The Role of Destination Management Organizations (DMOs) in Commercialization of Summer Tourism Products. New Challenges for Mountain Destinations in an Integrated and Global e-Market Place

Abstract

Having started to develop in the 19th century, mountain tourism has a very strong capital attraction for international tourist flow and represents approximately 15–20% of annual global tourism income (UNEP, 2007). Despite a huge variety of activity offers in numerous mountain destinations since the mid-1960s, summer tourism, unlike winter tourism, is stagnating (France Montagne, 2014; Nydegger, 2014). However, studies concerned with summer tourism development in mountain regions are rare. The paper presents the result of comparative study conducted between 2013, 2014 and in 2015 in 183 local and regional Destination Management Organizations (DMOs) operating in selected European and North American mountain areas in order to understand their role in the stimulation of summer tourism through various product commercialisation strategies.

Keywords

• summer mountain tourism
• Destination Management Organizations (DMOs)
• e-tourism market