The Holiday Decision-Making - Essay Example

Subject name: Subject number: Student name: Student number: Assignment number: Tutor: Due date: Executive summary The baseline of this topic is to find out the factors that influence decisions making process before going for a holiday. To have the best result a matrix will be used to determine the preferences of an individuals and what makes it impossible attain them. Further along a classification or ranking of importance of some evaluating factors shall be determined using the compensatory decision rule. Demographics will also be applied to determine whether the kind of holidays preferred are as a result of gender, age, income, family status and ethnicity or race. Findings The result provided by the compensatory decision rule does not represent the actual holiday to be attended The demographic state deeply influences the holiday destination Personality of an individual dictates the likes and so is the holiday Recommendations The holiday decision making is a complex process to have a definite pattern. More studies should be performed to have or to explain trends. The only information present is for regular holidaymakers, more should be done to ensure this service is demystified. Table of Content 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 4 1.1.1. Objectives............................................................................................................ 4 1.1.2. Compensatory decision rule................................................................................ 4 2. Evaluation criteria ................................................................................................................ 5 2.1.1. Rationale............................................................................................................. 5 2.1.2. Matrix 1.............................................................................................................. 6 2.1.3. Matrix 2.............................................................................................................. 7 2.1.4. Matrix 3.............................................................................................................. 8 3. Demographics and decision making..................................................................................... 9 3.1.1. Gender................................................................................................................ 9 3.1.2. Age..................................................................................................................... 9 3.1.3. Family status.................................................................................................... 10 3.1.4. Race, religion and ethnicity.............................................................................. 10 4. Personality influence.......................................................................................................... 11 4.1.1. Janet.................................................................................................................. 11 4.1.2. Titus.................................................................................................................. 12 4.1.3. Mark.................................................................................................................. 12 5. Market implication.............................................................................................................. 13 6. Reference............................................................................................................................ 14 Introduction Objectives Determine the most preferred holiday destinations Determine factors that influence decision making regarding holidays activities and destinations Determine whether demographic factors affect holidays and if they do to what extent To use compensatory decision rule to calculate the most probable destinations for the correspondents To find if the calculated destination represents the true will of the correspondents Compensatory decision rule This is the choice made by a consumer regarding available alternatives; the consumer considers each service or product with its ability to perform to expected levels. The items might have good and bad attributes and in this decision rule all the under performances are compensated by the over performing item. The overall is then utilized to formulate the concluding choice. Evaluation criteria Rationale Several factors have been considered in this case to be the evaluating factors, to rationalise their selection we take a look at each one of them. The first examines if the whole idea is exciting. It is expected to be very exciting because involves taking a break from the daily routine of work or studies hence wherever the destination picked it should provide an exciting time for the holiday makers. If this is not achieved then a holiday is not complete. Weather is a key factor generally in the place where the holiday makers are and their destinations. The weather conditions can interrupt travelling by all means; it also dictates the kind of clothes to be packed and precautionary measures such as stronger sun creams to be bought. If the weather situation is severe death can occur for examples heavy rains and heat waves. The cost of the whole trip also is very important, many people would wish to travel to many different places but the cost overwhelms them. It is necessary