Author: Andre Coleman

Increasingly, it is argued that the growth of tourism had a paradigm shift from old tourism which includes inexperienced travel, mass consumption and the standardization to new tourism to face the prevailing circumstances. (Fayos-Sola,1996). The paradigm gives way to new products in the tourism industry adapted to the demands and expectations of the “new” traveler (Aparna Raj n.d, The New Age of Tourism and the New Tourists, Bundelkhand University). For instance, one of the leading branches of this industry is called ecotourism.

In line with the World Tourism Organization (WTO), ecotourism is defined as all nature-based forms of tourism in which the motivation of the tourists is the observation and appreciation of nature as well as the traditional cultures prevailing in natural areas.

In Mauritius, with the government’s aspiration of welcoming 2 millions of tourists by 2015, concrete measures have been implemented to promote ecotourism. A clear illustration would be the development of businesses that uses local resources and the principles of sustainable development.

However, with the fierce competition at regional and national level, the new paradigm tourism is laying much emphasis on the eco-label tourism. The term “eco” has become buzz-word (Bob Harvey; 1990) used by organization to differentiate themselves from the rivals in the market for more economic gain.

Green washing

As the new tourists are more experienced, more educated more environments conscious, more flexible and more independent than ever before (Cater and Goodall, 1998; De Villiers, 1990), since 1990s a new strategy is being used by businesses to exploit their marketing potential. This is known as “green washing”.

In other terms, green washing refers to the false advertisement of a product that claims to be eco-friendly and in reality is not.

In today’s marketing world, companies are spending billions of dollars through advertising images and cosmetic changes. Undeniably, the concept of green washing is present in many fields. One of the famous domains is ecotourism as by definition is the managing of natural areas with conservation purposes. Knowing the difference between “real” ecotourism and marketing hype can often confusing.

As Mauritius is dedicated with incredible opportunities and exciting landscapes for ecotourism development in terms of chalets residences, hiking, trekking, quad biking, mountaineering, bird and dolphin watching, several attraction sites have been selected to identify where genuine ecotourism is practiced.

The Black River Gorges National Park as an Eco Tourism Spot.

The most visited site for nature lovers that is being promoted as an eco-tourist spot in Mauritius is the Black River Gorges National Park; which can be considered as a few of the rarest wild rainforest in the world. It contains 6,754 hectares of wildlife that is more than 250 varieties of plants and nine kinds of birds which are endemic to Mauritius including the famous pink pigeon, which was nearly to extinction. The park covers also 3.5% of the island which is located in the South west area. It is also very reputed for having and extraordinary natural beauty which is the Alexandra waterfall and it is an ideal background to the hills of Black River Gorge.

Black River Gorges National Park can be considered as a pure Eco Tourism spot in Mauritius as we have a minimize people who go hiking through the park. It also has low impact on the environment there are no roads and the most recommended means to visit the park is by foot as there are only hiking trails which can be found in the official map or you make request the guidance of someone experimented (a guide) and who knows the trails and the flora and fauna of the site. The best period to stop over the National Park is during the flowering season which is from September to January. You can come across the exceptional Dodo Tambalacoque, the black ebony tree and wild Chinese guavas which is very common in this region. Those who are passionate about bird, they must keep an eye of the endemic birds of Mauritius like the Mauritius kestrel, echo parakeet for examples.

Furthermore, with the revenue obtain from tourist industry there are some funds which goes directly to the Mauritius Wildlife Foundation which acts like a protector and conservator of the Mauritian wildlife and natural scenery (fauna and flora) found in Mauritius. They protect these living things for all time, while helping visitors enjoy the landscape. You are invited to the experience of a lifetime. For example, you can expect to see the peculiar, umbrella-shaped Bois de Natte trees, which are often draped with orchids, fems and lichens. Although a same amount of visitors see the native birds, you can rest assured that the Pink Pigeon and Mauritius Kestrel are slowly rebuilding their numbers deep in the forest.

There are guided safari tours and day tours that visit ecologically-rich places so we need experimented guides and local guides as well; so it helps creating jobs for local people and helps in the social development of the region. There is an information centre to help visitors during their visit and to teach them a little more about the Mauritian flora and fauna. It opens from 9-3pm Mon-Fri 9 clock-4pm Saturday and Sunday and is located at the western entrance of the park, south-east at about 5 km from the Black River.

Casela Nature Park as an Eco tourism Development site

Casela Nature and Leisure Park extends across 14 hectares which is full with abundant old trees on a mild incline located in the West part of Mauritius between Flic n Flac and Tamarin village. It is one of the most interesting places to where you can stop over during holidays as you will see lot of animals and enjoyable as there are numerous activities. The park was originally created as a bird park, which included 90 aviaries compelling 1500 birds of 150 species. Currently it entertains quite a lot of other animals also namely Mauritian Macaques, lemurs, tigers, lions, Zebras, ostriches, massive tortoises, etc. Casela actually extends several possibilities to be in contact with wild animals and enjoying the stupendous experience of wildlife photography on a Mauritius holiday trip with your loved ones.

