Journal of Travel Research http://jtr.sagepub.

com/

Jazz Festival Visitors and Their Expenditures: Linking Spending Patterns to Musical Interest
Christer Thrane
Journal of Travel Research 2002 40: 281
DOI: 10.1177/0047287502040003006

The online version of this article can be found at:

http://jtr.sagepub.com/content/40/3/281

Published by:

http://www.sagepublications.com

On behalf of:

Travel and Tourism Research Association

Additional services and information for Journal of Travel Research can be found at:

Email Alerts: http://jtr.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts

Subscriptions: http://jtr.sagepub.com/subscriptions

Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav

Permissions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav

Citations: http://jtr.sagepub.com/content/40/3/281.refs.html

>> Version of Record - Feb 1, 2002

What is This?

Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
FEBRUARY
JOURNAL OF2002
TRAVEL RESEARCH
Jazz Festival Visitors and Their
Expenditures: Linking Spending
Patterns to Musical Interest
CHRISTER THRANE
This research focused on the relationship between visi-
tors’ interest in jazz music as a motive for attending a jazz
music festival and their subsequent personal expenditures
during the festival. In addition, the study examined how a
number of other factors influenced the spending behavior at
the festival. The results show that people who are more inter-
ested in jazz music spend more money during the festival
than those who are less interested. The tentative explanation
suggested for this relationship is that those very interested in
jazz music spend more money on concerts and other ar-
rangements. The results also reveal that, among other things,
length of stay, respondents’ geographical location, house-
hold income, and household size affect the amount of per-
sonal expenditures during the festival. Finally, some outlines
for future research are suggested, and the results’ implica-
tions for festival managers are briefly discussed.
Prior research has shown that tourism expenditures depend
on a number of factors. For example, purpose of trip, travel
party size, length of stay, type of travel activities participated
in, and sociodemographic characteristics all appear to corre-
late with tourism expenditures (Leones, Colby, and Crandall
1998; Mak, Moncur, and Yonamine 1977; Pizam and Reichel
1979; Spotts and Mahoney 1991). The purpose of this study
is to extend the literature by examining, within a festival con-
text, if and how tourism expenditures are related to tourism
motives. In this respect, however, the study will also shed
light on how other factors influence spending behavior at
festivals.
Festivals or special events recently have been considered
as one of the fastest growing types of tourism attractions
(Crompton and McKay 1997; Getz 1997). Reviewing the
research on this topic, two quite different lines of research
have received most of the attention from scholars: (1) the
economic impact of festivals and special events and (2) the
reasons or motives people have for visiting these attractions.
Regarding the former, the supposed beneficial economic
impact on the host community surrounding the festival area
due to visitor expenditures is one of the most important rea-
sons for arranging a festival in the first place (Crompton and
McKay 1994; Gartner and Holecek 1983; Kim et al. 1998;
Walo, Bull, and Breen 1996; Uysal and Gitelson 1994). As to
the latter, research shows that visitors to the same festival
tend to differ in their motives for attendance (Backman et al.
1995; Crompton and McKay 1997; Formica and Uysal 1996;
Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
Mohr et al. 1993; Schneider and Backman 1996; Scott 1996;
Uysal, Gahan, and Martin 1993).
This study links these two separate strands of research by
examining how visitors’ motives for attending a festival
affect their subsequent personal expenditures during the fes-
tival. So far, no tourism studies have attempted to relate
spending behavior to the motives for tourism. In a way, this is
surprising since in previous research on a number of occa-
sions, tourism motives have been linked to both tourism atti-
tudes and behaviors as well as sociodemographic character-
istics (see Mansfeld 1992 for a review).
PURPOSE OF STUDY
