS surveys indicate that almost half the tourists decide
to visit a cultural attraction before leaving home, while about a quarter make the decision during
the journey to a region and a quarter only decide once they have arrived at the destination. This
indicates the importance for cultural attractions of attracting the attention of the tourists before
they arrive in the destination. Because it is unlikely that individual cultural attractions will have
the resources necessary to market themselves abroad, there is an important role for
collaborative destination marketing in developing cultural tourism.
How much do they spend?
One of the reasons why so many nations and regions are interested in cultural tourism is
because of its image as high quality, high spend tourism. This is attractive not only because of
the direct economic benefits it generates, but also because this spending can be used to
support the cultural sector, at a time when many governments are finding it increasingly hard to
bear the costs of heritage preservation and arts subsidies.
It is not surprising, therefore, that economic arguments tend to dominate discussions about the
costs and benefits of cultural tourism, much to the dismay of those involved with the cultural
sector. Such tensions are exacerbated by the fact that the cultural sector perceives that most of
the economic benefit of cultural tourism accrues to the tourism sector, rather than benefiting
culture directly. There seems to be some grounds for complaint in destinations such as Venice,
where staying tourists spend only 2% of their budget with cultural attractions, compared with
45% on accommodation and 21% on shopping.
The attractiveness of cultural tourists for most tourist destinations lies in their high overall
spend. The image of cultural tourists as relatively rich tourists is partially confirmed by the
research. The average total spend in the destination for cultural tourist groups in 2002 was over
€400 for foreign tourists and almost €300 for domestic tourist groups. The daily expenditure of
cultural tourists (over €70) is higher than visitors on a touring holiday (€52), beach tourists
(€48), those on a city break (€42) or engaged in rural tourism. However, it should also be noted
that the average stay of cultural tourists also tends to be lower than beach tourists.
Summing up the results of the research, it seems that today’s cultural tourists are generally well-
educated people with high status occupations and good incomes. These elements fit the
stereotype of cultural tourists that has persuaded so many destinations to pursue them. What is
often overlooked, however, is that not all cultural visitors are cultural tourists, and the level of
cultural motivation varies greatly from one tourist to the next. They are often looking for a
mixture of culture, entertainment and relaxation, not just traditional ‘high’ culture products. It is
also clear that younger tourists are much more important than has previously been recognised,
and the youth market will be particularly important in creating repeat visitors for the future.
Trends for the future
What is likely to happen to cultural tourism demand in the future? The best way to answer this is
look back at what has happened over the past few years. The last decade has seen the
emergence of cultural tourism as a clearly identifiable market segment, as tourism and culture
have become more and more closely linked. At present, however, culture is being integrated
into just about every form of tourism, so one wonders if it makes sense to talk about ‘cultural
tourism’ any more – it was already difficult to define, and in future it will be even harder.
Market maturity and diversification
What seems to be happening is that traditional forms of cultural tourism, such as visits to
museums and monuments are growing, but not as fast as they were 20 years ago. In fact, the
supply of static cultural attractions is outstripping demand in this area. Most growth in cultural
tourism seems therefore to be coming from new market niches which are emerging. As cultural
tourism grows it is differentiating into a range of sub-markets, and these new markets, such as
architecture tourism, gastronomic tourism, literary tourism and creative tourism are driving the
growth in the market as a whole.
The diversification of cultural tourism will however require greater knowledge and
professionalism on the part of the travel industry. There are signs that this is already happening,
with growing numbers of specialist cultural tourism operators in Europe and with most US states
having appointed cultural tourism officials. There is however a need to generate more structured
and consistent information on the market to aid the new cultural tourism professionals in their
marketing.
The growth of a more professional approach to cultural tourism is also likely to reinforce the
growth of new partnerships between the public and private sectors and between individual
cultural attractions. Product-related initiatives, such as joint ticketing of cultural attractions are
already well-entrenched in many major cities. In the future this will probably be increasingly
supplemented by joint marketing programmes of cultural tourism products in destinations.
These programmes will also make growing use of the internet for marketing, particularly as
Internet use for information-gathering among the highly-educated and well-connected cultural
tourists grows. Many systems for direct booking of cultural tourism products are already in
place, in spite of the complexity of many of the products on offer. For example the Dutch
company Artbase provides real-time information on 200,000 events worldwide at 20,000
different venues. Event information can be delivered in a variety of formats, such as Internet,
email, WAP and SMS, and can be linked to travel information and products from tour operators
and airlines.
