Results

Response rates from the surveys comprised 35.5% (n=648) in Sweden, 38% in Norway in 2014 (n=684) and 34.6% (n=585) in 2018. In both countries, the sample was dominated by micro businesses (with the overwhelming majority having less than two year-round employees). All surveys included questions regarding personal and business goals for operating an NBT business, the results of which are presented in Table 3.1.

As can be seen from the results, business goals associated with quality of life, interesting job, sustainability and access to nature are prioritized over

Table 3.1 Motivations to operate a nature-based tourism (NBT) business

* Measurement was done on a 5-point Likert scale (1 not important at all - 5 very important) ♦♦Measurement was done on a 7-point Likert scale (1 not important at all - 7 very unportant)

growth-oriented ones, which are typically attributed to lifestyle entrepreneurship (Ateljevic & Doome, 2000; Hollick & Braun, 2005; Lopez et al., 2009; Peters et al., 2009; Shaw & Williams, 1998; Skokie & Morrison, 2011; Shepherd & Wiklund, 2005; Dobbs & Hamilton, 2007). When it comes to the insights from the qualitative data, the main themes emerging from the interviews with NBT entrepreneurs in the north of Sweden were the following. All of the interviewees mentioned that starting an NBT busmess and relocating to a remote rural area was a way to improve their quality of life, which spans beyond monetary gain. This is explained by both push and pull factors, such as avoiding unfavorable conditions inherent in then^- previous social context as well as pursuing a better natural environment, work-life balance and new life paths overall. Piet, for example, who used to work in an office, stated:

I have just had enough to be honest. . . . Always being busy, never good enough, never fast enough. Always stressed out ... I thought, why can’t we just be normal, just give each other a little space and not ask impossible tilings from each other. Life would be a lot easier.

The interviewees presented NBT business as a way to gain access to conditions that were important for a better life, such as a clean environment, abundant natural resources, work-life balance, peace and nice conditions to raise children. Ellen, for example, says: “We came here for space, nature, silence - the quality of life”. In fact, none of the interviewees mentioned getting into their NBT busmess to increase the family income. It can be argued that NBT emerged as the most readily available income-generating option, since business and employment opportunities in the peripheral rural areas of the north are rather limited.

Further, it became clear that the interviewed NBT entrepreneurs do not have growth and expansion as a paramount business priority. Wim, for example, explains:

I’d like to grow in such a way to just stop worrying about my day-to-day finances. I do not need to become rich. And we won’t become rich anyway. If I wanted to get rich, I would have picked a different profession.

A recunent narrative around doing business was that it is simply instrumental for achieving personal goals, such as living in a certain area and having a certain lifestyle. Business success, in other words, is measured by these entrepreneurs against the ability to meet these goals, rather than against economic indicators of busmess performance. At the same time, however, it is important to emphasize that lifestyle entrepreneurship might offer a more enriching but not necessarily an easier life. In fact, our interviewees pointed out that they work longer hours than they did in then- previous jobs. Operating a campsite, for example, demanded constant on-site presence beyond working hours, which contradicts the goal for work-life balance, typically ascribed to lifestyle entrepreneurs. Nevertheless, the interviewees considered that with the decision to become NBT entrepreneurs, their lives have improved irr other ways.