Analysing Sustainability Issues in Cultural and Creative Tourism Business Models

This poster presents a typology of cultural and creative tourism business models developed through the EU Horizon project CROCUS (Cross-border Cultural and Creative Tourism in Rural and Remote Areas). Previous work on cultural tourism business models has highlighted the distinction between traditional models, focused on tangible heritage such as museums and archaeological sites, with creative tourism models that emphasize active visitor engagement with intangible practices like crafts or performing arts (Ohridska-Olson and Ivanov, 2010). More recently, Richards (2021) has charted the development of creative business models from the development of individual learning experiences to digital peer-to-peer platforms and placemaking. This poster presents a typology of cultural and creative tourism (CCT) business models and an analysis of the main sustainability issues associated with them across economic, social, and environmental dimensions. The typology identifies four distinct cultural and creative tourism business model groups—Looking & Listening, Making & Doing, Touring, and Buying & Consuming—based on their value propositions and forms of visitor engagement. Each model group involves different ways of leveraging cultural resources, ranging from relatively passive observation of performances or heritage sites to active participation in creative practices, movement between linked destinations, or the consumption of place-based products. Drawing on the literature on sustainable business model innovation (Bocken et al., 2014; Baldassarre et al., 2017; Lüdeke-Freund et al., 2018), this poster compares these business models, highlighting the sustainability challenges and opportunities associated with each. Looking & Listening models, often centered on tangible heritage, emphasize resource preservation and accessibility but face challenges in balancing conservation with visitor engagement. Making & Doing models potentially foster deeper connections between tourists and the local community through participatory experiences, but also raise concerns about inclusivity and the commodification of heritage. Touring models by definition involve mobility, which often increases environmental impacts but may also redistribute economic benefits across multiple locations. Buying & Consuming models integrate cultural resources into touristic services like gastronomy or craft production. While this creates a source of income, it may have negative impacts in relation to supply chain sustainability and equitable benefit-sharing. The paper demonstrates that a typology build around different ways of leveraging cultural resources can be productive in terms of establishing differences between business models into account when trying to develop more sustainable forms of cultural and creative tourism.