Keywords

1 Introduction

Wine tourism—also referred to as oenotourism, enotourism, or vinitourism—is a form of tourism which in the last decades has attracted intense academic and business interest, as it has developed to such an extent that today it is a distinct part of the global tourism industry. It refers to tourists visiting vineyards, wineries, cellars, wine festivals and shows to taste, consume or purchase wine, and/or engage in wine-related activities, and thus experience the culture and lifestyle of destinations [1]. Due to its nature, wine tourism is linked to many other tourist activities and alternative forms of tourism, such as agritourism, culinary tourism, cultural tourism, educational tourism, etc. Practically, this means that the target group of wine tourism does not only include wine enthusiasts, wine experts or tourists whose main motivation is wine, but visitors for whom wine and the related activities around it are a secondary activity in the destination they are visiting.

The interconnection of the wine and the tourism sectors can bring positive effects for both wineries and wine-producing regions, at local, regional and national level [2]. Many wineries and wine-producing regions around the world have recognized the benefits arisen from wine tourism development (i.e. sales, employment, profit, sustainable development), although the conversion of a wine-producing area into a wine tourist destination is not an easy task.

On the other hand, COVID-19 pandemic has heavily affected the global wine industry, especially the wine tourism activities. According to recent data [3], in 2000, 47.3% of wineries worldwide experienced a drop in visitor numbers of more than 90%. This resulted in 52.9% of wineries losing more than 50% of their income from wine tourism. To deal with the disruption caused by the pandemic, wineries had to apply new resilience strategies [4].

In this context, the aim of this paper is to investigate the level of wine tourism development in Montenegro, focusing on the challenges emerged by the COVID-19 pandemic. Even though winemaking activity has a long tradition in Montenegro and despite the growth of interest in recent years, there is a lack of research on wine tourism, in terms of demand and supply. This study aims to fill this gap, as one of the first attempts to explore the opinions and perceptions of winemakers in Montenegro around an issue of great interest in recent years.

2 Wine Tourism in Montenegro

Montenegro is the smallest country on the coastline of the Adriatic Sea located in Southeastern Europe with the population of 616,695 inhabitants [5]. When it comes to wine tourism in Montenegro there are still no significant research contributions [6] but despite that fact a more active approach to the development of wine tourism started with the realization of wine routes in Montenegro in 2006/2007. Organization of many different wine festivals, events, saloons and projects in the last decade are starting to embrace the importance of this segment within the most important industry for Montenegro. In The Program of Rural Tourism Development of Montenegro with the action plan 2019–2021 [7] wine tourism is placed on the list of the priority products of rural tourism in Montenegro in the group three which refers to other products related to rural cultural heritage. This program also emphasizes the importance of formation of different clusters related to tourism among which a cluster of wine should be considered.

On the basis of a conducted study during 2017 [8] about the reionization of the viticulture geographical production areas of Montenegro, 3 viticulture regions with their 10 sub regions and 1 potential viticulture region with its 5 potential sub regions were defined. This study thus covers the coastal, central and northern part of Montenegro and in this way unified the possibility for the development of wine tourism in all the main regions of the country. The wine-growing regions defined in this study are the Montenegrin Basin of Lake Skadar, Montenegrin Primorje, Nudo and the potential region of Montenegrin North. The area of vineyards grows from year to year and in 2021 was 2850 hectares with the overall production around 400,000 L per year and about 300 different wines on the market [9].

3 Methodology

This paper aims to explore the level of wine tourism development in Montenegro, focusing on the challenges emerged by the COVID-19 pandemic. More specifically, this research examines the motivation for (or not) engaging in wine tourism, the annual volume of visitors, the services offered to visitors, the promotional actions, the critical factors for the further development of wine tourism in the country, the impact of the pandemic on wineries and the strategies the winemakers followed to cope with it. For the purposes of the research, a self-completed structured questionnaire consisting of three sections and fourteen questions (closed and 5-point Likert scale questions), based on literature review [1, 10,11,12] was designed on the Google Forms platform. The first section includes questions about the main characteristics of the wineries, i.e., brand name, region, year of establishment, annual wine production. In the second section, the questions focus on the involvement of wineries in tourism activities, and in the third section the impact of the pandemic on the operation of wineries is examined. According to official data [9] the total number of wineries in Montenegro is 88. The questionnaire was emailed to 80 wineries, as no contact information was found for the other 8. The survey conducted from April to June, 2023. A total of 41 valid questionnaires were collected, a response rate of 51.2%, which—given the nature and challenges of the research—is considered a satisfying percentage. The collected data were statistically analyzed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 26.0.