New Market Niches
Creative tourism
ATLAS has looked in particular at creative tourism, which is arguably a development from
traditional passive forms of cultural tourism towards more active involvement of the tourist in the
cultural life of the places they are visiting. Creative tourism is also about actively learning skills
that tourists will take home with them. This high involvement form of tourism is the result of a
value shift towards self-development rather than just the material aspects of consumption.
For example, the Grecotel hotel chain was one of the pioneers in the field of creative tourism as
a participant in the EUROTEX project, which aimed to increase tourist interest in crafts by giving
them first hand experience of how textiles were made. At first, this project mainly involved crafts
demonstrations and direct sales of hand-made textiles to tourists by local craftspeople. Five
years on from the start of the EUROTEX Project. Grecotel (www.grecotel.gr) has now developed
‘Agreco’, a traditional farm where tourists can participate in a wide range of creative activities,
including making wine, bread, yoghurt and cheese, as well as feasting on these local products.
One can imagine the excitement of repeat visitors to the Grecotel properties in Crete, who can
tell their fellow guests that they personally trod the grapes for the wine being consumed at
dinner (even if this is statistically unlikely!). Not only does the Agreco farm provide a creative,
hands-on experience for visitors, but it also develops an integration of culture, history, nature
and landscape that tourists currently find so attractive.
In other parts of the world this development is being taken still further. In New Zealand, the
Creative Tourism Network (www.creativetourism.co.nz) is offering a wide range of courses to
visitors in the Nelson region, which has a relatively small range of cultural attractions. By adding
creative components to a crafts tourism or cultural tourism product, visitors can be persuaded to
stay longer, spend more and come back to the region more frequently. Creative tourism is
arguably more flexible than many traditional forms of cultural tourism, requiring less capital and
making more use of local skills and knowledge than museums or visitor centres.
In Bangkok, the classic cultural tourism product has been augmented by a number of creative
experiences for tourists. The Wat Po Massage School offers thirty-hour training courses in Thai
Massage, a skill an increasing number of westerners are eager to learn. Thai Boxing classes
also a new area of educational interest for tourists. For those wishing to learn something about
Thai cuisine, Thai cooking classes are available at nearly all the five star hotels in Bangkok.
Religious and spiritual tourism
Religious tourism is hardly new, but it is now increasingly being recognised that there is a high
degree of overlap between religious and cultural tourism. Many of those travelling for religious
motives, including pilgrims, also have a strong interest in the culture and heritage of the regions
they visit. In addition, religious tourism is undergoing a shift from purely religious to more
broadly spiritual motivations, which is opening up a wide range of new products and
destinations. A growing range of locations, both religious and secular, are creating ‘retreats’ for
those interested in spiritual holidays, and more and more courses in spirituality, self-
development and alternative therapies are being offered. This growth is stimulated not only by
the fact that people are more aware of their own spirituality, but also the practical constraints of
everyday life. The pressured daily routine that makes people want to retreat to a spiritual
location also means that there is no time to do this during ‘normal’ leisure time. Holiday time is
therefore becoming an increasingly important arena for self-development, spirituality and
creativity.
The number of people now taking some time out for a period of contemplation or spiritual
renewal can be judged from the growing number of pilgrims travelling to shrines all over the
world. The Camino de Santiago in northern Spain has been particularly successful in generating
large numbers of visits from pilgrims, some of whom walk the whole 769 km from St.-Jean-Pied-
de-Port to Santiago de Compostela, and many who cover at least part of the route. The number
of pilgrims earning their Compostela by walking to Santiago rose to a record 155,000 in 1999,
compared with just 2500 in 1985. The spirituality and spirit of camaraderie generated by the
pilgrimage can be judged from the many stories left by pilgrims on the Camino website
(http://www.santiago-compostela.net/), which is generating 20,000 page views a month. This
website is in itself an illustration of how tourists are increasingly using new technology to gather
information about cultural sites and events, bypassing the traditional supply chain of the tourist
industry. This is a trend which is likely to continue in the future, but it also opens up new
opportunities for the tourist industry to support and channel these informal networks to work
more closely with the consumer and to uncover more information about tourists’ needs and
desires.
