Understanding tourist preferences for travel packages: a conjoint analysis approach

Tourism is one of the most economically vital sectors in India, contributing around 122 billion USD to the Gross Domestic Product in the recent past. Tour packages are extensively used by travel agencies to attract potential clients and expand their customer base. Hence, the design of tour packages which cater to a wide range of tourists poses to be a challenging problem for travel agencies. The purpose of this study is to identify the important factors while deciding a particular travel package, as recognised by Indian tourists. A comprehensive survey was conducted to collect the data and a conjoint analysis method was used to analyse consumer preferences and marginal willingness to pay depending on their socio-economic backgrounds. The present findings and implications will help tour operators to understand their customers better and thereby design more appealing travel packages.