after deciding the destination to check if the pricing is comfortable. As earlier stated a holiday should be exciting and if this is to happen then safety must be assured. Regions experiencing political turmoil and other forms of instabilities are not advised to be holiday destinations. Furthermore the safety of food and equipment in use are also checked at this point. The issue of accessibility should not arise unless the holiday maker like the destination because of it remoteness. For family vacations travelling should be as comfortable as it can get to accommodate all the members. Respondent number: 1 matrix Respondent’s name: Mark Interview date: 12/04/11 Holiday destination Evaluative criteria 1 Skiing on Germany alps 2 Site seeing at grand canyon 3 Hiking on Mt. Kenya 4 Site seeing in China(g. Wall) 5 Surfing in Bahamas 6 Italy Hospitality & travel. Rank 5 Exciting 2 5 4 3 5 3 Rank 4 Weather 4 1 3 2 3 2 Rank 3 Affordability 5 2 2 3 1 4 Rank 5 Safety 2 3 3 3 3 3 Rank 3 Accessibility 2 2 2 2 2 2 Total attributes 15 13 14 13 14 14 Respondent number: 2 Matrix Respondent’s name: Titus Interview date: 12/04/11 Holiday destination Evaluative criteria 1 Skiing on Germany alps 2 Site seeing at grand canyon 3 Hiking on Mt. Kenya 4 Site seeing in China(g. Wall) 5 Surfing in Bahamas 6 Italy Hospitality & travel. Rank 3 Exciting 3 2 1 2 5 4 Rank 4 Weather 4 3 2 2 4 1 Rank 2 Affordability 3 1 2 2 2 2 Rank 4 Safety 3 4 4 3 3 3 Rank 3 Accessibility 4 2 2 3 1 1 Total attributes 17 12 11 12 15 11 Respondent number: 3 Matrix Respondent’s name: Janet Interview date: 12/04/11 Holiday destination Evaluative criteria 1 Skiing on Germany alps 2 Site seeing at grand canyon 3 Hiking on Mt. Kenya 4 Site seeing in China(g. Wall) 5 Surfing in Bahamas 6 Italy Hospitality & travel. Rank 4 Exciting 4 3 5 2 1 1 Rank 3 Weather 3 2 4 3 3 2 Rank 5 Affordability 5 4 2 3 4 3 Rank 3 Safety 2 3 5 3 2 2 Rank 2 Accessibility 1 2 3 2 1 1 Total attributes 15 14 19 13 11 9 The summation of the different attributes to the evaluation criteria shows the choices to be made with regard to compensatory decision rule. The most probable destination for mark is Germany Alps though he cannot afford it, Titus Germany Alps for sure and Janet would go hiking on Mt. Kenya. Demographics and choice of holiday Gender has been reported as a barrier to travel to some places in the world. The gender factor mostly affects women because of controversy on woman’s clothing and places to be seen. This is fact that is disputed by any liberated women and for her it is much better not to travel to such places than be intimidated because she is a woman. For men the issue is very little felt and when a man travels to places where gender lines are thick then he easily fits in because fellow men will not treat him as an inferior being as for the case of woman. The female gender is also commonly perceived as an easy target for people with immoral intentions; many cases have been reported where women were badly treated because the culprit knew the women were not physically strong to respond. Most women who experience this are ones who traveller alone, less cases occur if the woman has a male colleague whether friend or partner. (Chaya, 2010) Age although most veteran travellers do it to old, it has been shown that most travellers are young between the age of eighteen years and thirty years. (DIB Institute, 2009). Their research further showed that the young people travelled in groups rather with a partner which was very common with people above the age of thirty five years. Night life of the destination was very important for young people compared to the ones, the older people preferred to have dinner in a quite nice hotel while relaxing from the day’s activities. The young people like to go out and experience life in the local clubs and drinking sprees before retiring to bed. The old people who wish to change their locations from time to time they travel within the country. For the case of Europe the senior citizens travel around European Union block. (Ghazali, M., 1994). Family status also influences the holiday patterns. The parents have to guarantee that they posses adequate to cater for the whole family while away. There are also deliberations to be made concerning the school program for the children. Once a family has to travel somewhere to stay is to be booked in advance to avoid last minutes. If there is a little baby more provisions should made such that in case of emergency there is an emergency room within the vicinity. Special attention should be focused on the infant because the immune system is not very strong. Other factors like weather change, altitude and diet may cause considerable harm to the infant. For pregnant woman conception time must always come first then the destination must be capable of providing all the ante-natal care required. For the parent to balance all these needs with a holiday destination is quite a tedious and involving task. This in turn makes most parents avoid holiday destinations far away from home and reduce the frequency with which whole family holidays are done. (Rhiannon W., 2011) Race, ethnicity and religious background also play a crucial role in shaping the destinations of affected party. The regions in the world that have not fully eradicated this practice always scare potential tourists. The religion has also become a hindering factor since religion has controversial links to terrorism. Most travellers who are