Cultural Events
The growing popularity of staging cultural events such as the European Cultural Capital
underlines the growing importance of events and festivals in the cultural tourism product. Events
are seen as advantageous because they generally require less investment in fixed capital than
cultural infrastructure, they are more flexible, they can generate repeat visitation more easily
and they can be linked into the marketing themes of the destination.
Many destinations have started to develop events around local gastronomy as a way of adding
attractiveness and activity to their product as well as supporting local culture. People interested
in gastronomy are usually also interested in the culture that produces particular foods and the
landscapes and environments in which the food is grown. Not suprisingly, therefore, food
festivals have often grown up in rural environments, where the link to the land is still close. In
recent years, however, there has been a rapid growth in urban gastronomic events which are
more oriented towards creation of dishes and the preparation and enjoyment of food. In festivals
such as the Singapore Food Festival (now in its 10th year) or the Melbourne Food and Wine
Festival (11 years old), food has been turned into the centrepiece of a total cultural experience,
including master classes, cooking demonstrations and wine tasting. These kind of events are
likely to become more common, particularly as initiatives to upgrade gastronomy, such as the
‘Slow Foods’ movement begin to have an impact.
Destination marketeers have to be realistic about the potential of events to attract cultural
tourists, however. Some hallmark events may persuade people to travel long distances, but the
audience for most cultural events remains local or domestic. In Catalunya, for example, tourists
are found at only a handful of the 20,000 or so festivals staged. Tourists visit those festivals in
destinations they already know, such as Barcelona, but rarely travel further specifically for
cultural events.
New cultural consumers
Who is consuming these new types of cultural tourism? The barriers between different forms of
culture are also beginning to break down in postindustrial society. What we have identified is a
new trend towards the combination of different forms of culture rather than the previous division
between high and popular culture. Many people have become ‘cultural omnivores’ who combine
traditional ‘high’ culture (such as museums, opera and art galleries) with ‘popular’ culture (such
as pop music, sport and theme parks).
For example in the different cultural capitals we surveyed in 2001 (Rotterdam, Porto) and 2002
(Salamanca) we discovered that a large proportion of the tourists are cultural omnivores rather
than traditional culture consumers. The cultural omnivores are more likely than other visitors to
be cultural tourists and make more combined visits to cultural attractions. The omnivores are
heavy consumers of all forms of culture, and also take a large number of trips. However, they
do not fall easily into any particular socio-economic group, because they are linked by bonds of
taste rather than class. This means that old segmentation methods will not work so well in
future. We need to look more closely at the behaviour of cultural tourists, rather than just
opening the doors and expecting them to visit our cultural attractions.
Conclusions
Research has underlined the importance of the cultural tourism market for a wide range of
destinations. But there are indications that the traditional picture of ‘the cultural tourist’ as an
elderly, well-off consumer of heritage sites needs to be revised. It no longer makes sense to talk
about one single type of cultural tourist, or one single type of cultural tourism. As the market
matures it is also becoming increasingly diverse, producing opportunities and challenges for the
swelling ranks of cultural tourism professionals. Keeping track of these developments will be
one of the major priorities for policy-makers, marketeers and tourism academics in the future.
ATLAS Cultural Tourism Studies
Richards, G. (1996) Cultural Tourism in Europe. CAB International, Wallingford, 352pp.
Richards, G. (1999, ed) Developing and Marketing Crafts Tourism. ATLAS, Arnhem, ISBN 90-
75775-06-7,119pp.
Richards, G. (2001, ed.) Cultural Attractions and European Tourism. CAB International,
Wallingford. 259pp. ISBN 0-85199-440-7.
Richards, G. (2001) El desarollo del turismo cultural en Europa. Estudios Turísticos no. 150.
Hjalager, A-M. and Richards, G. (2002, eds) Tourism and Gastronomy. Routledge, London.
Richards, G., Hitters, E. and Fernandes, C. (2002) Rotterdam and Porto Cultural Capitals of
Europe 2001: Visitor surveys. ATLAS, Arnhem.
More information on ATLAS publications is available via www.atlas-euro.org