INTEGRATION OF HEALTH –ORIENTED INDUSTRIES (BALNEOLOGY, SPA AND WELLNESS) IN THE SCOPE OF BULGARIAN TOURISM Cover Image

ИНТЕГРИРАНЕ НА ЗДРАВНО ОРИЕНТИРАНИТЕ ИНДУСТРИИ (БАЛНЕОЛОГИЯ, СПА И УЕЛНЕС) В ОБХВАТА НА БЪЛГАРСКИЯ ТУРИЗЪМ
INTEGRATION OF HEALTH –ORIENTED INDUSTRIES (BALNEOLOGY, SPA AND WELLNESS) IN THE SCOPE OF BULGARIAN TOURISM

Author(s): Georgi L. Georgiev, Maria Vasileva
Subject(s): Tourism
Published by: ЮГОЗАПАДЕН УНИВЕРСИТЕТ »НЕОФИТ РИЛСКИ«
Keywords: SPA; Wellness; Balneo tourism; Health-oriented tourism

Summary/Abstract: Health-oriented tourism is assessed as a segment of increasing importance within the scope of the global tourism industry for the last decades. Fast developing processes of segmentation and fragmentation resulted in establishment of separate categories and subcategories of health tourism such as SPA, Wellness and Balneo-oriented tourism. Their wide popularization across the world and customer satisfaction is a precondition for their differentiation into independent industries going beyond the scope of tourism. And logically here comes the most important question – what is the key concept for each of these three industries? How are they treated within the different countries and regions in the world? Why is not there a common concept and definition for SPA and Wellness tourism around the globe? What is the reason for the abundance of interpretations, describing their scope, scale, used means and final products? This paper analyzes the most important problems related to the definitions of SPA, Wellness and Balneo-oriented industries and their specific features in tourism. Some recommendations and a model for their development in Bulgarian are proposed.

  • Issue Year: 5/2009
  • Issue No: 4
  • Page Range: 56-62
  • Page Count: 7
  • Language: English
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