An exploratory study for Hurtigrutemuseet

Abstract

The global tourism industry has seen a rapid development for the last ten years, both eco-tourism and educational tourism has been, and still is, big parts in this. Museums has played the key role as the core of cultural production, creating and interpreting places where the universe is realized, understand and mediated (Fife as cited in Ramshaw, 2006, p.46). This thesis will focus on tourists' experience at Hurtigrutemuseet in Stokmarknes, based on tourists' perception and service evaluation of the museum (before, during, and after the visit). Tourists’ satisfaction has been generally used as an assessment tool for the evaluation of travel experiences, products and services offered at the destination (Bramwell, 1998; Ross & Iso Ahola, 1991). This gives researchers a navigation that in this study tourist’s experience is be examined by tourist’s satisfaction measurement. The aim of this study case is to understand how the performance of the provider (Hurtigrutemuseet) can impact tourists' experience. The economic aspect in this is not a part of this study case and will be disregarded throughout the paper.