In Casela Nature and Leisure Park there are attractions for store of all age groups particularly the children will be delighted with the opportunity of caressing animals from the petty farm and they can also give food wallabies and pigs. The most indispensable and agreeable instant can be spent by petting zoo where infant deer can be enriched with milk; you can also come across chickens, ducks, ostrich, goats and many other little animals that can be fed there. For older ones there are activities like bike safaris, zip lines, the segway, where the visitors can find untamed boar, deer, and exotic birds. It can as well give the people the possibility to take pictures and enjoy the wild photography.

However Casela is another form of Eco Tourism, it is not a pure eco spot as we have bike safari, photo safari by bus, animal in cages and so on. But they respect a little the environment and cultural practices (Martha D. Honey, n.d). They are very involved in the protection of animals and old plants that are found in the surroundings. They also ensure that it provides a positive experienced for both the visitors and the host. While the host because it creates job opportunities, the development of the village and when the company invests in CSR projects.

Ecotourism can resume to travelling and contributing financially to local people and reduces to the minimal impact on the natural resources.

Valley de Ferney

Valley de Ferney, a nature reserve, is situated in the South East of the island; spread over 200 hectares tending to preserve the natural forest of its vicinity. With the uniqueness of its biodiversity, it accommodates more than 100 species of endemic plants.

Valley de Ferney can be a considerable reference for raising community awareness and providing educational experience with regards to biodiversity conservation and environmental protection

An establishment of a conservation Trust, mainly at Valley de Ferney Conservation Trust, since 2006 has taken place between the Government of Mauritius and CIEL Group.

This Conservation Trust main aim is to restore, protect and preserve the original fauna and flora of the Valley and respecting the rules of National Parks and Conservation Service.

The promotion of ecotourism at Valley de Ferney encourages people of the local community to consider Ferney Forest exceptional biodiversity.

The natural preservation Trust for the sake of ecotourism helps into the prevention of deforestation off the Valley.

Natural Resource Management

With regard to eco-touristic site management, Valley de Ferney Co. Ltd and Ciel Group are bided by the Valley de Ferney Conservation Trust to ensure their effectiveness in day to day management and good functioning of the site. They both ensure by collaborating to the management and not to disruption of trails and native habitats as well as litter.

In addition to fulfilling its mandate of promoting environmental sustainability, both Ciel Group and Valley de Ferney ensure that most employees are well trained so as to be able to offer a good quality of information, services and preventions guides. They also ensure that no large numbers of visitors enter the Valley, so as the natural habitats not to become disrupted.

Ile aux Cerfs (Deer Island) activities

Ile aux Cerfs (Deer Island) is very famous for its recreational activities on its beautiful sandy beaches It is also where the hotel Le Touessrok holds the concession, found on the eastern part of Mauritius the island is said to be part of the national heritage but the principle does not reflect the real will of those occupying it, the green washing aspect of the island is that campaign of “awareness and preservation” of the island’s ecologic side has been raised to but how far applied. About Rs 14.5 million revenues will be generated to preserve the island each year in order to keep it in a supposing good shape.

The deep truth

According to the most read, “Le Mauricien newspaper”, the green marketing behind is deceptively used to promote the perception that an organization’s aims and policies are environmentally friendly. The invasion of catamaran cruises or ferry boats transfer on a 24/7 basis are causing more than a harm to the island and its ecology whether on land or at sea. The island or party island has lost its charms and is no more what it should be or should have been. This abuse of the islands landscape is causing its death and the tarnishing of an historical land site, which is being under too much exploitation leading to severe environmental degradation, the two restaurants present on the island as well as the various barber queues that do take place everyday there contributes a lot to the islands degradation of nature. Hence it has no regards to the concept of ‘Maurice Ile Durable’.

Normally a business tends to fall in the green wash due to an increase of sale on the market. The same applies here concerning Ile aux Cerfs, portraying the idea that they are environmentally concerned but in reality neglecting ecology at large thus moving rapidly on the path of unsustainability.

Dolphin watching activities

As compared to another activity like the dolphin watching on the western part of the island at Tamarin or Le Morne ,the preservation of these aquatic animals are mere publicities to attract tourists and with the aim of an lucrative purpose, green tag to dolphin watching activities are simply a mask to prevent people from witnessing the truth. That is ecological damages like noise pollution and environmental disturbance like the releasing of petrol from the boats are good examples of how the environment is being degraded. This phenomenon of green washing existed since the island started to be economically fit and available on the tourist market

The activities on land or at sea

In both cases, that is whether on land or at sea ,green wash phenomenon is present and cannot be omitted .The lucrative mind set in businesses are making natural sites being tag with a green wash name on them.

Carnival Corporation is the largest and most successful cruise lines in the world. Their corporate offices are located in Miami, Florida with over 91,000 employees with offices all over the world. It all started in 1972 by Ted Arison who had a vision to create the greatest cruise line in the world. Carnival slowly started to grow and over time was awarded “The World’s Most Popular Cruise Line”.(Carnival, 2006) On 1987 the management team decided to take advantage to its well-known reputation and went public entering in the New York Stock Exchange as CCL.

