Behaviors and Needs of Wellness Tourists in Phuket, Thailand: A Study of Middle Eastern Tourists

Abstract

COVID-19 pandemic has had significant impact on various business sectors over the past few years, especially on hospitality and tourism business. It is necessary for businesses to redesign their products and services to satisfy tourists’ needs and trends. Phuket’s tourism has begun to focus and revitalize by embracing the ‘wellness tourism’ for sustainable growth; and promoting Phuket as a ‘world wellness’ travel destination. This research aims to study the behaviors and needs of wellness tourism in Phuket, emphasizing on Middle Eastern wellness tourists. A ‘purposive sampling’ was created as a sampling technique for this study. The number of participants used in this sample was 78 tourists from ten Middle East countries.

Overall, the majority (37.18%) was from Kuwait, another 19.23% was from Bahrain, and 8,97% was from Egypt and Turkey. The results of the study showed that most of the respondents (56.41%) spent between THB2,000-4,000 per day; excluding the transportation costs. The destination’s qualities; namely beach attractions, was the main factor influencing Middle East tourists’ choice of destination (22.28%). With choice of activities; the most attractive for activities was to live a ‘healthy lifestyle’ with emphasis on exercise and fitness (92.31%) and massage therapy (82.05%). They also valued natural beauty attractions (x̄ = 4.56), good weather (x̄ = 4.53), and child-friendly accommodations (x̄ = 4.44). This research is crucial for understanding tourist behavior which helps businesses adapt their business strategies by identifying preferences and creating targeted market to attract specific demographics, especially among middle eastern tourists.