The effect of vineyard routes on tourism development and regional development: Denizli example

The main purpose of this study is to reveal the effects of the vineyard routes tried to be created in Denizli on Denizli tourism and regional development of Denizli. Different desires of tourists cause them to have alternative tourism experiences in the places they travel. Today, wine tourism has become one of the most interesting alternative tourism branches worldwide and in Turkey, as tourists are in search of different experiences. In recent years, this type of tourism has been gaining popularity. Visiting vineyard routes gives tourists the opportunity to experience the region as well as tasting different types of wine. Moreover, if this region has the opportunities to offer tourists not only natural beauties but also the magical atmosphere of history, as can be seen in the example of Denizli, the satisfaction to be gained from this experience will increase even more. The wine richness of Denizli province is based on the fact that the wineries spread over a wide geographical area produce various types of wine and offer good and high quality wines. The history of wine production in the region goes back to ancient times. Therefore, wine production in this region has a history of thousands of years. For this reason, Denizli was chosen as the research area of this thesis. There is no previous research on vineyard routes in this region. Within the scope of the research, four wineries forming the Çal Vineyard Route were selected. Within the framework of the study, information was obtained and evaluated by participant observation and semi-structured interview method from the enterprises. This study on the Çal Vineyard Route represents an important step towards increasing the tourism potential of Denizli province and supporting regional development. The results of the study show that Çal Vineyard Road can be a strong attraction centre in the field of wine tourism and gastronomy. In this study, in order for the Çal Vineyard Road Route to contribute to the tourism potential of Denizli province and become an important value, suggestions have been made to overcome the difficulties encountered and to reach a wider audience.