Perspectives For Further Development And Promotion Of Czêstochowa As A Tourist Resort – Opinions Of Inhabitants

This paper presents the results of the sociological research conducted among the citizens of Czestochowa concerning its development as a tourist resort. In this article some theoretical aspects of tourism marketing, city marketing, management of local government and management of settlement units are presented. The nature of Czestochowa as a potential tourist resort, mainly in the scope of its history and attractions is an important issue which is discussed in this paper. The main part of this paper is the discussion on the results of the research concerning opinions about the possible augmentation of tourist traffic within the city, the opportunities and threats for Czestochowa’s development, the strengths and weaknesses of the city as a potential tourist resort and also the forms of promotion to create and raise interest among potential visitors. The presented research is a part of the process of the city’s strategic development that is based on consultation with the community. Without the approval of the city’s inhabitants the implementation of this strategy would be doomed to failure. The paper consists of four parts. The first one is a presentation of Czestochowa. Following this the conceptualization of the issue for analysis and theoretical problems of promoting tourism and the city are discussed. In the third part the methodology of the research is presented: the research process, sampling procedure, structure of the population under analysis. The fourth part of the paper is focused on analysing the issue of developing the tourist resort as one of the key elements of Czestochowa’s marketing focus. This part also contains some considerations about the possible ways to promote the city.