The purpose of this study is to explore the potential utility
of segmenting festival visitor expenditures according to the
motives visitors have for attending a festival and a number of
other factors. To meet this goal, the empirical approach fol-
lowed differs from previous festival research in two impor-
tant ways. First, this study investigates the differentiation in
expenditures made by different festival visitors and does not
attempt to estimate the overall economic impact made by vis-
itor expenditures. Second, this study is limited in the sense
that it focuses on how one particular motive for attending a
festival affects personal expenditures.
The research reported in this study was conducted at a
jazz music festival in Norway (Kongsberg Jazz Festival). On
the basis of the festival motivation literature as well as com-
mon knowledge, it was expected that general interest in jazz
music would be an important motive for attending the festi-
val. The theoretical rationale for how interest in jazz music
may be an important explanatory variable for personal expen-
ditures is that those visitors interested in jazz music will go to
more concerts than those who are less interested, and, as a
consequence of this, they will spend more money on admis-
sion fees and so forth. This, in turn, will entail that their over-
all personal expenditure during the festival will be greater
Christer Thrane is an associate professor of Sociology in the
Faculty of Tourism and Applied Social Science at Lillehammer Col-
lege in Norway. An earlier version of this article was presented at
the 8th Nordic Tourism Research Conference. The author wishes to
thank Hugo Birkelund, Hans Holmengen, Jo Kleiven, and Kreg
Lindberg for comments on previous drafts of the article.
Journal of Travel Research, Vol. 40, February 2002, 281-286
© 2002 Sage Publications
282 FEBRUARY 2002
(Hypothesis 1a). On the other hand, it is also conceivable that
visitors less interested in jazz music will spend more money
on issues other than concerts than those who are extremely
interested in jazz (e.g., on dining out, shopping, and drink-
ing). Thus, this perhaps equally plausible alternative propo-
sition can be considered as a rival hypothesis (Hypothesis
1b).
Any conclusion about the relationship between jazz music
interest as a motive for attending a jazz music festival and
subsequent personal expenditures is incomplete and partial
without considering other possible influences on personal
expenditures. That is, a number of other factors could possi-
bly confound, mediate, or moderate the relationship between
the motive in question and personal expenditures. Further-
more, these factors could also influence spending behavior in
a direct manner. The factors considered accordingly in this
study are discussed below.
Prior research on tourism expenditures has suggested that
length of stay at a destination is positively related to expendi-
tures (cf. Spotts and Mahoney 1991 and the literature cited
therein). Thus, the longer visitors stay at the festival, the
more money they will spend, all else being equal. Research
has also shown that the distance traveled to visit tourist
attractions affects expenditures positively (Leones, Colby,
and Crandall 1998; Long and Perdue 1990). Hence, it is to be
expected that visitors living farther away from the festival
area will spend more money than local people. A number of
tourism studies have documented that household income has
a positive influence on tourism expenditures in general (Asgary
et al. 1997; Cai, Hong, and Morrison 1995; Fish and Waggle
1996; Long and Perdue 1990; Taylor, Fletcher, and Clabaugh
1993; Tierney 1993). For this reason, higher household
income should be associated with higher expenditures during
the festival. Finally, a number of studies in the tourism litera-
ture have also considered the effect of family size/size of
travel party on expenditures (Fish and Waggle 1996; Mak,
Moncur, and Yonamine 1977; Spotts and Mahoney 1991;
Taylor, Fletcher, and Clabaugh 1993). Since evidence is
equivocal regarding the direction of the effects of these vari-
ables that are often highly correlated, no specific proposition
is suggested. A number of other factors influencing tourist
behavior (and expenditures) have, to varying extents, been
used in the tourism literature. Of these, the following are con-
