Health, Wellness and Tourism: healthy tourists, healthy business ...

FITNESS AND WELLNESS DEMAND AND OFFER DURING A CITY BREAK IN
BARCELONA
The (mis)match of the wellness and fitness offer of Barcelona for Dutch tourists who practice
fitness in their daily life and how Barcelona can develop itself into a wellness destination
Xavier Puertas
Escola Universitaria d'Hoteleria i Turisme
Barcelona
Spain
xavier.puertas@cett.es
Roos Gerritsma
University of InHolland, Amsterdam/Diemen
The Netherlands
roos.gerritsma@inholland.nl
Keywords: fitness, wellness, demand, supply, destination concepts
Dutch demand
Nearly 25% of the Dutch inhabitants practices fitness during their daily life 53 and often use
the wellness facilities offered in their gym. The main focus in this research is the question to
what extent this target group is looking for a fitness and wellness offer during a city break in
Europe, especially in Barcelona. Research has been carried out amongst 334 Dutch fitness
practitioners between the ages of 18 and 45 years old 54 . Sixty two percent of the respondents
visited Barcelona, and 71% of them would like to visit Barcelona again.
The sample consists of three different groups, depending on their monthly membership fee
they pay for their membership per month: budget (>30 euro ), middle (31 – 60 euro) and high
(< 61 euro), 46% use the wellness facilities frequently. There is a significant difference in
the use between men (38%) and women (53%). The more they pay for their membership, the
more often they use wellness facilities: low budget 28% and high budget 85%. Another
significant gender difference turns out to be the fact that women (45%) use wellness facilities
in order to relax, whilst for men this is 33%, men find the recuperation of their muscles more
important (38%) against only 12% of the women. Core values they all share are: taking care
of one’s own health, striving for a tight body and developing muscles.
Sixty nine percent of the respondents has been on a city break at least two times during the
last two years, 11% of them even 4 to 10 times. For approx. Seventy percent think that a city
break consists of 3 to 4 days. Twenty five percent want to pay 300 to 400 euros for such a
trip and 23% is willing to spend 400 to 500 euros for a city break in Europe. Funny enough
the men have a preference to go during the autumn and winter, and the women prefer to go
during spring and summer. Almost 50% brings sports cloths with them on a city break, men
more often than women. When using wellness facilities in the hotel, 75% of them would like
this to be an offer that is all inclusive with the price of their staying. High budget practitioners
(64%) are willing to pay more for fitness and wellness facilities in their hotel and find such an
offer very important, this against 26% of the low budget respondents. Only 9% of the
respondents think of Barcelona as an active and sports city, most of them consider Barcelona
more as a place to wonder around, visit the main attractions and sense its cultural atmosphere.
53 Fitness in The Nederlands 2008-2009, GFK Panel, NRIT Media