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Introduction
Tourism increasingly constitutes a central component of the world economy, being one of the main income sources for developed and many developing countries (Inkson and Minnaert, 2012; Mason, 2015; Costa, 2017). The contemporary tourism and hospitality market offers a range of cultural, social, technological, natural experiences and products for leisure and business, being a solid base for sustainable development in many regions all over the world (World Travel and Tourism Council, 2016). However, to harvest these positive effects, “a lot of different resources and competencies are needed to provide tourists with a combination of experiences, and, thus, to make a destination attractive” (Sheresheva and Kopiski, 2016, p. 261).
The year 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development, and it focused on the theme of “well-designed and well managed tourism” (UNWTO/WTCF, 2018, p. 11). It can be argued that any country that aims to gain and maintain competitiveness in the global tourism market should pay special attention to sustainability issues and management practices (Farmaki, 2015; Mowforth and Munt, 2015; Edgell, 2016). It is also important to take into account major global trends in tourism that are effecting both management and consumers. Governments and tourism business actors have to deal with digitalization, technology with a focus on robotics and artificial intelligence, big data analytics, the sharing economy, social media and online communities, and all other results of rapidly advancing technologies that impact on “how consumers evaluate, use and discuss hospitality and tourism products” (Bowen and Whalen, 2017, p. 592).
There is a major shift underway in consumer preferences, travel modes and choice of destinations. For example, the recent UNWTO Research (UNWTO/WTCF, 2018) indicates that the volume of tourism demand for city destinations has increased by approximately 50 per cent worldwide in the past decade. At the same time, due to the excessive number of tourists in most popular cities, travelers increasingly look for new destinations. There is growing interest among travelers in visiting “wild places” for ethical and authentic experiences in adventure tourism (Patterson, 2015; Gunter, 2017; Rickly and Vidon, 2017). Wellness tourism is also a steadily growing segment (Stará and Peterson, 2017), and gastronomic tourism is assuming more importance too (Björk and Kauppinen-Räisänen, 2014; Gheorghe et al., 2014). Every...