sidered in this study: gender, if this year’s visit is for the first
time, planning horizon (when one made the decision to
attend the festival), age, work status, and if the interview took
place during the weekend.
In summary, the primary purpose of this article is to
assess the impact of music interest as a motive for attending a
jazz festival on spending behavior during the festival. In
addition, the article will also scrutinize how jazz festival
expenditures are influenced by the factors considered above.
METHOD
Setting and Sample
Kongsberg Jazz Festival is one of the largest in Norway
and has taken place annually at the beginning of July for
nearly 35 years. In 1997, about 10,000 tickets were sold for
the various concerts arranged during the 4-day period of the
festival (Wednesday to Saturday). In 1997, a visitor survey
Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
covering a broad range of topics was also conducted. This
survey consisted of a personal face-to-face interview and a
self-administered questionnaire. Twenty-five trained students
from Lillehammer College carried out the personal inter-
views according to an intercept approach, distributing the
questionnaires at the end of the personal interviews. The
interviews took place on several locations throughout the
city of Kongsberg. However, they were generally conducted
in the concert areas and in the closed street where the festival
visitors gathered between the various concerts and other
arrangements—the area known as “The Festival Street.”
Adult visitors were randomly selected as they entered or
departed from these areas and when they were sitting down
and relaxing in The Festival Street. The screening question,
“Do you have a ticket to at least one concert during the festi-
val?” ensured that only real festival visitors were included in
the sample. A total of 1,061 usable interviews were obtained
during the 4-day period, of which 65% were collected on Fri-
day and Saturday.
Measures
Personal expenditures were measured by asking respon-
dents to estimate how much they spent during the festival
(not including travel expenses, if any), divided by the num-
ber of persons they were paying for (78% paid for themselves
only; 15% paid for two persons; 7% paid for three or more
persons). Jazz music interest was measured as the response to
three questions: “The reason that I attend this year’s festival
is: (1) that jazz music is my main interest during leisure time;
(2) the music only; and (3) that this year’s artists have a spe-
cial appeal to me.” Responses to each question were coded
from 1 to 5 (1 = disagree, 2 = partially disagree, 3 = neutral,
4 = partially agree, and 5 = agree). The alpha reliability of
the resulting summated index (mean value = 8.28) was .66,
which was considered as satisfactory given its exploratory
character and the fact that it comprised only three items.
Length of stay was measured in number of days. Respon-
dents’ geographical location, a proxy for distance traveled,
was measured using a three-group nominal variable, coded
as two dummy variables. The respondents living within the
municipality of Kongsberg were classified as locals (the ref-
erence category). In contrast, the respondents living outside
the municipality of Kongsberg and who traveled back and
forth to the festival every day were considered as regionalists,
while the tourists differed from regionalists by also spending
the nights in Kongsberg. Household income was coded as
class midpoints using a 12-point ordinal variable, and house-
hold size was a continuous variable. Gender was coded 1 for
males and 0 for females. First visit was a dummy variable (1
= yes, 0 = no), and planning horizon was measured as the
response to the question, “When did you decide to attend the
festival?” Possible responses to this question were (coding in
parentheses) less than 14 days ago (0), 15 days to 1 month
ago (1), 1 to 3 months ago (2), 3 months to 1 year ago (3).
Age was coded as class midpoints using a 5-point ordinal
variable, and work status was a dummy variable (1 = work
full-time; 0 = otherwise). Finally, weekend interview was
coded 1 if the interview took place during Friday or Saturday
and 0 if on Wednesday or Thursday. The means, standard
deviations, and ranges associated with the study variables are
reported in Table 1.
 JOURNAL OF TRAVEL RESEARCH 283

