Destination attributes that attract international tourists to Cape Town

Abstract

The purpose of this study is twofold. The first purpose is to identify Cape Town’s important destination attributes. Secondly one needs to examine how and to what extent Cape Town’s important destination attributes impact on international tourists’ decision on choosing Cape Town as their destination. A proposed model was formulated and it postulates that international tourists’ perception of Cape Town’s important attributes impacts on their decision making in three ways: (1) directly; (2) it impacts on Cape Town’s overall image, and in turn, influences their decision; (3) it also impacts on the international tourists’ overall satisfaction with their trip to Cape Town, and in turn, influences their own or their peripheral people’s future decision on destination selection. Ten of Cape Town’s important destination attributes were identified based on a triangulation approach prior to the research. A structured questionnaire was used to examine how and to what extent these important attributes impact on international tourists’ decision, along with the aforementioned “three ways’ influences”. Three hundred and fifty (350) international tourists, awaiting their departure in the boarding area of the Cape Town International Airport were selected as the sample. The valid data collected was computed by means of the SPSS to test the hypotheses, which were formulated according to the “three ways’ influences”. The results show that, while each of the ten Cape Town’s attributes was important for the destination-unrestricted international tourists to choose Cape Town as their destination, the ten Cape Town’s attributes were not serious concern in the destination-restricted international tourist’ decision on destination selection. The results also show that, the ten Cape Town’s attributes revealed different importance levels in influencing tourists’ destination decision making, formation of Cape Town’s overall image, and the tourists’ satisfaction level with their trip to Cape Town. Some attributes were more important than others.