Today Carnival has added over 100 ships and acquired premium cruise lines in almost every sector of the industry. In 1989 Holland America Line was acquired by Carnival adding niche operators including Windstar Cruises and Alaskan/Canadian cruise lines. In 1992 several luxury liner, where acquired such as Seabourn and Europe’s largest operator Costa Cruises. Carnival was not done expanding and in 1998 they acquired the prestige’s luxury operator Cunard who built the world largest ocean liner Queen Mary 2. (Carnival, 2006)

Carnival Corporation was beginning to take shape, but on 2003 they successfully merged with Princess Cruises creating a global power house. Carnival also purchased P &O cruises, Ibero cruises and AIDA Cruises lines. Carnival had become the largest cruise operator in the world from US to Europe. Although Carnival managed several cruise line operator each line had its own distinction and separate operations.

In 1972 Ted Arison owner and operator of all Carnival had a vision. Ted story begins when he took a small ship called the Mardi Gras and converted it into a small ocean liner. The Mardi Gras was an innovative cruise liner like no other for its time that only made a one-way trip from Miami to San Juan, Puerto Rico. (Carnival, 2006) Although it wasn’t easy surviving, Ted Arison was focused to be successful and on 1974 he became full owner of Carnival cruise line.

Organization as large as Carnival has management team that is broken up to different divisions. It starts from CEO & Chairman Micky Arison, the next tier down is Howard S Frank as the COO who over sees all businesses of company, within that same tier is David Bernstein who is CFO of all Businesses. The Next tier down is Richard Ames SVP of Shared Services, within same tier Arnaldo Perez SVP General Counsel and Secretary. Next tier down is Larry Freedman who is Chief Accounting Officer and Controller. The last tier down are all the divisional Presidents who manage AIDA Cruises, Carnival Cruise Lines, Carnival Australia, Carnival UK, Costa Crociere S.p.A, Cunard Line, Holland America Line , Princess Cruises and Seabourn Cruise Line. (David, 2013)

Carnival’s overall goal is to collaborate all its brands to reach every area of the cruising industry. Carnival’s main focus is to attract all types of customers who are in different demographic, budgets, geographic and all cultures. The main concepts that Carnival tries to achieve is to be known as “Fun Ship”, along with all the amenities that go with it such as Luxury, elegance and exotic destination. (David, 2013)

Carnival has invested in their own marketing division, were they offer a 10% commission to their travel agents and offer other bonus programs. The marketing division has focused on marketing material, advertisement, website interaction, seminars and videos. These efforts are too assist agent in the field to generate more sales. Their website division has created promotional campaigns that offer discounts, VIP savings, resident discounts, special meals, and holiday deals. (David, 2013)

Carnival domestic and international destinations are growing. New routes are being developed and new ships are being built. Traveler’s most appealing destinations are the Caribbean, Alaska, Bahamas, Hawaii, Mediterranean/Greek Island/Turkey, Bermuda, Europe, Panama Canal and least appealing West coast of Mexico.(David, 2013). Competition is growing among the other cruise lines and more theme based environment is beginning to evolve. For example, onboard amenities are being created such as cell phone access, entertainment, villas, multiple themed restaurant, fitness center and spas are making this industry competitive. (David, 2013)More and more people are cruising and more bigger and better luxury liners are being built around the clock. Carnival is the leader in the industry but it must not lose their edge because competition can knock them down to second place.

Executive Summary

Carnivals Mission statement is to be the world’s largest cruise operator that offers exceptional customer service to all its clientele. Carnival’s number one goal is for its passengers to have an memorable experience and to continue to travel on Carnival. Carnival would like to offer its clients a One-stop shop for traveling. Carnival has eleven different Cruise lines around the world that can make that happen.

Despite of economic down turns of the tourism industry; Carnival has continuously grown and expanded their portfolio of cruise line brands. Carnival Corporation has ten cruise lines with one hundred active vessels. In its portfolio of cruise line, Carnival has been able to generate nine percent revenue and delivering new ships each year. Carnival growth strategy has allowed the company to achieve a four percent increase in revenue growth and maintain the largest and most profitable travel company globally.

Since its public offering and forty years in business, Carnival has managed to acquire multiple cruise lines that cater to the global travelers. Carnival’s global expansion is now reaching out to travelers in North America, Europe and Australia. Carnival cruises continue to offer itineraries products around the world and offer all types of entertainment including excursions. Carnival continues to venture into regions that are untapped markets, such as Asia to increase market share.

Cruise industry has many competitors trying to take each other’s market share. The few players who compete with each are Carnival Corporation, Royal Caribbean Cruises, Celebration Cruise line, Star Cruises, Norwegian Cruise Lines and Radisson Seven Seas Cruises. Each company has its own niche and advertises in a certain clientele. With an all-inclusive themes cruise liners are beginning to distinguish themselves by the type of services they offer. The industry trend is to create massive ships that allow cruise line to offer more activities that can generate additional revenues to the cruise company. Today the Cruise industry is growing and more ships are currently in production. Cruising is now a major player in the traveling industry and more and more people are cruising today. Market conditions for the cruise industry is growing and for the last five years the cruise industry has been growing at 8% each year. (Cruise tourism, 2010).