TABLE 1 log Expi = a + bYi + ei,

MEANS, STANDARD DEVIATIONS, AND RANGES
ASSOCIATED WITH STUDY VARIABLES and model 2 and model 3 were specified as

Standard log Expi = a + bYi + Σ cjXij + ei,

Variable Mean Deviation Range Percentage
where
Personal
expenditures 975.83 874.67 33-6,500
Log personal Expi = overall expenditures of person i,
expenditures 6.52 0.88 3.50-8.77 Yi = jazz music interest of person i,
Music motive 8.28 2.85 3-15 Xij = other independent variables pertaining to person i
Length of stay 2.97 1.06 1-4 (length of stay, geographical location, household income,
Planning horizon 1.82 1.30 0-3 and household size in model 2; length of stay, geographical
Household size 2.73 1.33 1-5 location, household income, household size, gender, first
Household visit, planning horizon, age, work full-time, and weekend in-
Income terview in model 3), and
(× 1,000) 296.88 194.93 50-650 ei = error term.
Age 35.39 11.85 20-60
Gender (female = reference)
Male 55.4
Female 44.6 RESULTS
First visit (no = reference)
Yes 28.7 On average, the visitors at the festival spent 975 Norwe-
No 71.3 gian crowns or about $122 per person during the festival (see
Work full-time (no = reference)
Table 1). According to model 1 in Table 2, visitors who
Yes 62.2
No 37.8 reported that musical interest was a very important motive
Weekend interview (no = reference) for attending the festival spent more money than those who
Yes 65.3 considered the musical motive to be of lesser importance.
No 34.7 The range of the jazz music motive index (3 to 15) and the
Geographical location (locals = reference) magnitude of its coefficient suggested that a 1-unit increase
Tourists 36.5 in motivation was associated with a 5% increase in personal
Regionalists 14.7 expenditures. In other words, visitors who scored, say, 13 on
Locals 48.7 the motive index spent 54% more money on average during
Note: Number of observations = 1,012-1,061. the festival than visitors who scored 3 (.054 × 10 = .54). Note,
however, that the explained variance according to model 1 is
small, suggesting that other factors should be taken into
account when predicting personal expenditures. Overall, though,
model 1 is highly significant (F value = 30.31; df = 1; p <
Analyses .00001). (The Pearson correlation coefficient between the
motive index and expenditures is .184; p < .00001.)
Ordinary least squares (OLS) regression analysis was
In model 2 in Table 2, length of stay, geographical loca-
used to estimate the three main models considered in this tion, household income, and household size are added to the
study. Both linear and semilogarithmic functional forms were regression equation. The first thing to note about this model
examined, and the latter proved superior throughout. In fact, the is the expected increase in explanatory power compared to
semiloga- rithmic specification of the models showed no sign model 1. Second, all coefficients have signs as expected
of hetero- scedasticity according to the Cook-Weisberg test according to the suggested propositions. In addition, house-
(Cook and Weisberg 1983), whereas the linear specifications hold size has a negative impact on personal expenditures.
clearly did. In model 3, the remaining factors are added to the regres-
In general, semilogarithmic regression estimates can be sion equation. In general, the introduction of these did not
interpreted as the percentage change in the dependent vari- alter the findings from model 2. However, it should be noted
able associated with a one-unit increase in the independent that the difference between the regionalists and the locals
variable. Unfortunately, dummy coefficients (and large coef- was reduced once these factors were controlled for. In more
detail, the results of model 3 in Table 2 suggest that staying 1
ficients in general) do not permit such a straightforward
more day at the festival on average meant an increase in per-
interpretation. Following Halvorsen and Palmquist (1980), sonal expenditures by 24%, ceteris paribus [exp. (.213) – 1 =
the percentage difference between the characteristic of inter- .237]. In a similar fashion, the regionalists spent 18% more
est and the reference category is obtained by taking the money during the festival than the locals [exp. (.165) – 1 =
antilog of the coefficient minus 1. .179], while the tourists spent 73% more than locals [exp.
In model 1 in Table 2, the log of personal expenditures is (.547) – 1 = .728]. Note also that the tourists on average spent
regressed on the jazz music motive index only; in model 2, 47% more money during the festival than regionalists [exp
the theoretically informed explanatory factors previously (.547 – .165) – 1 = .465] and that the 95% confidence interval
discussed are added to model 1; and in model 3, the remain- for the coefficients for regionalists and tourists did not over-
ing factors are added to model 2. Formally, model 1 was lap.1 Household income had a small though highly signifi-
specified as cant positive impact on expenditures, indicating that visitors
Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
284 FEBRUARY 2002

TABLE 2
EFFECTS ON THE LOGARITHM OF PERSONAL EXPENDITURES: MULTIPLE REGRESSION RESULTS

Variable Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

Music motive .054 (.009)*** .037 (.009)*** .030 (.008)***
Length of stay .231 (.025)*** .213 (.026)***
Regionalists .245 (.082)** .165 (.080)*
Tourists .620 (.058)*** .547 (.061)***
Household incomea .007 (.001)*** .005 (.001)***
Household size –.135 (.019)*** –.125 (.019)***
Male .226 (.050)***
First visit .105 (.063)
Planning horizon .120 (.020)***
Age –.006 (.002)**
Work full-time .241 (.059)***
Weekend interview .103 (.054)
Constant 6.07 (.087)*** 5.40 (.133)*** 5.22 (.158)***
Adjusted R 2 .029*** .225*** .285***
F value for change in R 2 49.25 14.32
Degrees of freedom (numerator/denominator) 5/950 6/944
p value for change in R 2 ≤ .0001 ≤ .0001
Note: Unstandardized ordinary least squares regression coefficients; number of observations = 957. Standard errors are in pa-
rentheses. Owing to space limitations, the t statistics (the coefficients divided by their standard errors) are not shown.
a. Coefficient multiplied by 10,000.
*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

