Evaluating Economic Sustainability of Nautical Tourism Through Brand Equity and Corporate Performance

Previous literature has validated the effect of brand equity on firm’s value through the impact of measures of perceived quality and brand loyalty on customer value and willingness to buy. Simultaneously, understanding how sustainable tourism can be developed is important for destinations, to identify regional policies, and to potentiate its attractiveness to tourists that are increasingly looking for nautical activities in close contact with nature. Thus, this paper compares the performance of nautical tourism firms in the Centro Region of Portugal, to assess the economic sustainability of those firms. Bearing this in mind, the sample of 51 firms is split into those with a brand and the brandless firms to evaluate the impact of brand equity on corporate performance. The analysis is drawn on the concept of firms’ economic and financial performance, which is measured by a set of indicators of profitability, financial structure, and leverage, constructed from companies’ financial reports from SABI database for 2015–2019. Data on touristic firms operating in the Centro Region are collected from the National Tourism Registry. Results show that brand impacts positively on corporate performance and, thus, increases the economic sustainability of these firms.