Research Shows High Satisfaction from those Visiting Adjara

As Batumi has become one of the most popular tourist destinations in Georgia, the local Tourism Department decided to run a number of studies to determine the perceived pros and cons of traveling in the Adjara region, as well as to find out what challenges tourists face during their trips. The results were mostly positive – more than 90 percent of tourists were satisfied while travelling within Batumi and other resorts of Adjara.

The studies were conducted in two phases during August-December 2015 and included 1,000 respondents in each phase, with about 36 percent from Turkey, 16 percent from Armenia, 16 percent from Azerbaijan and 7 percent from Russia.

The research indicated that the majority of respondents (58 percent) were visiting Adjara for the first time. 90 percent of the respondents said they would happily visit the region again and planned to recommend it to friends and relatives. Only 1.5 percent said they did not want to visit the region again.

Most visitor-respondents said they were travelling through Adjara together with their friends (37.4 percent) and with family (34.2 percent). Only 23.7 percent were alone on their visit to the region and 4.7 percent were with their work colleagues.

64.9 percent of the respondents had heard about Adjara from their friends and relatives, claiming that they found this the most reliable source of information about the Georgian region. The second most popular answer was that their own experience encouraged them to visit Adjara again – 25.4 percent. Media sources like TV, radio, print media and internet as sources for information about the region came in at 17.7 percent.

The data surprisingly showed that only 26.80 percent of the respondents had booked accommodation in advance, with 73.20 percent having found a place to stay after arriving in Adjara. The majority of tourists were attracted by beach and entertainment – 44.1 percent, the nature and landscape – 37.3 percent, while 5.9 percent came to Adjara to visit their friends and relatives.

On the negative side, 14.4 percent of respondents said they were dissatisfied with the service provided in the region. 11 percent complained about the high prices and 10 percent complained about road safety. That said, at the same time 84.4 percent of the respondents found it difficult to say what kind of services they would like to receive during their next visit to the region.

“The research was focused on 10 target countries, the main idea of which was to make it possible to see the needs of tourists, their satisfaction or dissatisfaction according to each country,” said Mamuka Berdzenishvili, the Head of the Department of Tourism of the Autonomous Republic of Adjara.

He added that such research allows the Department of Tourism to work in the right direction and to launch appropriate campaigns for each country to make Adjara even more of a tourist pull.

Eka Karsaulidze