from affluent households spent more money than less afflu-
ent visitors. Also, as household size increased by one unit (or
one household member), expenditures decreased by 13%
[exp. (–.125) – 1 = –.133]. Furthermore, male visitors spent
25% more money during the festival than females [exp.
(.226) – 1 = .253], older visitors spent more than younger
ones, and visitors who worked full-time spent more than
those who did not. Likewise, visitors who decided to attend
the festival a long time in advance spent more money than
those who decided to attend more recently. Finally, the effect
of the jazz music motive index was reduced by 44% once
adjusted for the all the factors in model 3 [1 – (.030/.054) =
.444]. Yet, this motive index still had a significant, direct
effect on personal expenditures. In other words, a 10-point
increase in the motive index was associated with a 30%
increase in personal expenditures, ceteris paribus.2
The reduced effect of the music motive when comparing
model 1 with models 2 and 3 in Table 2 suggests that some of
the motive’s effect on expenditures is mediated through the
other factors in the multivariate model. However, this effect
reduction could also reflect that some of these factors were
determinants of the motive index. To examine the latter pos-
sibility, the motive index was regressed on the remaining fac-
tors in model 3 in Table 2 (results not shown). The results
here showed that, in particular, location, planning horizon,
and age had a significant (p < .00001) impact on the motive
index (bregionalists = 1.41, btourists = 1.33, bplanning horizon= .324, bage=
.033, adjusted R2 = .085). In sum, these findings suggested
that about 44% of the bivariate association between jazz
music interest as a motive for attending the festival and per-
sonal expenditures was attributable to whether visitors were
locals, regionalists, or tourists and to planning horizon and
age.3
Like most expenditure data, the data considered here
were characterized by huge variations in personal expendi-
tures. To examine whether the influence of outliers had any
distorting effects on the reported results, both median regres-
sion and robust regression were performed in addition to the
Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
reported OLS analyses. Both of these strategies confirmed
the overall patterns described above, although some of the
coefficients were slightly changed. Furthermore, no variance
inflation scores exceeded 1.48, suggesting that collinearity
among the independent variables was not a problem (Chatterjee
and Price 1991).
To shed some additional light on the factors determining
the personal expenditures during the festival, the spending
variable was further dichotomized into big spenders and low
spenders and regressed (in a logistic fashion) on the factors in
model 3 in Table 2.4 The results appear in Table 3. As can be
seen, the results by and large mirror the results in Table 2. For
example, the more important musical interest was as a motive
for attending the festival, the more likely a respondent would
be classified as a big spender. In a similar fashion, staying
longer at the festival, higher household income, and deciding
to attend a long time in advance increased the likelihood of
being a big spender. Finally, especially tourists, men, and
full-time workers, as opposed to their respective reference
categories, were more typically big spenders. Since logistic
regression coefficients have no intuitive metric, the final col-
umn in Table 3 reports so-called first differences (King
1989). This measure captures the greatest possible difference
that each variable could make, that is, the change or differ-
ence between the lowest and highest values for each inde-
pendent variable, holding the other independent variables
constant at their means. In other words, respondents who
scored 15 on the jazz music motive index were 35% more
likely than those who scored 3 to be classified as big spend-
ers. Likewise, tourists reported a 36% higher probability than
locals of being big spenders.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The tourism literature has a long tradition of relating
travel expenditures to various trip characteristics and socio-
 JOURNAL OF TRAVEL RESEARCH 285