Internal Assessment (A)

After reviewing three years of Carnival 10k data from Financial Statement and Balance sheet, we can see that Carnival is the biggest cruise line operator in the world. The analysis of ratios is broken up into five segments including, liquidity, activity, profitability, asset management and leverage. Within these segments you can see the company’s current ratio to total debt to assets. This data indicates the company is strong and sound.

Under the current ratios you take the current assets divide by current liabilities which include cash, accounts receivable and short term investments. Carnival shows a down trend of liquidity from 2009 to 2011. When you look at the current ratios, you see that in 2009 the current ratios were 0.31. In 2010 there was a 0.09 drop which left them with a current ratio of .22, and in 2011 you only see a .01 drop which left them with a current ratio of .21.

Carnivals receivables turnover shows an increase in the ability to extend credit sales and collect receivables as the years progressed from 2009 to 2011. Carnival has a successful rate on collecting receivable. In 2009, Carnival had an Accounts Receivable Turnover of 37, had increased by 27% for a total of 47 in 2010. During 2011 you see a 30% increase in accounts receivable turnover which left them with a ratio of .61 in 2011. Carnival shows they are able to extend credit and collect in a 30 day timeframe.

Looking at Carnivals Return on Asset percentage, you can see in 2009 ROA came in at 4.86 has an increase of 0.46% in 2010 for a total of 5.32% and incurred a slight decrease. In 2011 the total ROA came in at 5.02%. Under the Total Assets Turnover (TAT) you see Carnival shows an increase during 2009 -2011. In 2009, Carnival had a TAT of .37, an increase of .02% in 2010 for a TAT of .39, and in 2011 reflected another .02% increase for a TAT of .41. Based on the ROA and TAT comparisons, Carnival maximizes their assets and the number shows an upward trend.

When you look at the Operating Profit Margin (OPM) on Carnival you see margins have been declining through the period of 2009-2011. Carnival had an OPM of 16% in 2009, 16.22% in 2010 and a decrease in 2011 to 14.28%.Net income by percentage of sales declined for Carnival from 2010 to 2011 by 1.56%, while they only saw a gain in sales of .37% from 2009 to 2010. Now, when you look at earning per Share (EPS), as a shareholder these numbers would indicate how profitable the company can be which Carnival had EPS of 2.24 in 2009, and increase in EPS of 0.23to total 2.47 in 2010, and a slight decrease of .05 in 2011 to total 2.42. Stock holder for Carnival would probably want to hold onto their stock as it shows a consistent trend.

Overall, Carnival has lower liquidity ratios and has much better management of its assets, relies less on debt to finance its assets. Carnival has higher price per earning percentage for 2011. When you look at stock price history, Carnival has a consistent price in the $30’s price range. After looking at all ratio’s from Liquidity Ratios, Leverage ratios, Activity ratios, Profitability ratios and growth ratios. Carnival has great management of its assets and it is stable for investors.

Internal Assessment (B)

Organization as large as Carnival has management team that is broken up to different divisions. It starts from CEO & Chairman Micky Arison, the next tier down is Howard S Frank as the COO who over sees all businesses of company, within that same tiers is David Bernstein who is CFO of all Businesses. The Next tier down is Richard Ames SVP of Shared Services, within same tier Arnaldo Perez SVP General Counsel and Secretary. Next tier down is Larry Freedman who is Chief Accounting Officer and Controller. The last tier down are all the divisional Presidents who manage AIDA Cruises, Carnival Cruise Lines, Carnival Australia, Carnival UK, Costa Crociere S.p.A, Cunard Line, Holland America Line , Princess Cruises and Seabourn Cruise Line. (David, 2013)

If you look at the organization chart Carnival Management team, you see the hierarchical of the line relationship of the chain of command. Carnival runs an effective organization but I would recommend a different approach. The Chain of command will start with the CEO which looks at the overall executive team. The tier below would be Chief operation officer which will manage all internal departments such as Marketing, Sales, Customer Service and Operations. On this same line of command you have Chief financial officer which will manage the accounting department along with the controllers. Next to the CFO you have president of Cruise lines this position will oversee all the regional directors. The next tier down would be American cruise director which will manages all Domestic cruise lines and a European cruise director which will handle all international cruise lines. The next tier down would be the Presidents of Carnival US, Holland America and Princess Cruises. On the same tier you will find Presidents for Aida, Carnival Australia, Carnival UK, Costa Cruises, Cunard and Seabourn. These Presidents will manage all the lower level management such as the Vice Presidents and Managers. This organizational chart has a chain of command that manages all levels of the company. The power of executive has more upper management to the managers and this way there is a clear communication channel to the top. The current organization chart doesn’t have a chain of command that manages the entire company and all its divisions.

