Gastronomy tourism festivals and evaluation of festivals in the case of Izmir province

It is seen that food and beverages have an indispensable position in the festivals, which are one of the attraction centers of the tourism industry. Nowadays, different kinds of festivals are organized in many parts of the world, they can contain gastronomic products or they can be gastronomy-oriented. Festivals contribute to the local community, local economy, the image of the region, and the sustainability of the local cuisine. Besides, festivals also help destinations to promote local culture and develop regional tourism. Accordingly in this thesis, the participants' opinions who sell products in their booths at the gastronomic festivals, which help domestic tourism and local products in Turkey to come into prominence, and their level of satisfaction from these festivals, are aimed to be investigated. The scope of the research consists of the participant opinions who sell products in their booths at the 10th Alaçatı Herb Festival and the 5th International Urla Artichoke Festival arranged in 2019. A semi-structured interview technique, one of the qualitative research methods, was used in the thesis study. In both festivals, the participants were asked the same questions in the interview form. The answers given by the participants during the Alaçatı Herb Festival (4-7 April 2019) and the International Urla Artichoke Festival (26-28 April 2019) were recorded by their permissions. As a result of the face-to-face interviews, a total sample size of 41 people was reached as 21 in Alaçatı and 20 in Urla. In this research, the findings obtained from the participants in both festivals were subjected to content analysis. Firstly, the descriptive information about the participants, then the results regarding the themed and coded data were listed. In line with the answers obtained from the participants, three main themes have emerged. These are listed as opinions about the festival, products, services; activities at the festival, and the festival visitors. As a consequence of the findings obtained from the participants, it was concluded that the two festivals contributed economically to all stakeholders in the region. Also, the participants' enjoyable time, socialization, and being able to please the visitors who visit their booths as the factors that positively affect their intention to rejoin the festival. Furthermore, the effect of the festival on the region's cultural promotion, tourism potential, and promoting local gastronomic products draw attention as the other elements that the participants were satisfied with. Thus, within the scope of the thesis, the result and suggestions have been tried to present that could help the stakeholders and researches to see the issues that the gastronomic festival participants were satisfied with, and support their work in this direction.