TABLE 3
EFFECTS ON THE PROBABILITY OF BEING CLASSIFIED AS A BIG SPENDER:
MULTIPLE LOGISTIC REGRESSION RESULTS

Variable Parameter Estimate Standard Error z Statistics First Differencea

Music motive .123 .028 4.33*** .349
Length of stay .558 .087 6.36*** .367
Regionalists .541 .256 2.11* .133
Tourists 1.51 .194 7.81*** .361
Household incomeb .011 .004 2.58** .165
Household size –.301 .062 –4.81*** –.281
Male .572 .159 3.59*** .137
First visit .480 .201 2.38** .117
Planning horizon .408 .068 5.99*** .282
Age –.014 .007 –1.90 –.135
Work full-time .667 .186 3.57*** .155
Weekend interview .368 .171 2.14* .088
Constant –4.53 .540 –8.40***
Note: Unstandardized logistic regression coefficients; number of observations = 957; pseudo R 2 = .218.
a. The entries are the difference in probability of being classified as a big spender between the maximum and minimum value for
each variable (0/1 for dummies), holding the other independent variables constant at their means.
b. Coefficient multiplied by 10,000.
*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

demographic variables. This research extends previous work
by connecting spending behavior to another important field
of tourism research, that is, tourism motives. Using data from
a survey conducted at a jazz music festival in Norway, this
study primarily has attempted to examine the relationship
between jazz music interest as a motive for attending the fes-
tival and subsequent personal expenditures during the festi-
val. It was hypothesized that this relationship would be posi-
tive (Hypothesis 1a), reflecting that visitors more interested
in jazz music would spend more money on admission fees to
concerts and other arrangements. The empirical results, using
semilogarithmic OLS regression analysis, supported this claim,
as a one-unit increase in the index measuring jazz music
interest (a scale ranging from 3 to 15) was associated with an
overall 5% increase in personal expenditures.
To get a more correct estimate of the direct effect of this
motive index on expenditures, more complex regression mod-
els adjusting for length of stay, geographical location, house-
hold income, household size, gender, first visit, planning
horizon, age, work status, and weekend interview were also
carried out. In sum, the results of these models revealed that
the effect of the jazz music motive index on personal expen-
ditures was reduced by 44% once adjusted for the factors in
the most comprehensive regression. That is, ceteris paribus, a
one-unit increase in the jazz music motive index ranging
from 3 to 15 was associated with a 3% increase in personal
expenditures. Furthermore, this analysis showed that the
regionalists and the tourists, as expected, spent more money
than the locals during the festival and that length of stay and
household income, both as expected, affected personal expen-
ditures in a positive way. Household size had a negative
impact on personal expenditures. Finally, male visitors and
visitors working full-time spent more money during the festi-
val than female visitors and visitors not working full-time,
and aging and deciding to attend the festival a short time in
advance were associated with smaller expenditures.
As an alternative approach, the expenditures variable was
also dichotomized into big spenders and low spenders and
logistically regressed on the above-mentioned factors. The
results here supported and strengthened the conclusions drawn
Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
from the OLS procedures, as respondents very motivated by
a jazz music interest were clearly more likely to be classified
as big spenders than those less motivated. Further analyses
also revealed that, to some extent, the association between
the jazz music motive index and spending behavior during
the festival was due to the higher scoring on the motive index
by regionalists, tourists, those who decided to attend the fes-
tival a long time in advance, and older people.
IMPLICATIONS AND LIMITATIONS
The above results have a number of implications. From a
theoretical point of view, they illustrate that a subjective phe-
nomenon such as a motive could be used as one of the predic-
tors of the more “objective” phenomenon, expenditures. It
must be stressed, however, that more research is needed on
the possible links between motives and spending behavior
before any more definite conclusions regarding the relation-
ship between these variables can be drawn. Questions that