When comparing Carnival from its competitors such as Royal Caribbean, Norwegian and Disney you can see where these cruise lines compete with one other. The Profile is broken up by four categories, High Customer Service, Low Customer Service, and Expensive to In-Expensive. Customer Service is large role when it comes to cruising. Prices also play a major role when it comes on choosing a cruise line. I compared all four companies on a 4-7 day cruise to the Caribbean departing from Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Port Canaveral. After comparing the reviews and prices of all four cruises, the most expensive trip was Royal Caribbean. Oasis of the Sea is one of the largest ships cruise ship in the world with a rating of 88% in customer satisfaction and pricing ranging from $749 to $1599(not including taxes, port fees, off season). Travelers rated Disney Dream cruise of 84% with pricing ranging $480 to $1900(not including taxes, port fees, off season, 4 night cruise). Critics gave Carnival Dream a 75% rating with pricing ranging from $299 to $749(not including taxes, port fees, off season).The last company evaluated was Norwegian Epic receiving a 72% rating with prices from $429 to $899(not including taxes, port fees, off season).

Carnival Strategies is to compete by offering the most affordable all inclusive entertainment travel experience anyone can have. Carnival Cruise Lines has 24 ships in its fleet. Carnival purchase used ships and refurbishes them with new enhancements. By doing this Carnival is saving millions of dollars and is able to keep costs low. Another strategy carnival does is that it purchases large amounts of fuel when price of oil is low. Carnival marketing strategy is to brand their name as the fun ship; people are drawn to affordable traveling that has tons of fun. The advantage that Carnival has is that it’s the largest cruise operator in the world. This allows Carnival to have negotiating power politically, along with negotiating new ports or to expand smaller ports. This allows Carnival to increase their ship line and increase demographic reach. The disadvantage is that Carnival is known as the cheapest cruise line with refurbished ships that cater to the masses.

Royal Caribbean strategy is to focus on purchases newer ships. By doing this they are building on their name brand recognition and promoting value to all of their luxury lines. Royal Caribbean disadvantages are that they have expensive ships that need to generate a high return on investment. Another disadvantage are fuel cost this can really affect the profitability of the company. Royal Caribbean main goal is to dominate the cruise industry with one name brand at a time.

Norwegian Cruises line strategy has around 8% market share in industry and growing. The advantage Norwegian has is that they have 13 ships in there fleet. There demographics is growing from North America, Hawaii, Alaska and Europe. Norwegian disadvantages is that there fleet of 13 consist of older to new ships which requires frequent renovations. Having older ships can affect the name brand recognition of Norwegian for having an image of having old ships. Overall Norwegian Cruise Lines has many good attributes that they have introduced, such as casual dining & variety of restaurants and Las Vegas shows. These are popular themes that the industry is following.

Internal Assessment (D)

Carnival’s value is to offer world class service at a fraction of the price. The “Fun Ship” is there motto and that is what they would like to be known for. They spend countless hours trying to create activities that all of the passengers would love and enjoy. Carnival’s number one goal is for all its passengers to have a memorable experience and to return back to its lines.

SWOT Analysis
Strengths
The largest cruise operator in the world with eleven cruise brands0
Carnival most profitable company in the industry.
Has established name brand recognition as the” Fun Ship”.
Carnival has negotiating powers with vendors, ports and political figures.
Able to purchase fuel when prices are low.
Weaknesses
Revenues are dropping.
Carnival generates majority revenues in North America which means economy can affect the company.
Currencies devaluation.
Long term debt on new ship construction.
Opportunity
There is still market share in the vacationing market.
Bigger ships are being made that carry more people.
Asia is an untapped market.
Threats
US Tax loopholes may be expiring
Cap and Trade
Accidents on the ships
Security of the ships from pirates.
Internal Factor Evaluation Matrix
Internal Factor
PESTLE Analysis
Political / Government

Ongoing relations with Politicians and cruise line operators are essentials. Politicians are directly involved on expanding and creating ports, taxes, environmental fees, trade restrictions and tariffs. These projects need the backing from the Politicians. Without agreements with governments, cruise operators would not be able to conduct business in their countries.

Governments and Political factors work hand and hand in the cruise industry. Each countries government is in communication with the cruise ship operators from port facilitation to emergencies safety & rescue occurrences. Depending on the region, Pirates are a continuing problem. Cruise ship companies rely on local governments for protection from these threats. Government plays an important role when it comes to safety & protection.

There are mutual benefits when working together with cruise ship companies. The cruise industry offers an increase of local employment within the city and its ports. For example restaurants, hotels, taxis, theme parks, museums, shops, taxi drivers and travel guides are all positively affected. In some countries tourism brings large sums of revenues to the local city and governments. This enhances the relationship with cruise companies and Politicians.

Economic

The cruise line industry is growing at a growth rate of 8% and more people are traveling today than ever before. Many Economic factors are involved, such as clientele’s economic positions, growth in markets, currencies rates when working international and inflation plays a role. Cruise operators will be affected under management and operational levels. If the price of fuel starts to increase, then this will affect operating cost of the company. If interest rates increase then this will affect the revenues of the company. Economic factor plays a major role of the survival of the company.

Social / Cultural / Demographic

Social factors are measured by the Demographics, Population Growth and Age of their clientele. Popularity destinations and customer experiences will identify cruise industry demands. For example if a certain demographic and age, has a positive experience on their vacation. Then a positive trend will occur for that demographic and age segment. Social studies are important to the cruise industry to determine marketing opportunities on certain segments of the cruise industry.

