ABSTRACT
Despite extant consumer behaviour research that deals with the ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ of consumer decision making, studies on food and tourism are largely limited to food safety and hygiene issues (MacLaurin 2001; MacLaurin et al. 2000 cited in Mitchell and Hall 2003). Food and tourism studies that have been focused on tourist and visitor behaviour at food events are limited, mainly because research on food-and beverage-related festivals is at its formation stage (Kim et al. 2010) and studies that research consumers’ attitudes and behaviours towards food festivals in tourism destinations are at an embryonic level (Sparks 2007; Kim et al. 2009). This is surprising considering the emergence of food festivals in many tourism destinations as a means of promoting locally sourced food consumption (Organ et al. 2015). To this end, consumer behaviour research is important to food tourism stakeholders in the hospitality and tourism industry such as restaurant and café owners, cookery school providers, festival organisers, hotel and resort managers, bed and breakfast operators, food producers as well as destination marketers (Mitchell and Hall 2003). By understanding how tourists make their decisions to consume food-related products, we will be able to gain a better understanding of when we need to intervene in their decision-making process. In this regard, the aim of this chapter is to bridge the existing gap between consumer behaviour studies, food research and tourism studies. In particular, the following questions guided this study: (1) What are the motives for visiting slow food festivals (SFFs) in rural destinations; and (2) How are these motives conceptualised into post-consumption experiences such as satisfaction and intention to revisit?