need to be addressed, and which also point to the limitations
of the present study, concern for example, the “explanatory
status” of motives. Are they causal predictors, or are they just
reflections of nonmeasured behavior, such as, in the present
context, number of tickets purchased? Furthermore, future
research should also pay more direct attention to the mea-
surement of expenditures and perhaps distinguish between
expenditures on different types of products and service cate-
gories. Finally, other motives than the one investigated in
this research should be considered.
In addition to the positive association between jazz music
interest and expenditures, the results of this study show that a
few independent variables can explain, in a statistical sense,
a moderate amount of variance in spending behavior at a jazz
music festival. This may have important implications for fes-
tival managers trying to develop profitable marketing strate-
gies. For example, to festival managers, some visitors are
probably more important than others in the sense that they
spend more money—by using more money on accommo-
286 FEBRUARY 2002
dation, buying more concert tickets, eating and drinking
more often in restaurants, and so on. In this way, prediction is
probably more important than explanation. From a purely
economic perspective, one could, for example, argue that a
justifiable strategy would be to try to attract more big spend-
ers at the expense of (or in addition to) the low spenders. To
do so, however, requires that one is able to precisely pinpoint
the exact characteristics of the big spenders at festivals. The
results of this study might be of help in this respect. Other
than pointing to a number of the big spenders’ objective char-
acteristics, the results of this study suggest that a festival’s
“theme,” that is, jazz music, could be used in promotion and
other market communication efforts to attract more big spend-
ers to the festival. However, the other factors considered in
the study may be equally or more important in this regard.
For example, getting people to stay longer at the festival,
attracting more tourists and affluent people, as well as people
who plan to visit the festival a long time in advance, will per-
haps achieve the same goal more efficiently. Needless to say,
however, more research on other types of festival is needed
to verify that the segmentation approach adopted in this
study is viable for all types of festivals, or at least for most of
them.
NOTES
1. Similar results were obtained when the dummy variable
“travel distance to the festival” (a 1-hour drive or more = 1, other-
wise 0) was substituted with “geographical location.” That is, peo-
ple who traveled more than 1 hour to attend the festival spent more
money than those who did not. However, since the reported model
yielded a higher R2 and travel distance could not enter into this re-
gression model equation without causing collinearity problems, it
was not included in the analysis.
2. It should be noted that although attending a festival in the lit-
erature is generally regarded as tourism, most festival visitors tend
to be local people (Getz 1997). This was also the case in this re-
search (see Table 1). Consequently, since local people’s festival at-
tendance does not involve travel or staying away from home, their
motives for attending should be considered as leisure motives and
not as tourism motives. However, since this distinction had no bear-
ing on the results of this study, that is, the same results were ob-
tained when the locals were excluded from the analyses, the use of
the term “tourism motive” seems justified.
3. Another possibility is that some of the factors introduced in
models 2 and 3 in Table 2 moderate the relationship between the
music motive index and personal expenditures. To explore such a
scenario, all product terms involving the music motive index and
the remaining factors were added to the regression reported in
model 3 in Table 2. None of these interaction terms reached statisti-
cal significance, however, implying that the factors considered did
not moderate the relationship between the motive index and
expenditures.
4. People were classified as big spenders (coded 1) when their
expenditures equaled or exceeded 1,000 Norwegian crowns (44%
of the sample) and as low spenders (coded 0) if their expenditures
were less than this value (56% of the sample).