4 Results

The wineries that participated in the survey come from all three winemaking regions of the country. The vast majority of them (90.2%) are located in the Crnogorski Basen Skadarskog Jezera region, which in not surprising since most of the country’s wineries are located in this region, 3 wineries come from the Crnogorsko Primorje region, and just one winery from the Nudo region. Regarding the wineries’ year of establishment, the oldest winery was established in 1912 and the newest in 2020. As can be seen, many new wineries have been established in recent years, as only 5 of the 41 wineries in the sample were established before 2000 (1912, 1932, 1963, 1966 and 1990, respectively), while 16 wineries were established in the period 2000–2010 and the remaining 19 in the period 2012–2020. Almost nine out of ten wineries (90.2%) are very small in size, producing less than 50,000 L of wine per year. Only three wineries are very large with an annual wine production of more than 500,000 L, and one winery produces 50,000–100,000 L.

Of the 41 wineries that participated in the survey, 33 (80.5%) are open to the public. The other eight wineries cited lack of state support and inclusion of wine tourism in national tourism planning as the main reason for not being involved in wine tourism. Secondary reasons reported were in order of importance the lack of appropriate infrastructure for the reception and hospitality of visitors, the need for extra staff/increased operating costs, the high cost required (lack of capital, lack of financing for expansion), and finally the business philosophy, as emphasis is placed on production and sale of wine rather than other tourism related activities. 21 of the visitable wineries are open all year, while the other twelve are open for five to eleven months a year. The number of visitors received by wineries varies and is indicative of the level of development of each winery’s tourism activities. This number ranges from 10 to 30,000 per year, while 17 wineries receive less than 1000 visitors. It is also noteworthy that 25% of wineries do not keep data on the number of their visitors.

Subsequently, participants were asked to indicate their level of agreement with a set of reasons for getting involved in tourism activities. They recognize multiple benefits and reasons that led them to the decision to develop wine tourism activities. The main reasons for this relate both to the expected benefits for their own business and to their region and also Montenegro as tourist destinations. Regarding the benefits to their own business, they expect that by engaging in wine tourism they will raise the brand recognition of the winery and its wines (mean = 4.23), get in contact with the consumers receiving feedback (mean = 4.18), improve the image of the winery (mean = 4.05), achieve cellar door sales (mean = 4.03), and attract new customers (mean = 4.03). As far as the benefits for their region/country, they consider that their tourism activities contribute to the tourist development of the region and the enrichment of the offered tourist product (mean = 4.26), contribute to the seasonality mitigation and extension of the tourist season (mean = 3.95) as well as the sustainable development of the region (mean = 3.94), strengthen the local economy through increased agricultural production and employment (mean = 3.73), and finally offer jobs to the locals (mean = 3.65).

Having recognized several potential benefits of wine tourism, the 33 wineries that are open to the public offer multiple services to their guests. Wine tasting and cellar door sales are available in all the wineries, while a slightly lower number of them offer also guided tours in the winery and the vineyards. Interestingly, 13 wineries provide accommodation.

Results show that participants use multiple methods to promote their wineries. Social media seem to be the most popular way of promoting (34/41), while other common promotional activities are participation in exhibitions (32/41) and wine contests (26/41), the company website (24/41), and cooperation with travel agencies and tour operators (24/41). More traditional ways of advertising, such as brochures, are still popular (23/41), while some wineries are adopting more innovative marketing tools, such as smart phone apps (7/41).

The participants were asked to rate a number of factors on a scale from 1 (not at all important) to 5 (very important), concerning the future development of wine tourism in Montenegro. Winemakers were quite positive in their responses, agreeing that most of the factors are crucial for the future development of wine tourism in the country. More specifically, they believe that the number one factor that could boost wine tourism in the country is the greater promotion of Montenegro as a wine tourist destination (mean = 4.59). The promotion of the unique wine identity and the recognition of Montenegrin indigenous varieties is also considered a very important factor (mean = 4.56), followed by the better promotion of the country’s wineries (mean = 4.49).

The last part of the survey examined the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the operation of wineries. Wineries reported that the pandemic had a significant impact on their operations. The greatest reduction seems to have been in sales, either within the winery (mean = 1.32) or to hotels and restaurants (mean = 1.46), which resulted in a reduction in the wineries’ turnover and profits (mean = 1.46). Consequently, as is logical, wine tourism activities were also negatively affected, as the reduction in the number of visitors (mean = 1.54) resulted in a drop in turnover from tourism activities (mean = 1.51). Finally, wine exports (mean = 1.71) and online wine sales (mean = 1.83) seem to have suffered the smallest decrease.

