Tourism and recurring sport events: Event tourists’ and regular tourists’ profiles and expenditures at the Windsurf World Cup on Sylt

Both groups are profiled in terms of travel-related and socio-demographic characteristics. Furthermore, the purpose of this paper is to address determinants of spending for each spectator group. Data collection was conducted using an on-site questionnaire. Analysis of variance between profile characteristics is based on χ² and Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney tests, whereas the analysis of determinants of spending builds on the Tobit model.

Recurring sport events that do not count among the mega sport event category have become a popular means of attracting tourists to a destination. Thus, research on different spectator groups attending such events is very relevant, yet surprisingly scarce. This study helps filling this void by a comparative analysis of two types of spectators present at the Professional Windsurf Association Windsurf World Cup on the German island of Sylt: travellers who come to Sylt solely for the event (event tourists) and travellers whose motivation to visit the island was not primarily driven by the event (regular tourists).

The results show that the two examined groups are clearly distinguishable, both in terms of profile characteristics and determinants of spending. This indicates that specific strategies seem advisable for sport event and tourism destination managers at mature tourist destinations.

The study’s major contribution to both tourism and event management literature is that it exposes key characteristics of and differences between both groups within a specific setting at a non-mega sport event at a mature tourist destination.