Today cultural factors play a role when traveling on a cruise ship. There are several cultural destinations from The Caribbean, Alaska, Western Mexico, Mediterranean, Europe, South America and Asia pacific. The Caribbean is most popular cultural destination in the world and Mediterranean is next in popularity. As the cruise industry grows more cultural destinations will be available.

Demographics factors are important when conducting research and development. When conducting research they look at certain segments from Age, Income, Sex, Civil status, Occupancy, Education and Employment status. Conducting market study requires statistical data on each demographics. There are four different segments that are broken down by Luxury, Premium, Contemporary and Special. With all this information gathered, research and development can create a market strategy that will provide valuable information when creating an itineraries or new destinations.

Technological

Technological factors are important externally and internally within the company. Having good communications from management to operations is a critical factor when operating a company. Cruise companies are also looking for new technological advancement that can help improve safety occurrences. New technologies are being developed to assist the multibillion dollar industry. Due to the increase production of new ships, technologies are advancing each year. Cruise ships are looking for the most advanced Maritime technology, GPS systems and Satellite Weathering systems that the industry offers. Now that cruising has become a large part of the travel industry new and safer systems are in demand.

Legal

The Legal factors are important to the cruise industry. The cruise industry has been monitored for many types of law violations, such as employment, consumer, health and safety violations. If any cruise company is caught, violating any of these laws, large fines or criminal penalties can result from it. The legal occurrences can damage political and governmental relations. This is why Legal factors play an important role to the cruise industry.

Environment

The Environment factors have a large impact to the cruise industry. For example climate change and weather can impact the cruise industry as a whole. The cruise ships have advance weathering systems that can detect storm movement. Environmental factors must be addressed when creating newer cruise ship. Cruise operators goals are to decrease the environmental effects to the environment, thus decreasing climate change. For example reverse osmosis systems, shore power systems and wastewater systems all help decrease their environmental footprint. With pressures from Politian’s, cruise companies are forced to implement new environmental friendly technologies that can have a positive effect to the environment.

We have an increase of population size and people will have different needs to have successful healthy and happy lives. For example, a family staying with their aged parents may regard a car as a necessity to ferry his aged parents to their medical appointment. Due to growing need, without a car to provide the mobility they need, many are force to travel in a less desirable manner. Hence, we could see that the majority of mode of transportation used by most of people in Singapore is car.

Car however has led to a series of problems including air pollution, congestion and growing greenhouse gas emission because a running car’s engine produces large amount of carbon dioxide being emitted into the atmosphere every day. According to Katzev (2003), automobiles are also a major source of carbon dioxide, the so-called green-house gas, which many claim is the principle source of global warming. As such, we need to start as a group of community thinking about more sustainable form of transport in Singapore. One potential alternative to removing cars on the road is through car-sharing scheme. This research will focuses on the opportunities to present to Singapore through this car sharing scheme in our transportations. This is the more sustainable option in the long-run.

In 2012, there were more than 520,000 private cars registered in Singapore. The motor vehicle population in Singapore which include private and company cars, rental cars, taxis, buses, motorcycles, goods and other vehicles were increased by 1.45% from 951,307 in 2011 to 965,192 in 2012 (Singapore Police Force, 2013). Such a large number of private cars reduce the efficiency of the transport system by taking up road space that is needed by public transport and commercial vehicles. The government had tried a series of measures to reduce car overpopulation and traffic congestion by heavily taxing the purchase and use of cars as well as with recently announced that COE prices increase to reach more than S$95,000. However, this had the unintended effect of pricing out people who are in need of a car as does not table the problem of overpopulation. This is because as the population grows, the numbers of cars on Singapore growth will continue to grow.

The need of Singapore transportation become more sustainable

In Singapore, despite there are a lot cars on the road, we need to decrease cars on the road to make the transport more sustainable, one potential ways by doing this is through car-sharing scheme. Singapore is a small island city-state country whereby we cannot afford to ignore the effects that transport that has on health and the environment. The environment is our priority and Singapore needs to keep the environment as pristine as possible.

Our economy depends on an efficient transport system to delivery smoothly a flow of goods and personnel to where they are needed. Our limited supply of land also means that we have to allocate resources to transport system very carefully. Hence, it’s important to adopt a greener form of transport.

Nevertheless, we understand that no matter how efficient Singapore public transport system are, can never fully meet every mobility need. Despite of an excellent MRT system and efficient taxi system, alternatives are required to allow for Singaporean to make different choices about going around on the island. Car-sharing scheme is such a choice for such opportunities to remove cars on the road while still allowing people to get around as they need to.

Car-sharing scheme, a new approach to sustainable transportation in Singapore

Car-sharing is a pay-as-you-drive transportation service introduced in many modern cities to build a sustainable urban transportation strategy and environment-friendly urban community. This amazing green business idea works because people save money, and lose the hassles of ownership, yet still able to access to a car when they need one. The car-sharing growth in Singapore is mainly boosted by the rise of COE price. Higher COE prices are driving people to look for cheaper and more flexible options and therefore would able to push people towards using public transport, or opt for car-sharing.

