A qualitative study on the strategy formation process of tourism and gastronomy integration: The case of Cappodocia

The purpose of this research is to understand the strategy formation process of integration tourism and gastronomy integration in a destination. The research was conducted in Cappadocia region which includes Ürgüp, Uçhisar, Avanos, Göreme, Derinkuyu and Kaymaklı territories. Because very little prior empirical research has existed in this field, and there is a need for rich and meaningful descriptions of the strategy process, this study has used a qualitative research method. Documentary analysis and semi-structured interviews were used in data development process, and then the data were content-analyzed. Semi-structured interviews were conducted between 10th and 30th of July 2015 with 30 tourism stakeholders who voluntarily participated in the research. The sample included travel agency officials, representatives of public sector, tour guides, faculty members of the local university, chefs, and presidents of the regional professional associations. Eight themes emerged from the qualitative data. These are gastronomic tourism products, gastronomic identity, management of stakeholders, views of stakeholders, restaurants, actions, tourist behaviours, and markets. As the first theme, gastronomic tourism products were constituted by local dishes, local wine, food competitions, gastronomy tours, wine tastings, and food festivals. The second theme was labelled as gastronomic identity and it included two sub-themes as geography and culture. The sub-themes of stakeholder management were stakeholder groups and their collaboration, and individual entrepreneurship. The fourth theme with the label of views of stakeholders was constituted by gastronomic vision and situational assessments. Restaurants as the fifth theme was a combination of four sub-themes as location, employees, atmosphere, and authenticity of local food served in restaurant. The sixth theme was labelled as actions since this theme describes the actions of the stakeholders in the region and it was constituted by exploration-inventory and education. Tourist behaviours included one sub-theme that is labelled as tourists' behaviour and motivation. The last theme of markets was constituted by two sub-themes as gastronomy markets and gastronomy promotion policy. Research findings revealed that even stakeholders had a vision for developing gastronomy and tourism collaboration in the region, there was not a clear strategy that had been formerly formulated towards that vision. Moreover, the findings also showed that quantifiable performance indicators or strategic objectives for gastronomy and tourism integration did not exist as well as the lack of cooperation among stakeholders. Instead, specific examples of local restaurants and wine tasting tours emerged in response to demand of tourists visiting the region, and those can be evaluated as the initial strategic attempts for development of gastronomy tourism in Cappadocia Region. Furthermore, the factors including the region's potential for gastronomy and tourism integration, stakeholders' awareness and vision of gastronomy tourism, and individual entrepreneurship instances for gastronomy tourism (organizing training and education programs to enhance culinary skills of employees, discovering and protecting local culinary cultures, organizing culinary activities, and starting and running local restaurants the serve local dishes) support the view that emerging strategy model is more suitable for the region rather than a strategic planning approach. Keywords: Gastronomy, Strategy Implementations in Gastronomy and Tourism Integration, Gastronomic Identity, Emergent Strategy, Qualitative Research, Cappadocia.