from such religious background feel violated because whenever they travel they have to undergo what they claim as unnecessary checks. To avoid this sort of discrimination the choice of holiday destination is made on the treatment that the immigration officers and general public would provide for them. For the case of skin colour the same case applies the holidaymakers will check the history of the country regarding reported cases of racial discrimination. The countries that are known to have some elements of such behaviour will definitely be avoided; the choice will also favour destinations that are of the same race as the traveller to avoid unnecessary confrontations during the holidays. (Bruce, C., 2007) Personality influence on decision Safety has always been the first thing that runs through everybody. The safety of destination ensures that the holiday make can travel stay and get back safely. It also enables extensive travelling round the region of destination. The insecurity of a region registers dramatic reduction in number of tourists. As many would assume disaster is not only as a result of human conflict but it can be purely as a result of natural disasters. Many cases of travel bans have occurred because of such cases. For example the tsunami that heavily affected the tourism sector. Volcanic eruptions another case that apart from creating unsafe conditions for holiday destinations it can cause travel cancellation for the safety of passengers aboard the planes. The differences in personal character are put in action and the people who are more risk takers will travel despite the warning. Although this might be the case majority will definitely prefer to postpone the holiday or come up with a crash program. The parents have no choice but cancel their trips in favour for the children because it would be as twice as hard to be in disaster zone with children as adults only. This can be considered a personality character for all the correspondents. (DIB Institute 2009) Janet is a college student but loves nature very much according to her choices she preferred travelling to beautiful sites like Mount Kenya and the Alps. Although she believes financial obligation is the most important criteria for her because of her limited income generating sources. On further clarifications Janet confirmed that for her it is much of a bother to travel alone in countries outside Europe and North America. She attributed this because she has to be very careful on how to interact with the society in general, she said she has to buy new clothes for destinations where religion was very strong and dressing had to be carefully observed. She believed she was also partly harassed only because she was a girl and to avoid this she always travelled in smaller groups to avoid much attention and on the other hand to create some sort of security for each one. Titus is a manager in local company; he is quite skeptical about the conditions of developing countries and thinks holidays should be in places where class is observed. Titus confirmed that he would spend twice as much to have a holiday in very secure place. I would conclude from the acquaintances that we have shared that mark is not very much into nature and scenery as holiday destination consideration. He also combines his holidays with a little bit of work, he looks around wherever he travels for means and ways to improve the performance of his company. He jokes with respect to his job that in the wild there are not much opportunities for his job. From this perspective he would like very much to visit Europe and relax in good hotels and travel around the continent. Mark owns a mid-sized business company in the neighborhood. He can afford occasional holidays with his family but as the compensatory decision shows Titus would prefer travelling to the Alps for skiing holidays. For him to do skiing with the family a lot of equipment are required and they are not as cheap as mark would wish them to be. The accommodation also becomes an issue because many people travel to the Alps for the skiing causing appreciation of the accommodation costs. To accommodate the whole family he has to give the trip because it would be costly and opt for a cheaper destination. Marketing implications The tourism sector should design subsidised whole family packages for them to get more visitors been locked out as a result of financial strain. There should be intense marketing for all possible activities that everybody can do during the holidays. Most people struggle to gather information about affordable destinations to no avail. In the research it has shown most holiday maker are addicts to doing it over and over hence company should provide the best possible service to attract more and retain existing ones. (Chaya, 2010) Reference Bruce, C. “Irish gay men and tourism” behaviours and motivations, 2007 Dublin Institute of Technology, 2007 Chaya. “A guide for women travelling abroad” 2010, retrieved on 12/04/11 from: http://www.vagabondjourney.com/mommytravelblog Ghazali, M. “Travel behaviour” a study of older Malaysians; 1994 Rhiannon, W. “Choosing the best holiday destination” retrieved on 12/04/11 from: http://www.zeromillion.com/financial-services/choosing-the-best-holiday-destination-by-rhiannon-williamson.html What to regard as vital when selecting a destination for your summer holiday? 2009 http://www.fiabrussels.com/download/publications/itestexecutive_summary.pdf Read More