The aim of the thesis was to explore the recent trend of increasing number of Chinese tourists who are choosing Rovaniemi as a tourism destination and reveal what their travel behaviour is. The thesis was commissioned for the company, Elves Event which offers Lappish experiences for customers and its main target market is Chinese tourist. The training experiences of the author helped to understand Chinese tourists’ behaviour in a practical perspective.

The theoretical support of the thesis is based on tourism destination and travel behaviour. In order to ensure the reliability and validity, the previous studies were used in the thesis such as academic journals and statistical data from authoritative organizations. A survey, as a research method was conducted aiming to gather information of Chinese tourists’ travel behaviour and their expectations related to travelling to Rovaniemi.

The results of the thesis showed that nowadays, Rovaniemi is a more and more popular tourism destination among Chinese tourists and most of them hold a positive altitude on their travel experiences in Rovaniemi and those who have not visited Rovaniemi held high expectations. Thus, Rovaniemi should keep utilizing its advantages of unique tourism resources such as the Arctic environment and the culture of Santa Claus to promote its attractiveness to expand Chinese market.

The findings revealed some development issues. Rovaniemi should concentrate on strengthening its inconvenient transportation, adjusting the high price of some commodities and developing Chinese services. The thesis offered a general view of how Chinese tourists consider Rovaniemi as a tourism destination and in what aspects the local tourism can be developed in order to benefit its future strategy building.