From firms to extended markets: A cultural approach to tourism product development

The tourism industry is a rapidly growing economic and cultural domain with remarkable societal effects. Critical tourism studies have discussed these effects from different theoretical perspectives. However, they have mostly concentrated on existing tourism products – on their consumption and consequences – and left tourism product development without critical attention. We take up the task of filling this gap. By leaning on the cultural approach of marketing and critical tourism studies we suggest that tourism product development has – as originating from modern marketing and management disciplines – taken the viewpoint of large manufacturing enterprises, and separated service providers from consumers. In this article we discuss a more comprehensive way of understanding product development in tourism. We highlight the complexity and contextualised nature of tourism products and their development by approaching tourism product development from a cultural perspective. We argue that product development should be regarded not only as a managerial process but as a multi-actor cultural construction that allows us to translate cultural market knowledge into products and to keep up with cultural and ideological changes. Instead of renewing the traditional dualism of production-consumption, we theorize and reconceptualize markets to break off from dichotomies separating customers, firms, employees, locals, and regional economic development – production and consumption – from each other. Different market actors are embedded in the markets where several market activities are represented and negotiated to develop competitive and sustainable tourism products. It is time to do business as unusual

Unintentional coopetition in the service industries: The case of Pyhä-Luosto tourism destination in the Finnish Lapland

Summary The rise of the service industries has changed operational business environments and mixed the roles and blurred the boundaries of private and public sectors. While cooperation has become more evident and more diverse, also simultaneous cooperation and competition between different firms and the firm and the public sector, namely coopetition, is gaining an increasing importance. We consider intentional and unintentional coopetition between firms and the public sector within the service industries by using Pyhä-Luosto tourism destination in Lapland, Finland, as a context of analysis. The analysis stresses, first, the challenging tension between cooperation, competition and coopetition in a tourism destination, and secondly, both strategically planned and unintended, more instinctive coopetition. In particular, the case illustrates interplay between public and private sectors, the relationship between strategic and operational levels of development work, and emphasises the role of the surrounding region in development.Coopetition Coopetition network Service industries Tourism destination Socio-cultural dynamics Public-private partnership Management practices Lapland