Abstract:
Gastronomy tourism is a contemporary and exceedingly developing sub-sector in
the tourism industry. The purpose of this study is to identify how gastronomy
influences domestic tourists’ satisfaction and destination loyalty. The study
adopted the quantitative research technique. A sample of 175 domestic tourists
was drawn from the population of all the domestic tourists who visit Kandy city
through the convenient sampling technique. Data were collected through an
online survey by using a structured questionnaire. Data analysis was done using
both descriptive and inferential statistics by using SPSS 21.0 package. Sobel test
was conducted to reveal the mediate effect. According to the results of the t-test
and the ANOVA test, marital status, education, occupation, and purpose of the
visitation have a significant difference with the tourists’ satisfaction while the
marital status has a significant difference with the destination loyalty. The results
of correlationanalysis revealed that there was a positive relationship between food
quality, food variety,food presentation, food price, and tourists’ satisfaction. In
terms of destination loyalty, there was a positive relationship exposed in food
quality, food variety, food presentation,food price, and as well as the tourists’
satisfaction and destination loyalty. According to the results of regression
analysis, all the hypotheses were accepted shown that the gastronomic variables
significantly impact tourists’ satisfaction while tourists’ satisfaction significantly
impacts destination loyalty. The Sobel test results disclose a positive mediation
effect between gastronomic variables, tourists’ satisfaction, and destination
loyalty. According to the research, findings conclude that there was an influence
of gastronomy on domestic tourists’ satisfaction and destination loyalty. Basedon
the findings researcher mainly recommended providing fresh and diverse food
items, maintaining quality standards, and using correct preparation methods,
adopting varied yet reasonable pricing strategies to enhance the tourists,
satisfaction and destination loyalty.This study is substantial, predominantly, for
hoteliers, food operators, food marketers, destination managers, and all related
private and public tourism authorities to make policy decisions to ensure
sustainable gastronomy tourism in Sri Lanka.