Downloaded from jtr.sagepub.com at Cape Breton University Library on February 15, 2013
REFERENCES
Asgary, N., G. De Los Santos, V. Vincent, and V. Davila (1997). “The De-
terminants of Expenditures by Mexican Visitors to the Border of
Texas.” Tourism Economics, 3 (4): 319-28.
Backman, K. F., S. J. Backman, M. Uysal, and K. Mohr Sunshine (1995).
“Event Tourism: An Examination of Motivations and Activities.” Fes-
tival Management & Event Tourism, 3 (1): 15-24.
Cai, L. A., G.-S. Hong, and A. M. Morrison (1995). “Household Expendi-
ture Patterns for Tourism Products and Services.” Journal of Travel &
Tourism Marketing, 4 (4): 15-40.
Chatterjee, S., and B. Price (1991). Regression Analysis by Example. 2d ed.
New York: John Wiley.
Cook, R. D., and S. Weisberg (1983). “Diagnostics for Heteroscedasticity in
Regression.” Biometrica, 38: 159-78.
Crompton, J. L., and S. L. McKay (1994). “Measuring the Economic Impact
of Festivals and Events: Some Myths, Misapplications and Ethical Di-
lemmas.” Festival Management & Event Tourism, 2 (1): 33-43.
⎯⎯⎯ (1997). “Motives of Visitors Attending Festival Events.” Annals of
Tourism Research, 24 (2): 425-39.
Fish, M., and D. Waggle (1996). “Current Income versus Total Expenditure
Measures in Regression Models of Vacation and Pleasure Travel.”
Journal of Travel Research, 35 (2): 70-74.
Formica, S., and M. Uysal (1996). “A Market Segmentation of Festival Visi-
tors: Umbra Jazz Festival in Italy.” Festival Management & Event
Tourism, 3 (4): 175-82.
Gartner, W. C., and D. F. Holecek (1983). “Economic Impact of an Annual
Tourism Industry Exposition.” Annals of Tourism Research, 10 (2):
199-212.
Getz, D. (1997). Event Management & Event Tourism. New York: Cogni-
zant Communication.
Halvorsen, R., and R. Palmquist (1980). “The Interpretation of Dummy
Variables in Semilogarithmic Equations.” American Economic Re-
view, 70: 474-75.
Kim, C., D. Scott, J. F. Thigpen, and S. S. Kim (1998). “Economic Impact of
a Birding Festival.” Festival Management & Event Tourism, 5 (1/2):
51-58.
King, G. (1989). Unifying Political Methodology: The Likelihood Theory of
Statistical Inference. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Leones, J., B. Colby, and K. Crandall (1998). “Tracking Expenditures of the
Elusive Nature Tourists of Southeastern Arizona.” Journal of Travel
Research, 36 (3): 56-64.
Long, P. T., and R. R. Perdue (1990). “The Economic Impact of Rural Festi-
vals and Special Events: Assessing the Spatial Distribution of Expen-
ditures.” Journal of Travel Research, 28 (4): 10-14.
Mak, J., J. Moncur, and D. Yonamine (1977). “How or How Not to Measure
Visitor Expenditures.” Journal of Travel Research, 16 (1): 1-4.
Mansfeld, J. (1992). “From Motivation to Actual Travel.” Annals of Tour-
ism Research, 19 (3): 399-419.
Mohr, K., K. F. Backman, L. W. Gahan, and S. Backman (1993). “An Inves-
tigation of Festival Motivations and Event Satisfaction by Visitor
Type.” Festival Management & Event Tourism, 1 (1): 89-97.
Pizam, A., and A. Reichel (1979). “Big Spenders and Little Spenders in U.S.
Tourism.” Journal of Travel Research, 18 (1): 42-43.
Schneider, I. E., and S. J. Backman (1996). “Cross-Cultural Equivalence of
Festival Motivations: A Study in Jordan.” Festival Management &
Event Tourism, 4 (3/4): 139-44.
Scott, D. (1996). “A Comparison of Visitors’ Motivations to Attend Three
Urban Festivals.” Festival Management & Event Tourism, 3 (3):
121-28.
Spotts, D. M., and E. M. Mahoney (1991). “Segmenting Visitors to a Desti-
nation Region Based on the Volume of Their Expenditures.” Journal
of Travel Research, 29 (4): 24-31.
Taylor, D. T., T. Fletcher, and R. R. Clabaugh (1993). “A Comparison of
Characteristics, Regional Expenditures, and Economic Impact of Visi-
tors to Historical Sites with Other Recreational Visitors.” Journal of
Travel Research, 32 (1): 30-35.
Tierney, P. T. (1993). “The Influence of State Traveler Information Centers
on Tourist Length of Stay and Expenditures.” Journal of Travel Re-
search, 31 (3): 28-32.
Uysal, M., L. Gahan, and M. Martin (1993). “An Examination of Event Mo-
tivations: A Case Study.” Festival Management & Event Tourism, 1
(1): 5-10.
Uysal, M., and R. Gitelson (1994). “Assessment of Economic Impacts: Fes-
tivals and Special Events.” Festival Management & Event Tourism, 2
(1): 3-9.
Walo, M., A. Bull, and H. Breen (1996). “Achieving Economic Benefits at
Local Events: A Case Study of a Local Sport Event.” Festival Man-
agement & Event Tourism, 3 (3/4): 96-106.