The impact of fees on customer purchasing behavior and beliefs in winery 5 tasting rooms: A scoping review

36 Purpose: This scoping review presents a summary of studies that examined the impact or influence 37 of tasting fees in wineries on the purchasing behaviour, beliefs, obligation to buy wine, and 38 willingness to pay for such fees. 39 Methods: A search was conducted in August 2021 and updated in March 2022 of databases (i.e., 40 Academic Search Complete, Scopus) and hand searching using terms such as wine, tasting fees, and 41 charges. Documents were included if they were databased studies, published in English, and related 42 to the research question. They were then coded for characteristics of the document, design, sample, 43 winery, purchasing behaviour and beliefs, and findings. The coding and analysis were conducted 44 between August 2021 and March 2022. 45 Findings: Of 195 possible documents, 16 remained after a title and abstract scan, and 12 were 46 included after a full-article scan. The reviewed studies were conducted primarily in Australasia (60%) 47 and North America (28%) and a majority of findings were derived from surveys or interviews. A 48 majority of the findings suggested that customers and industry professionals did not support the 49 adoption of tasting fees at the cellar door (64%). Though, mixed impact was noted for purchasing 50 behaviour (i.e., volume, money spent), slightly stronger negative associations were seen for intention 51 to visit the winery or purchase wine in the future, willingness to pay for fees, and obligation to buy 52 wine. 53 Originality: This is the first systematic review to examine the impact or influence of tasting fees on 54 purchasing behaviour and beliefs in wineries. 55

winery or purchase wine in the future from the winery; (4) willingness to pay for tastings; and (5) 131 obligation to buy wine.

Protocol and registration 139
Because of the small body of research available on the impact of tasting fees, the scoping review 140 method was chosen because it is an appropriate format to summarize the extent of existing literature 141 on broad topics and identify research gaps in the evidence [28]. The steps for the review were based 142 on a recommended framework for scoping reviews [28] [29] and the Preferred Reporting Items for 143 Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) [30]. 144 However, the protocol of this review (i.e., a description of the rationale, hypothesis, and planned 145 methods of a review), was not formally registered because scoping reviews are not currently accepted 146 for registration with the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO).

Selection of sources of evidence 170
Once the initial search was completed, a screening was conducted of the titles and abstracts of the 171 documents. During this process, the reviewer determined whether a document should be included, 172 and if excluded, the reason for exclusion was recorded. A full-text screening was then performed on 173 the remaining documents. 174 175

Data charting process and data items 176
Data extraction was conducted by the author from August 2021 to March 2022. Given the small 177 number of included documents, and that one coder was involved, all documents were double coded. 178 The following information was extracted using a codebook: characteristics of the studies (i.e., author, 179 year, publication status/type); characteristics of samples (i.e., population, sample size, age, sex, level 180 of wine experience, study design); characteristics of wineries (i.e., locationcontinent, location -181 country, locationwine region, provenancecountry, provenance -region); characteristics of wine 182 purchasing behaviour and beliefs (i.e., research questions); and purpose and findings. Because a 183 document could have information on more than one of the research questions (e.g., wine purchasing 184 behavior, intent to purchase wine in the future, willingness to pay for fees), more findings than 185 documents were noted. 186 187

Synthesis of results 188
Frequency analyses for categorical variables and content analyses for the main findings were 189 conducted [29]. The meanings of the main finding were categorized using the themes developed from 190 the analytic framework of this review: wine purchasing behaviour or beliefs, willingness to pay 191 tasting fees, and obligation to buy wine. The direction of impact of tasting fees on purchasing 192 behaviour, beliefs about the winery, and intent to purchase or visit the winery in the future (i.e., neutral) and willingness to pay tasting fees (unwilling, willing, neutral) were coded and the 195 corresponding frequency was calculated. A list of all documents included in this review is presented 196 in the Appendices (see also Table A1). . A majority of findings were derived from samples that were of mixed age (83%), mixed 219 sex (96%), tended to be visitors to wineries (44%) or wine tourists (36%), and had medium (64%) or 220 high (20%) experience with wine (see Table I). As for the wineries and wine regions, a majority of 221 findings came from Australasia (60%) or North America (28%), from countries such as Australia 222 (48%) and the United States (28%), and from regions that were considered established (58%) or new 223 or developing (29%). The provenance of the countries involved was considered to be established 224 (100%). Finally, a majority of findings, were from surveys (60%) or interviews (24%). 225 As reflected in Table 2 (and Table A2 in the Appendices), most of the findings related to willingness 226 to pay tasting fees (nfindings = 9; 36%) or impact of fees on purchasing behaviour (nfindings = 6; 24%). 227 Overall, a majority of the findings had a negative valance in regard to the impact of tasting fees on 228 wine purchasing behaviour, beliefs, intentions, obligation to buy and willingness to pay (nfindings = 16; 229 64%). Specifically, the few findings for purchasing behaviour (volume, $) were split between 230 negative (nfindings = 4; 67%) and positive (nfindings = 2; 33%) impacts of fees. For instance, "Visitors 231 who had free wine tasting spent more money at the wineries than visitors who paid a tasting fee" 232

