– – Aberdeen Tartan Day – – This repo
Aberdeen Tartan Day
This report examines the data from a Market Research Questionnaire presented to visitors of Aberdeen. Awareness of past events is reviewed and, preferences for future events are examined, with various alternatives being explored.
On August 5, 2005 Aberdeen City Council held its second Tartan Day. In an effort to expand this newfound tradition Council wishes to explore levels of interest in different types of potential activities. In the past such activities as the Country Fair, walking tours, a family day at the Union Terrace and special Jacobite displays at Provost Skene’s House were included in the programme.
The data, provided by the client, consisted of 30 respondents to the questionnaire. Although this number is small it is sufficient to extract some general information for Aberdeen City Council to make decisions regarding future events. The raw data were assumed to be correct as well as the methods for collecting the data deemed appropriate.
The raw data were copied to a minitab file (available upon request) and various graphs and statistical tests performed. Means and medians were compared and, in some cases, correlation coefficients were calculated to identify relationships between areas.
Demographically the respondents were evenly split by gender and equally distributed in the three age ranges 15-19, 20-24 and 25-29. Twenty-eight live in Aberdeen City, 23 are college students, one secondary student and six employed full time. All six of the respondents employed had salaries below ?1500 per month.
There was huge variance in the level of awareness respondents had in the events held in Aberdeen last year. Of the 30 people surveyed almost all were aware of the “Free at the Dee” event but less than 25% were aware of ‘Tartan Day’.
Event
Number Aware
Number Attended
Aberdeen Jazz Festival
6
2
Aberdeen International Football Festival
14
1
Aberdeen International Youth Festival
13
1
Free at the Dee
28
14
Tartan Day
7
1
International Traders Fair
4
0
10k Fun Run
8
2
Highland Games
15
3
Apart from the traders fair, the football and youth festivals, the Tartan Day attracted the fewest percent of the people aware of its existence. Free at the Dee seems to have generated the keenest attraction.
How respondents find out about events connected with their hobbies and interests is shown below:
Communication mode
Percent who used this
TV
50%
Press
22%
Posters
18%
Text Message
20%
Internet
60%
30%
Word of Mouth
93%
Leaflets
13%
Clearly word of mouth and the internet seem to be the most effective communication modes with traditional print modes (leaflets, posters, press) among the least. A review of the cost effectiveness of e-mail and the internet compared to TV may be worth undertaking. Note that since many respondents make use of more than one media the above percents add to more than 100%.
The pie chart below shows the relative popularity of the five proposed themes for future Tartan Day events. These are based on the number of respondents who chose each activity as either their first or second choice.
The boxplot below poignantly illustrates how the respondents voted. The shaded area shows how the middle half voted with the line in the box showing the median. The broad box for sports indicates the wide range of opinions related to the desirability of sports as a theme but whereas the small shaded area for music indicates a strong consensus (the median is actually 1). The star at 4 for music is a lone dissenter called an outlier. Clearly neither theatre, art nor highland games are very attractive as themes to the respondents. No one ranked theatre or art as number one and a singular champion of highland games voted it a first choice. Both sport and music seem to be popular. Twenty ranked music as number one and 8 ranked it as number 2 where sport received nine votes in each category.
A closer inspection of the data revealed that those that placed music high as an activity tended to place sports low. A similar relationship held between highland games and theatre. This information could be valuable should the committee decide to hold two events concurrently.
Most people who expressed a preference voted for the event to be held at the beginning of July either at the beach or Duthie Park.
Month
Count
Time
Count
Place
Count
June
11
Beginning of month
13
Beach
11
July
16
End of month
1
Duthie Park
14
August
2
No preference
16
Union Terrace
3
September
1
Castle Gate
1
Exhibition Centre
1
Seventy percent of the respondents would like to see a Scottish theme (Haggis, Angus Beef burgers, Whisky and tartan) at the festival. Almost a quarter had no preference.
Two-thirds of the respondents claimed to be willing to pay for this event and, of those, an overwhelming 80% peg ?1 to ?5 as reasonable with the rest willing to pay between ?6 and ?10.
Since a full two thirds of the respondents selected music as the theme they would prefer for future events a review of their preferences might reveal some additional information. The music lovers showed the same generally low level of awareness and participation at the various events held in Aberdeen last year as the complete sample of thirty respondents. The first surprise is the mode of communication for the people who selected music.
Communication mode
Music People
Percent who used this
Full Sample
Percent who used this
TV
50%
50%
Press
75%
22%
Posters
65%
18%
Text Message
20%
20%
Internet
60%
60%
30%
30%
Word of Mouth
90%
93%
Leaflets
20%
13%
The group that choose music made use of most media the same as the full cohort with the notable exceptions that the music group made much more use of the printed media: press, posters and leaflets. The planning committee may wish to take this into account when designing their advertising. Advertising in the printed media could place more emphasis on the music aspect and other forms of media target a more general audience.
The music group favoured the beginning of July as did the whole group with an even greater percentage favouring Duthie Park. They also would like to see a Scottish theme added to the festival although whether this is confined to food, drink and dress or includes the music was not indicated.
Last years brochure heralded ten out of its sixteen venues as ‘admission free.’ Two-thirds of the respondents expressed a willingness to pay for the event they chose as a potential theme for Tartan Day (ie. they expressed a willingness to pay for a music event). The committee will need to consider the question of fee from a philosophical view as well as a pragmatic one. Generally the profile of the group willing to pay aligns closely to the whole group of respondents with a few notable exceptions. The potential payers showed greater attendance at both the 10K fun run and the highland games. They relied less on internet for communication and slightly more on e-mail. They showed a significantly greater reliance on TV for communication. None of the potential payers wished to see Tartan Day in August and they favoured Duthie Park very strongly.
The data were reviewed by parsing other subgroups with no startling results. The age groupings and the groupings according to employment status showed no difference from the group as a whole. There were slight gender differences in the choice of media. Females tended to favour the press and posters.
A number of questions emerge naturally from the above results. If music is to be a theme what kind of music would be best received? Could there be two themes like music and sport? The survey did not indicate family status. If Tartan Day is to be a family event this group could be targeted in any follow-up surveys.
The general level of awareness as indicated by the participants of the survey of Tartan Day in the past has been low and the attendance even lower.
Based on the survey results the committee should consider changing the date of Tartan Day to early in July. The majority favour a music theme with the venue at Duthie Park and they are willing to pay a small entrance fee (below ?5).
Depending on the target group a variety of media should be used to communicate the events of the day.
