Nature-Based Tourists in the Gironde Estuary: Examining and Identifying the Relationship between their Expenditure and the Motivations for their Visit

This paper is a first attempt to investigate the effect of motivations, trip characteristics and the socio-demographic characteristics of tourists on their daily expenditure in the Gironde estuary. The paper examines the effect of these factors by adopting a quintiles regression and an OLS regression. Mainly the quintile regression allowed us to establish a segmentation approach into light, medium and heavy spenders. The empirical results indicate a significant relationship between the importance attached to perform a seaside tourism experience by tourists and their daily expenditure on a current trip. Surprisingly, these results contrast with the fact that the variable reflecting whether or not tourists have already visited a natural amenity appears to have no influence on the level of daily expenditure by tourists. The investigation additionally finds that travel motives, though to a lesser degree, when taken in tandem with variable such as household income, mean of accommodation chosen by tourists influence touristsÕ daily expenditure.