9 pages., via online journal., In the last few years, the contribution of the agricultural sector to tourism has been increasingly evident. Agritourism provides the possibility to have a green holiday experience and allows farmers to diversify their income. In the tourist sector, communication is decisive in determining consumption choices, and the Web plays an important role. Considering that the Internet can bring potential benefits and reach new customers, it is important that websites are complete and attractive. This paper evaluates agritourism websites in an Italian region (Sicily) to analyse the strategic choices made by farmers. This study uses the eMICA methodological approach to analyse the quality of the websites and a cluster analysis to find homogeneous groups of farms. The results indicate that there is a large group of Sicilian agritourism providers that have been slow in taking advantage of the new opportunities offered by the Web, whereas another group, which is less numerous, makes use of social networking tools, demonstrating web 2.0 communication.
12 pages, via online journal, This study, underpinned by the Resource-Based View and its association with the Relational View, contributes to the existing cross-disciplinary literature involving economic geography, tourism and marketing by extending the current understanding of the relationship between firms' value co-creation activities and sales performance in the context of rural wine producing firms. Specifically, by investigating how a firm's competitor orientation (possessing and acting upon knowledge of competitors) affects the relationship between firms' capabilities to engage in value co-creation activities and sales performance. This investigation utilises a multi-level qualitative investigation within small-to-medium-sized, New Zealand wine producers engaging in various value co-creation activities (wine hospitality and tourism such as accommodation and restaurants through to wine sales, including at cellar doors). The methods employed involved 40 interviews across 20 businesses; observations of cellar door employees in all 20 firms; and collection of archival data. The findings reveal that by having a high degree of a competitor orientation, the enhanced value co-creation activities can help individual companies improve sales performance and support cluster sustainability, including via repeat tourism. However, results vary among competing businesses based on the product-markets served, where illustrations of potential tensions highlight the need for the management of complementary relationships, within and across clusters (the latter typically being to serve overseas markets). This study consequently offers new unique insights that explain strategies affecting not just an individual firm's performance, but also, the sustainability of other businesses.
Via online journal., Creating unique stories through storytelling as a way to stage extraordinary experiences has become increasingly important in the tourism industry, particularly in experience-based activities such as farm tourism. However, limited resources and the lack of knowledge of the experiencescape suggest that many farm tourism operators struggle to integrate the experiencescape as part of storytelling. The research method chosen was an explorative study with the use of semi-structured in-depth interviews with key farm tourism operators in the Inland region in Norway. How stories and concepts are created is dependent on the resources available, the perception of authenticity, the history of the farm as well as the environment. Storytelling can be facilitated through tangible elements in the experiencescape such as the physical environment as well as intangible elements including the interaction and dynamics between the host and guest. The farmer or the person telling the story also need to possess certain skills, engagement, and interest in order to be committed to deliver the story or the concept. Essentially, the farmer becomes a part of the product and the experience.
