How Winery Tourism Experience Builds Brand Image and Brand Loyalty

Annamma Joy,Kathryn Latour,Bianca Grohmann,Seyee Yoon

doi:10.26813/001c.30210

Abstract

This research examines the role of the winery tourism experience in the formation of brand image and brand loyalty. A qualitative analysis of 2540 TripAdvisor reviews—a user-generated form of electronic word of mouth—of four wineries of the Okanagan Valley posted over six years (2014-2020) reveals not only Pine and Gilmore’s (1999) four categories of consumer experiences (i.e., esthetics, education, entertainment, and escape), but also an additional factor (i.e., social interactions with employees and other visitors). The TripAdvisor reviews also show that—based on their winery tourism experiences—consumers express differentiated brand image impressions associated with wineries and brand loyalty. The contribution of this research lies in the identification of social interactions as a complementary dimension of winery tourism experiences, and in linking winery tourism experiences with brand image and brand loyalty. From a theoretical perspective, the findings encourage a greater integration of the consumer experience and the brand image and loyalty literature, as well as quantitative research examining their relation. The findings also have managerial implications for brand experience management in the wine tourism sector.

Highlights

An increasing number of wine producers offer winery tourism experiences in order to boost direct-to-consumer sales of wines on site, and—perhaps more importantly—as a means of building brand image and valuable, long-term relationships with consumers (Karlsson & Karlsson, 2017)
This research builds on earlier work (Thanh & Kirova, 2018) to examine to what extent the 4E conceptual framework and social interactions arise in consumers’ TripAdvisor reviews, and whether consumers’ winery experiences give rise to brand image perceptions and brand loyalty
Brand image plays an important role in creating consumer loyalty, especially in situations that make brand differentiation based on tangible quality features difficult (Keller, 2020)

Summary

Introduction

An increasing number of wine producers offer winery tourism experiences in order to boost direct-to-consumer sales of wines on site, and—perhaps more importantly—as a means of building brand image and valuable, long-term relationships with consumers (Karlsson & Karlsson, 2017). The 4E framework suggests that consumer experience includes active (i.e., education, escape) and passive (i.e., esthetics, entertainment) consumer participation (Pine & Gilmore, 1999; Quadri-Felitti & Fiore, 2012; Thanh & Kirova, 2018), experience marketing involves staging (Pikkemaat et al, 2009)—the integration of the experience category within a comprehensive and thematic design of the environment (e.g., architecture, natural setting) and offerings delivered therein (e.g., historic tours, cultural activities, food, wine tastings) in order to create experiences that consumers find unique, memorable, want to repeat, and enthusiastically promote via word-of-mouth (Bruwer & Alant, 2009; Pine & Gilmore, 1998; Pizam, 2010; Quadri-Felitti & Fiore, 2012). This research builds on earlier work (Thanh & Kirova, 2018) to examine to what extent the 4E conceptual framework and social interactions arise in consumers’ TripAdvisor reviews, and whether consumers’ winery experiences give rise to brand image perceptions and brand loyalty.

Method

Results

General Discussion

Findings

Limitations and Future