Spirits tourism (spiritourism) in Poland on the example of museums of vodka

Abstract

The paper presents a new type of drink tourism, namely spirits tourism (spiritourism), whose development recently has gained momentum in Poland owing to, among others, the establishment of two original culinary museums in Warsaw devoted entirely to vodka. Visitors can see raw materials, production stages, types of vodkas and learn about the Polish vodka consumption culture from the Middle Ages to the present day. The paper sets out to identify vodka as an element of Poland’s national culinary heritage. Subsequent part identifies spirits tourism (spiritourism) and discusses motivation behind practicing this type of beverage tourism, as well as outlines the profile of a spirittourist. The last section presents the operation of the culinary museums dedicated to Polish vodka, which contribute to the development of spirits tourism. The research objective was implemented with the use of nonreactive research – a method of content analysis, which uses data from secondary literature, as well as the technique of participant observation during several study visits to the culinary museums devoted to vodka in the years 2019–2020, which are located in the Polish capital.