Car-sharing allows individual to gain the benefits of using a private car without the costs of responsibility of owning a car. The benefits of car-sharing can include – more careful consideration of the necessity, duration, and distance of automobile trips, resulting in decreased vehicle use and ownership, and reduced parking demand and traffic congestion. Besides, car-sharing will be greater consideration given to alternative mode, resulting in increase of MRT passengers. Car-sharing also provide cost saving to individual and employers, energy savings and air quality benefits as well as reduce the emission of carbon dioxide. Despite to its many potential benefits, car-sharing may gain in popularity in Singapore as demonstrated by increasing North American membership.

Through car-sharing scheme, we are able to reduce cars on the road which led to less congestion, less pollution, less dependence on oil, and cleaner, fresher air to breath.

Car-sharing Operators in Singapore

There are about 300 car-sharing vehicles located in over 100 locations in Singapore. Land Transport Authority (LTA) is working closely with HDB and car-sharing operators to provide more locations across the island to make it more convenient for users to access a car-sharing service in the near future. In Singapore, currently have a few car-sharing service providers: Car Club, Whizzcar and Kah Share. Clean Mobility Singapore, an environmental start-up company that provides electric cars for hire launched in Buona Vista-Ayer Rajah area and have designated parking lots in Pixel Building, Biopolis, Fusionpolis, Insead Campus and Block 71 Ayer Rajah Crescent. Clean Mobility is part of the Energy Market Authority and Land Transport Authority’s three-year, electric-vehicle trial costing $20 million (The Straits Times, 2011). The Straits Times (2013) had reported that more than 150 people have plugged into a year-old electric car-sharing sharing scheme operated under the brand name Smove. Meantime, Kah Share, Whizz Car and Car Club have reported an increase of between 15 per cent and 35 per cent each in membership numbers (The Straits Times, 2011).

Government Intervention

Like many other cities, Singapore faces the challenge of managing traffic congestion. With a fixed quantity of road space, each additional vehicle adds to the demand of road space and increases congestions for every other vehicle and pollutes the environment. Singapore is a land of scarcity, the country does not have the luxury to allow everyone to own a car and that car ownership cannot be put under the same category as basic necessity such as housing (Channelnewsasia, 2013). As part of effort to reduce carbon emission from car, the Singapore government implemented the Vehicle Quota System (VQS) which allows the government to control the amount of cars on the road.

Vehicle quota system – The VQS is controlled by the Certificate of Entitlement. The purpose is to limiting the number of newly purchase vehicles and aims for sustainable growth in vehicle population. The buyer has to bid to purchase a COE which is valid for 10 years before the vehicle can be use on road. The government had decided to reduce the allowable vehicle growth rate from 3 per cent per annum which was the rate since vehicle quota system introduced in 1990, to 1.5 per cent per annum in 2009, and further reduced it to one percent per annum in 2012 and 0.5 per cent per annum in February 2013. The COE premiums for small cars (up to 1,600cc) breached the $90,000 mark, finishing the year’s first bidding session at $92,100 on January 2013. This is up 12.4 per cent from last month’s bidding where prices ended at $81,889. Prices for big cars in Cat B (above 1,600 cc) also reached a new high, ending at $96,210. The previous record-breaking price was $94,502 in August 2012 (icarsclub, 2013).

Figure .1: COE Open Bidding Result (Source: sgcarmart.com, 2013)

Taxes and fees on vehicles – Every car in Singapore is taxed by an import (Customs) duty, registration fee, an additional registration fee, and road tax which make owning a car in Singapore very expensive. The import duty is 31% of the import value of the car, on top of that, a Registration Fee is charged for private cars and on top of that, an Additional Registration Fee (ARF) is charged. The (ARF) is 100% of the Open Market Value (OMV) of the vehicle.

Public parking charges have been raised and also additional surcharges were levied to discourage car use. Others cost such as insurance, Electronic Road Pricing (ERP), petrol and maintenance cost which are extremely costly for an average earning individual and thus it helps to control car population. Hence, implementation of government regulations with soaring premiums for COEs, taxes and fees or charges, it had directly boosted the use of car-sharing for the people who need to travel around the island. For a successful car sharing scheme in Singapore, Singapore government has to play its part in addressing the problems of climate change and looking at ways and measures to reduce our emission.

Research Question

Our research will focus on the primary and secondary question in view of the solution to road congestion, pollution and other environmental and resource consequences of automobile dependence through car-sharing.

1.2.1 Primary Research Question

Our research question is what are the benefits and opportunities for using car-sharing scheme to make Singapore transports system become more sustainable.

1.2.2 Secondary Research Questions

The scopes that this research is focusing on:

What is car-sharing scheme and how does Car-sharing works;

What are the benefits of car-sharing scheme;

Who benefits from car-sharing scheme;

Which countries have already develop car-sharing scheme

The Scope of the Research

The study will focuses on the benefits of car sharing scheme in our transportation option for many people in meeting the transportation needs in an economically and environmentally responsible manner in Singapore.

