The marketing value of sustainability in Europe, as seen by tourism developers-An exploratory approach to Portuguese tourism precincts

Abstract

Tourism precincts have a very relevant territorial presence in areas with the most valued landscape features, both scenic and ecological lato sensu. The rationale of their development is allocating a business value to those very same features. The design of territorial occupation tends however to fit best practices and therefore sustainability is duly taken into account. But, do developers value it in their marketing documents? Is sustainability already a settled stance which needs not to be stated, or is it worth while mentioning by developers because it is an end-users' choice criterion? By resorting to European Union tourism sustainability categories and using them to assess the sustainability discourse in the marketing statements of Portuguese recent tourism developments (precincts), we approach the answers to the abovementioned questions. The result seems to be a subdued relevance of sustainability for marketing purposes. The derived risk might be the stagnation on the path towards a more comprehensive sustainability if the latter doesn't work as a marketing differentiation tool.