Service-dominant logic and the festival experience

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to understand the process of value co-creation by examining festival attendees' perspectives of their festival experiences. Service-dominant logic (SDL) is used as a framework to understand the how value is co-created in the festival setting. Design/methodology/approach - Using a SDL approach and personal meaning mapping methods, this research offers insight into how value is co-created by the attendee, festival, and influential others. Findings - This research found that personal, social, cultural, physical, place, and arts presentation domains come together to add value to the festival experience. Research limitations/implications - This research adds insight into the value co-creation process if festival settings. SDL is examined in relation to findings and re-conceptualized based on findings. This research was not intended to generalize all performing arts festivals but instead provided a detailed descriptive account of the experiences offered by performing arts festivals examined. Practical implications - These findings contribute to the understanding of how co-created experiences can be developed, marketed and managed and provide insight into areas of future research to better understand the co-creation process in event contexts. Originality/value - By providing a framework for understanding the festival experience, employing SDL, and using of experiential assessment methods across festivals, this research fulfils an identified need for an in-depth understanding of the co-created meanings of festival experiences.