Abstract
Creative tourism experiences constitute clear examples of the experience economy principles. They address new tourists' necessities. They can activate tangible and intangible resources, contribute to the development of local skills while offering the chance to engage with the overall social agents of the tourism system addressing key tourism challenges of the 21st century. Over the past few years, surf tourism has aroused the interest of many people, and surf tourists are increasingly more experienced, demanding and seeking a wide range of engaging experiences. To connect surf tourism to creative tourism, the authors developed a model focused on a creative surf experience. The chapter presents several contributions to the development of creative experiences of surf tourism where surf destinations can focus on and develop a greater audience that searches for such experiences.
TopIntroduction
Experiences are prime manifestations of the experience economy (Geus et al., 2016), presenting themselves as activities that can surpass the conventional providing of services, by telling a story, while providing an ambience and engaging with the customer under new arguments by staging tourism experiences. The ‘experiential discourse’, in the late 90s, namely through Pine & Gilmore (1998, 1999), offering a new approach to the provision of services while seeking to respond in part to new stimuli, interests, profiles and desires that characterised the demand for services in cultural tourism (van der Ark & Richards, 2006). Here the well-known model of the four realms of Pine annd Gilmore (1998, 1999) provided a new mindset for the holistic approach to experience development.
Contemporary to the experience economy paradigm, the rise of the creative economy is reflective of the larger changes occurring within the global economy marked by the shift from economies based on the production of goods to economies based on the provision of services (Policy Research Group, 2013). Creativity was championed as the main intangible resource (e.g., ideas) for creating value depending on narrative, theming and performance (Richards, 2021).
Creative tourism is based on creativity and its relation to tourism, the specialised consumption as a characteristic of the postmodern tourist and the experience economy paradigm and co-creation (Carvalho et al., 2019). These theoretical underpinnings gain relevance in the present chapter, as creative experiences and co-creation are mandatory for the success of this tourism segment. Creative tourism corresponds to a form of cultural tourism (Ohridska-Olson & Ivanov, 2010; Richards, 2010) where the active involvement of the tourist is sought while developing an authentic and profound touristic experience, arguably, resulting in skill and creative development (Carvalho, 2014) based on the living culture of the destination where such experiences are developed (Cheng & Chen, 2021; Richards, 2011, 2021; Richards & Wilson, 2006, 2007).
Surf tourism can be defined as a type of tourism that includes travel having surfing as the main or secondary motivation, for surf practice or simply to enjoy/or observe the surf activity (e.g., surf events) (Reis, 2020). Thus, it includes practitioners, as well as all types of companions or other people who travel, among other aspects, to passively enjoy the surfing practice (Buckley, 2002; Dolnicar & Fluker, 2003; Martin & Assenov, 2012; Ponting & McDonald, 2013; Reis, 2020). Consequently, surf tourists can be seen as participating more actively or more passively.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Creative Experiences: New ways for tourists to engage in cultural experiences based on activities characteristic of the touristic destination where they are undertaken.
Surf Culture: Culture related to surfing, where participants share different values and ideas from the dominant culture.
Surf Tourist: A person who travels to a surf destination for a certain time to surf or appreciate the surf practice.
Surf Tourism: Type of tourism that includes travel by any person who has surfing as their main or secondary motivation, whether for active practice or simply to enjoy/observe the activity and/or participate in surf-related events.
Co-Creation: Process through which the customer participates in the production and consumption of products, services or experiences.
Creativity: Problem-solving strategy or innovation process used to design more engaging and memorable tourism experiences.
Surf Destination: Surfing tourist space, consisting of a set of attributes that interact with each other as a composite product.
Creative Tourism: Special interest tourism alternative to massive forms of cultural consumption of tourism, where the tourists can develop their creative capital through engaging with locals.