SWOT Analysis for Isle of Wight Food Show - Essay Example

Topic: SWOT Analysis for Isle of Wight food show (case study) 1.0 Overview of the event marketing environment – Situation Analysis Event marketing environment is very competitive in the UK with such events as Taste Festivals, which are held at various places to celebrate local culinary talent. The Isle of Wight has been on the top of getting awards for organising festivals to name the winning of music festival as the ‘Best Major Festival’ while the award for ‘Best Medium Size Festival’ was cornered for the third year consecutively by Bestival. Wiley Events has been the leading event organising company in the IOW. Micro-environment 1.1 The Isle of Wight (IOW) Food Show The IOW has organised the food show for the 3rd time, generally taking place in the first weekend of May. The IOW food show is jointly organised by Isle of Wight Tourism, Isle of White Chamber of Commerce, the Island Traders’ Association and Wiley Events. It is a two-day event taking place from 1pm to 6 pm. Entry to the festival is free as per the Needles Park pay per attraction policy. Exhibitors are charged £200 for the services rendered to them. Venue of the food show is Needles Park, Alum Bay in the North West of the island. Various stakeholders to the food show include accommodation providers, event organisers, transporters, visitor attractions, the local council and DMO. 1.2 Wiley Events Wiley Events has been the leader in the line of bespoke event management since 2001. Teddy Toddington and Pippa Powell, the partners of Wiley Events carry 20 years experience in event organising. Both are experts in their own right and divide job functions as per their acumen in different event management functions. Wiley is also into advisory role of offering consultancy services to other companies particularly in the areas of sales, operations and administration. 1.3 Isle of Wight Tourism There are 21 specific touring sites, as identified by tourism data. Caravan sites also organise touring and camping, capturing 8% visitors of the event market. Summer is the peak season of tourism in the IOW when occupancy rate is 80%, which reduces to 37% in the spring and 19% in the autumn season. There are 60 worth-seeing sites, as per the Attractions Mini-guide 2005 and places of interest could be 200, as taken from the Tourism Baseline Audit 2003. Macro-environment 1.4 The Isle of Wight – Tourism destination – economy, social, cultural trends, physical environment, business environment Measuring 23 miles by 13 miles, the Isle of Wight boasts of near about 2.6 million visitors each year with an approximate tourism spend of £352 million a year, tourism being 24% of the Island’s GDP and the first tourism destination to encourage quality and supervised stay facility; Once reaching to the Isle of Wright, one finds the transport infrastructure fully customised for visitors’ comfort. Cultural trends include such events as Taste Festivals, which are held at various places to celebrate local culinary talent. Business environment is very competitive with the Isle of Wight remaining on the top by getting awards for organising festivals, just to name the winning of music festival as the ‘Best Major Festival’ while the award for ‘Best Medium Size Festival’ was cornered for the third year consecutively. Business on the island depends on the initiatives of the stakeholders to use tourism as a tool to re-energise the economy. Success in leveraging this tool can be doubtful if only the traditional niche area of the tourism portfolio is given attention by focussing just on summer holiday customers and coach and school group market. To reap the benefit, investment on facility and quality staff provision is mandatory otherwise actual contribution of tourism in the local economy would slow down. Negative outcomes can appear in traffic snarls to the displeasure of local people and affecting environment and standard of living. Businesses won’t be able to expand to raise the quality benchmark. Public sector can withdraw support if any of the symptoms reappear and the card of tourism is not played tactically for the benefit of tourism, which would culminate in the creation of wealth, satisfying the environmental concerns, raising the living standards and providing a more than satisfactory experience to the tourists. 1.5 Strategic Tourism Plan ‘Vision 2020’ Potential tourism opportunities in the Isle of Wight are waiting to be exploited by collective efforts of various stakeholders under the canopy of Strategic Tourism Planning “2020 Vision”. By 2020, growth in expenditure at 2004 prices would be 40% more than just £500 million and visitors’ rush would increase 50% to 3.9 million, a surplus of 1.3 million from 2004. 