Destination India: Investigating the impact of Goa's attributes on families' leisure travel experience

Abstract

Th e recent discourse of tourism development among offi cials within the Government of India has included the state of Goa, mainly because it has consistently witnessed positive economic impacts from tourism. However, in view of competition from other destinations, Goan tourism planners will need to identify important attributes of Goa that will positively aff ect tourists' destination loyalty. Th is study examines the correlation between fi ve attributes of Goa and tourists' loyalty to Goa. Families traveling to Goa are targeted in this research because they represent a signifi cant portion (39.5%) of the overall tourist arrivals in 2012. A sample of 258 families was collected, through convenience sampling, at the departure hall of Goa's Dabolim Airport between September and October 2012. Th e fi ndings of the study revealed that all the attributes investigated have exerted destination loyalty. Moreover, price and accessibility are found to the least signifi cant infl uence on the loyalty to Goa, Th ese fi ndings contradict those from past studies on individual travelers. Implications of the fi ndings along with suggestions for future research for the tourism industry are also presented in the fi nal section of this paper.