Brand equity of tourism destinations: The influence of country image and regional image

This paper focuses on the customer-based brand equity for a regional tourist destination, and develops a theoretical model including the causal relationships between the dimensions of brand equity (awareness, image, perceived quality and loyalty). Accordingly, the loyalty of international tourists is considered as the main outcome variable for explanation in the theoretical model. Moreover, the paper adopts an international tourism approach and takes into account the hierarchy of destination brands, analyzing the influence of country destination image (i.e. country as umbrella brand) on the regional destination image. The empirical evidence obtained from a sample of 253 international tourists visiting a regional destination in Spain supports that loyalty towards the destination is positively influenced by the perceived quality of the destination, which in turn is directly influenced by the image and awareness of the destination. Additionally, our results support for the idea that the perceptions of international tourists of a regional destination are positively influenced by their perceptions of the country destination where the region is located. The country’s brand therefore acts as an “umbrella brand” for the region’s brand.