In order to cope with these impacts, wineries in Montenegro have taken a number of measures and actions. Half of them (21/41) had to reduce or completely cancel any plans for new investments. Subsequently, 18 wineries implemented the relevant health protocols and protective measures, such as masks, COVID-19 tests, social distance, hygiene measures, etc. The decline in wine sales forced several wineries (15/41) to reduce their production, while in terms of wine tourism activities, some wineries (15/41) turned to domestic tourism to make up for the lack of international tourist arrivals. Other measures mentioned were a reduction in wine prices together with special promotions (9/41), staff reduction (7/41), development of online sales channels (7/41), promotion of a sense of security (6/41), development of delivery services (6/41) and a reduction in staff salaries (3/41). Only two wineries did not need to take any of the above measures, while on the other hand a significant number of wineries (11/41) forced to take more drastic measures, temporarily suspending their business activity.

5 Discussion and Conclusions

This paper contributes to the existing literature on wine tourism, as one of the first studies in Montenegro examining the development of wine tourism, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings present very interesting aspects of the interrelations between wine production and tourism in the country.

First, the survey revealed the profile of wineries in Montenegro. The majority of them are located in a specific wine-producing region of the country, they are small in size and were established after 2000. Eight out of ten have been actively involved in wine tourism. Most of them are open to visitors all year round offering a variety of activities to their visitors. These activities, in addition to the popular expected activities of a winery described by other authors [1, 2, 13] such as wine tasting, guided tours in the winery and the vineyards and cellar door sales, include other interesting activities that correspond to the modern concept of wine tourism and form a complete and authentic wine tourism experience. The linking of wine tourism with other special and alternative forms of tourism such as gastronomic tourism or agritourism is also proposed by many authors [14, 15]. Some winemakers seem to have grasped the above, as they offer multiple active experiences to visitors.

Winemakers recognize both the potential of wine tourism as an economic activity, as well as specific benefits for their wineries. Brand enhancement, customer feedback, improving the winery’s image, attracting new customers and winery sales are among the main benefits that winemakers recognize from their involvement in wine tourism. On the other hand, benefits also exist for the destination itself, such as greater tourism development through the enrichment of the offered tourist product, the reduction of seasonality and the extension of the tourist season, the sustainable development of the destination. These findings confirm the results of previous research [2, 10, 16, 17] on the benefits of wine tourism to wineries and destinations. On the other hand, important obstacles are recognized that prevent some wineries from developing wine tourism activities, the most important of which are the lack of state support and the non-inclusion of wine tourism in national tourism planning, the lack of appropriate infrastructure for the reception and hospitality of visitors, the need for extra staff/increased operating costs, the high cost required (lack of capital, lack of financing for expansion), and finally the business philosophy, as emphasis is placed on production and sale of wine rather than other tourism related activities. The same problems have been highlighted in previous research [10,11,12], so they seem to be common in other countries as well.

In general, winemakers admit that wine tourism in Montenegro has not yet developed as much as it could, proposing specific measures for its further development. These measures include the greater promotion of Montenegro as a wine tourist destination, the promotion of the unique wine identity and the recognition of Montenegrin indigenous varieties, and the better promotion of the country’s wineries. Regarding the latter, winemakers already apply multiple techniques and tools for their promotion, such as social media and websites, participation in wine exhibitions and wine contents, and cooperation with travel agencies. Greater use of digital marketing tools which have been highlighted by other authors [18,19,20] as crucial for the promotion of wineries, especially during and after the pandemic [21] is suggested, but also closer cooperation with travel agencies which have been shown to play an important role in the promotion of special and alternative forms of tourism in Montenegro [22]. In order to embrace the importance of the development of wine tourism in Montenegro, previous research [6] also emphasizes that tourists should have the possibility to buy wine at a lower price directly in wineries than in stores which is not still the case.

In addition, the majority of winemakers reported that the pandemic has heavily affected their wine tourism activity, forcing them to take multiple measures to cope with these effects and adapt to the ‘new normality’ [23]. The most common of these measures include the partial or total cancellation of investment plans, the implementation of health protocols and virus protection measures, the reduction of wine production and the shift to domestic tourism. Similar measures were implemented by wineries in other countries [11, 12, 24].

Although this study provided valuable insights into the wine tourism development in Montenegro, it has one basic limitation. It examines the opinions and perceptions of winemakers only. However, the development of wine tourism in a destination involves many more stakeholders. Future research could widen the research to include also other stakeholders, such as local authorities, national and local tourism bodies, national and local wine networks and associations, the local community and the wine tourists themselves. Furthermore, future research could focus on the role of networks and synergies as well as wine routes in the development of wine tourism in the country, which is acknowledged as crucial by other authors [25].