1.6 Event Tourism – an event portfolio – Isle of Wight Event tourism has huge potential in contributing to the economic health by enriching the event portfolio of the Isle of Wight. It is evident from the fact that big brands are sponsoring the event business of the IOW. Further, event management brands such as Wiley Events are organising the events for the Isle of Wight. Tourism department needs to enrich the event portfolio of IOW. 1.7 The Isle of Wight destination – target customer groups Customers of the Isle of Wight are ‘families’ primarily who visit the Isle during summer holidays. First time visitors don’t visit a place for the sake of visiting; they want to have an unforgettable experience. To make tourism a dynamic industry, it is very important that a varied customer range gets a memorable experience, not just families with kids. For that the Isle needs to match the customer expectations, build their confidence and long-term interest in the ravishing beauty of the Isle. Tourism needs to cater to the varied demand of such customers in the future who are fit, spendthrift and at the same time old in age. Healthier holidays would be in great demand. Fun element needs to be created by exhibiting art, culture and historical aspects. There needs to be sophisticated technology usage in place for easy and timely booking arrangements. The tourism stakeholders need to create such destinations where environment quotient is very high. Hobbies, interests and worth learning experiences need to be promoted to cater to visitors’ experience. Customers desire a wholesome experience in a short span of time. Dependence on the traditional customer base won’t inject necessary oxygen to the tourism sector of the Island of Wight economy. Job market won’t expand to the desired high standard and long-term. 1.8 The Isle of Wight destination – Island stakeholder relationships The island stakeholders include accommodation providers, event organisers, transporters, visitor attractions, the local council and DMO. A lot depends on the initiatives of the stakeholders to use tourism as a tool to re-energise the economy. Success in leveraging this tool can be doubtful if only the traditional niche area of the tourism portfolio is given attention by focussing just on summer holiday customers and coach and school group market. 1.9 Food and Drink Festival competition – Organising competitions in such food and drink festivals can help in increasing the attraction of foodie people to this event. Visitors for such events need to be varied, as envisioned in the “Vision 2020” to include other than traditional customers, the Chill-Out category of visitors that include DINKS (Dual income No kids), and SINKS (Single income No kids), and Empty Nesters (children grown up and moved away). 1.10 Food and Drink trends - the rise of the foodie Eating and drinking varied range of delectable delicacies and wines is becoming a trend with the people during holidays. The UK people are embracing this life style trend with open arms to connect with the local roots of celebrating cultural festivals with spirited participation. The UK food market is brewing with foodies who want to have a date with delectable foods during summer holiday time. They could be people with high-income group, having spending power on tastier things of life, food being one of them. Market is full of another class of customers who are serious foodies, satiating their taste buds without considering the cost factor. 1.11 Inter-Island event competition To promote tourism portfolio, inter-island event competition can raise the bar for tourism industry. It could be a way out to energise the event management industry too in the lean months of the year. 1.12 Marketing research – stakeholder feedback Future growth in the Isle of Wight event holding can be possible if the stakeholders present it as an innovative and “hassle-free” destination. Events should take place randomly throughout the year; at the minimum there is need to develop eight Strategic Events in the IOW. Some strategic festivals may include Jazz Divas (April), Motocross (May), Wight Diamond (May), Beach Soccer (July/August), Powerboat, Ryde Carnival and the Bestival to be celebrated in the month of September. 2.0 Marketing assumptions – some of the marketing assumptions could not hold ground such as: Climate -- It is assumed that all would be well in event management business but it rarely happens as planned. If we see the event history of 2011, rainy climate spoiled the show. Customer Complaints – The marketing assumptions proved wrong on customer issues when they complained of insufficient signage. Lack of theme was found to be another drawback. There was shortage of drink stalls; weather was also unfriendly; seating capacity was insufficient; no musicals were aired and one could see litter all-around. Exhibitor Withdrawal – The previous two years there were not enough exhibitors for the food show. Unhappy Sponsors – Sales of the sponsoring car company could not reach the desired level because of absence of the target audience. Read More