237
The findings for beliefs were either negative (nfindings = 2; 67%) or neutral (nfindings = 1; 33%). One 238 finding implied that customers held more positive views toward wineries that did not charge tasting 239 fees, "…visitors who tasted wine at no charge felt significantly more appreciative of the personnel 240 who provided services than did visitors who paid a tasting fee" (Kolyesnikova and Dodd [27], p. For intention to visit or purchase from the winery in the future, a majority of findings suggested that 244 tasting fees had a negative effect (nfindings = 3; 75%). For example, "…for a winery wishing to attract 245 the youth market, charging a tasting fee would not appear appropriate..." (Hall and Treloar [22], p. 123), and "An entrance fee would generate revenue but reduction in visitation may be a poor trade-247 off for these wineries" (Taylor et  On the question of willingness to pay tasting fees, more than half of the findings suggested a lack of 251 willingness (nfindings = 5; 56%), while several supported a willingness to pay (nfindings = 3; 33%). For  In terms of obligation to buy wine in the presence of tasting fees, the findings implied a lack of 264 obligation (nfindings = 2; 67%) or neutral (1; 33%). For instance, "…visitors who paid a tasting fee felt The included studies were conducted primarily in Australasia and North America and a majority of 275 findings were derived from surveys or interviews. 276 Though a majority of the findings suggested that customers and industry professionals did not support 277 the adoption of tasting fees at the cellar door, some variation was observed across the research 278 questions examined in this review. Mixed impact was noted for purchasing behaviour (i.e., volume, 279 money spent), whereas slightly stronger negative associations were seen for intention to visit the 280 winery or purchase wine in the future, willingness to pay for fees, and obligation to buy wine. One 281 of the more salient findings was that tasting fees are associated with perceived service failure of 282 depends on whether wineries are seeing the tasting fee as a mechanism for weeding out freeloaders 305 and recouping costs or a source of revenue. 306 If tasting fees are supposed to dissuade the casual customer and allow wineries to provide a higher 307 level of service to the potentially loyal customer [38], then we would expect that satisfaction is higher 308 for wineries that charge fees or in regions that have adopted fees in comparison to those that have not 309 doe so. However, along with the findings of this review, other research challenges this notion. 310 Several potential implications for wineries can be garnered from this review. First, if the intent of a 323 tasting room is to generate interest in a winery and to stimulate sales, then requiring a tasting fee 324 without any reimbursement after a purchase is not an effective strategy. While it may generate 325 revenue in the short term, the findings of this review suggest such practices will not inspire customers 326 to revisit or to purchase wines from the winery in the future. Thus, wineries should consider waiving 327 tasting fees with the purchase of wine. Second, the perceived quality of the tasting room experience 328 is critical to customer tolerance of fees. Visitors are willing to pay for tastings if they feel they learned 329 something about the winery, wines, and/or region while receiving value for money in terms of the 330 quality of the wines tasted. Therefore, if the argument for having such fees in place is to partly cover 331 the costs of capable and knowledgeable staff in the tasting room, that fact should be apparent to the 332 customer. Finally, the cost of tastings has increased dramatically in the past few years and this may 333  --"Charging tasting fees that were not redeemable against a purchase would have a significant impact on visitors" (p. 127) "The idea of charging fees for tasting proved to be a controversial issue and it was suggested by the majority of wineries that tasting fees would never be charged (with the exception of groups)" (p. 126).

Bitsch
(2020) -, -"In short, our main findings are that consumers are willing to pay positive prices for wine touristic activities" (p. 2492).

Charters
(2009) + "While many participants said that some sort of exchange felt necessary at the tasting room, particularly where the service experience has been excellent, it is unclear whether charging a tasting fee is an appropriate response" (131).

Hall
(2008) -"Overall, the results have shown that for a winery wishing to attract the youth market, charging a tasting fee would not appear appropriate..." (p. 123) Holecek (2014) + + + "Although it is clear that visitors spent more at wineries that charged a fee, it is possible that the difference is spending was the result of other factors." "Almost 71 percent of respondents said they don't avoid tasting rooms that charge a fee while 29 percent said they do." King (1997) 0 0 -"The attitude of these tourists was varied with some people stating that although they often did buy at the wineries when there was a tasting fee they did not feel compelled to buy the wine…" (p. 383).
"Due to the impact of the results, wineries could lose 36% of visitors" (p. 383) "The proposition that all wineries introduce tasting fees was not generally accepted by association members…" (p. 382).

Kolyesnikova
(2009) ---"Visitors who had free wine tasting spent more money at the wineries than visitors who paid a tasting fee" (p. 816).
"…visitors who tasted wine at no charge felt significantly more appreciative of the personnel who provided services than did visitors who paid a tasting fee" (p. 816).
"…visitors who paid a tasting fee felt less obligated to end their visit to the winery with a purchase" (p. 816).