Co - Creation in Tourist Experiences

The tourist experience is multi-faceted and dynamic, as tourists engage with its formation and creation. The tourists then become vital in creating value for themselves together with the service provider. Experience value cannot be pre-produced, but is co-created between host and guest(s) in the servicescape. The tourist managers can therefore only plan for and facilitate for value co-creation to take place. This book responds to the need for a critical review of how firms can facilitate and dramatize for enhanced experience value for tourists. As the roles of participants and providers are changing rapidly, new knowledge in terms of how value creation and value co-creation can transpire needs to be generated. The aim of this book is therefore to accentuate the role and importance of the core elements in value creation processes, namely, the customer(s), the setting in which co-creation would take place, and the provider. Bringing together scholars from diverse areas to address the nature of how the actors co-create values through interaction in different experience settings, the book also serves as a guide to the best practice of co-creation of tourist experiences. It will therefore appeal practically as well as theoretically to scholars and students of tourism, marketing, leisure, hospitality, and services management.

List of illustrations Notes on contributors Preface Acknowledgments 1. Tourist experience creation: an overview Nina K. Prebensen, Joseph S. Chen and Muzaffer S. Uysal 2. Creating emotional platforms Sandra Gountas 3. Designing and managing co-creative processes in a holiday environment: the case of French Northern Alpine ski resorts Isabelle Frochot and Dominique Kreziak 4. Staging for value co-creation in nature-based experiences: the case of a surfing course at Surfers Paradise, Australia Nina K. Prebensen 5. Designing forest-based wellbeing tourism services for Japanese customers: acase study from Finland Raija Komppula and Henna Konu 6. Innovation potentials through value proposals: a case study of a museum in northern Norway Nina K. Prebensen 7. Value co-createdin geothermal tourism: the case of the 'ryokan' industry in Japan Timothy Lee 8. Value creation through heritage and identity Ruhet Genc 9. Gastronomy in a co-creation context Ruhet Genc 10. Co-creating customer experience: the role of employees in tourism and hospitality services Prakash K. Chathoth, Eric S. W. Chan, Robert J. Harrington, Fevzi Okumus and Zibin Song 11. Co-creating the sightseeing experience with and without a guide Anita Zátori 12. Creating value with seasonal workers through psychological contracts Kristin Woll 13. Challenges and research directions in co-creating tourism experience Joseph S. Chen, Muzaffer S. Uysal and Nina K. Prebensen Index

Nina K. Prebensen is a Professor at UiT - The Arctic University of Norway. She alsoholds a 20% position at the University College of South East Norway. She has published papers in various tourism journals. Her research particularly highlights the tourist decision and experience processes, where co-creation of value for hosts and guests are in focus. Joseph S. Chen is Professor in Tourism, Hospitality and Event Management inthe Department of Recreation, Park and Tourism Studies at Indiana University, Bloomington, USA. His research foci entail tourism marketing, tourist behaviors, social impacts of tourism, Arctic tourism and sustainability in hospitality and tourism. Muzaffer S.Uysal is a Chairand Professor in the Hospitality and Tourism Management Department in the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA. He is a member of International Academy for the Study of Tourism and the Academy of Leisure Sciences. His current research interests center on tourism demand/supply interaction, tourism development and QOL research in tourism and hospitality.