Award Date

12-2013

Degree Type

Professional Paper

Degree Name

Master of Science in Hotel Administration

Department

Hotel Administration

First Committee Member

Curtis Love

Number of Pages

36

Abstract

Las Vegas, Nevada, is a renowned travel destination attracting tourists from all over the world. Gambling has been a dominant destination image of Las Vegas in the mind of both the national and international tourists, since the history and fast development of this city has always been related with the gambling industry. In more recent years, the business model of this city has gradually changed itself to a more complete tourist destination with mega resorts, high-end shops, amazing restaurants and incredible shows and etc. Las Vegas is now turning itself into an entertainment and business oriented travel destination along with the gambling (Ro, 2013).

Although domestic visitors are still the primary source of inbound tourists to Las Vegas, recent statistics of the inbound tourism market of Las Vegas show a great potential of international tourists market, which now contributes more to Las Vegas’ revenue than ever before (Steinmetz, 2011). The Chinese market, as one of the four emerging markets, is a very dynamic one to Las Vegas in terms of its increasing visitation and more spending. In addition, the reform of US visa policy to the Chinese visitors, the current public policy in China, and the characteristics of Chinese tourist all positively impact Las Vegas to attract Chinese visitors.

In recent years, with the development of gambling industry in other areas such as Asia and Europe, Las Vegas is not the only gaming destination to attract tourists. Moreover, more than half of all visitors claimed their primary reason for visiting Vegas was vacation or pleasure. Only 9% of them claimed that gambling was the primary visitation reason (Higgins, 2011).

Therefore, a simple gambling destination image of Las Vegas might not be enough to be competitive among other travel destinations. In order to attract more visitors and generate more revenue, it is important and necessary for Las Vegas to diversify its destination image to its inbound tourism market especially the Chinese market.

Keywords

Business travel; Casinos; China; Gambling; International travel; Nevada--Las Vegas; Resorts; Shopping centers; Shopping; Stores; Retail; Tourism; U.S. Customs and Border Protection; Vacations

Disciplines

Business | Gaming and Casino Operations Management | Hospitality Administration and Management

File Format

pdf

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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