Research Method

The research method we will be using is both qualitative and quantitative research approach. The quantitative method will be based on the research question analyses based on the current situation and analyses through literature review. The qualitative method shall be gathering information through sets of questionnaire on a focus group of employees, employers and retirees at a few point of location in Singapore.

Research Objective

The main objective of the research is to understand the problems of increasing car population which led to a serious problem of air pollution, congestion and growing of greenhouse gas emission and to identify the opportunities and benefits of car-sharing scheme as an alternative transportation mode towards sustainable form of transport in Singapore.

Limitation

This research will be discussing the benefits of car-sharing scheme using normal car and only within Singapore based on the knowledge and understanding gather from collected information sources and data. There will be limitation to forecast whether of the impact and growth car-sharing scheme by using electric car. It may impractical at this moment although electric car have the potential to reduce our carbon emission significantly if adopted on a large scale and government play its part promoting green vehicle by provide a range of incentives or rebates. However, the technology is still in the early stages of development. Beside, in order for electric car to have a positive impact on reducing emission, the energy grid empowering these cars need be from a sustainable source like solar or wind. Due to the cost of buying a hybrid vehicle is much higher than of a normal car, users, limited range of electric vehicle as well as the charging time. The information and data will be obtained from published news and journals except the information from questionnaires.

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
Definition and explanation of car-sharing scheme

Car sharing is a revolution in personal transportation – urban mobility for the 21st century. Carsharing is designed to replace car ownership for people who do not need to drive to work every day, and to significantly reduce road congestion and greenhouse gas emissions. It is a service that provides 24/7 self-serve access to a network of cars stationed around the city (and increasingly, cities world-wide), which can be reserved by the hour or day via smart phones, Internet and call centres (Carsharing, 2013).

Automobile, despite its numerous benefits, is largely responsible for many of the environmental and social problems in the world today (Katzev, 2003), which Singapore is one of such countries. The dependence on automobile has contributed traffic congestion and pollution to the air of Singapore. Therefore, in order to reduce traffic congestion and reduce the environmental impact contributed by automobile in Singapore, numerous efforts have been made by the government to reduce vehicle population growth rate by increasing the Car of Entitlement (COE) prices for cars or reducing the quota for COE.

Car-sharing is first introduced in Singapore by NTUC Income in 1997 since the rise of COE prices and over the years, the interest in car-sharing has risen as car-sharing is the ticket for drivers who cannot afford or do not want to own a car (The Strait Times, 2012).

Differ from car-pooling, car-sharing is a process whereby people share or rent a car without having to bear the responsibilities of car ownership and costs. Whereas in car-pooling, it is a group of individuals taking the same car together to get to a common destination at the same time. In car-sharing scheme, the car-sharing companies pay all of the costs of vehicle maintenance, service, and repairs. This includes insurance coverage, parking, and the cost of fuel (Katzev, 2003). Also differ from conventional car rentals, car-sharing companies operate by placing cars near to member’s home or office when the needs to use the cars arise. (Martin & Shaheen 2011). The pay-as-you-drive or pay-per-use transportation service which provided by the car sharing companies offer drivers another alternative and freedom of using the car. Drivers get to enjoy the benefits of a car without having to own one for a short period of time based on their travelling needs, such as hourly or daily basis. The drivers are also allowed to choose the types of cars according to their needs.

This scheme is introduced in many modern cities to build a sustainable and environment-friendly urban community (Land Transport Authority, 2013). A research done in the North America shows that one shared vehicle can take 6 to 33 privately owned vehicles off the road. This is made possible by reducing the number of private vehicle required to complete non-work trips (Green Business Times, 2013). Hence, car-sharing reduced congestion on the road as it reduces car ownership and people dependency on privately owned vehicles. Car-sharing also has environmental impact to the environment. According to the article stated in Green Business Times (2013), ‘vehicle miles traveled by members dropped by 67%, yet they were able to maintain mobility and convenience of transportation while getting access to a wider variety of cars. The drop in vehicle miles traveled will have a huge environmental impact that results in a decrease in greenhouse gas emissions from 39% to 64%’.

Since its inception, car-sharing has grown rapidly and it has become more common worldwide, especially in Europe and North America (Shaheen, Sperling & Wagner 1999). Car-sharing membership has increased by 360% worldwide between 2006 and 2010 (Carsharing, 2013) and as of January 2011, North American car-sharing companies served almost 604,000 members with about 10,000 vehicles. (Martin & Shaheen 2011).

2.1.1 How car-sharing works in Singapore

It usually takes less than 5 minutes from reserving to collecting a car-sharing vehicle and the whole process is automated and it is self-service just like having a own car. To use the car, the user can follow the steps listed below:

Join as a member

User who wishes to car-share must first join as a member at any of the car-sharing company. After which, members will receive a personal keyfob/ smartcard. The keyfob/ smartcard is use to unlock an electronic box where the car keys are kept.

Making reservation for the car

When there is a need to use the car, member can make reservation via smart phones, Internet and call centres. The reservation can be made within a few minute notice or few days in advance. The booking will be keyed into a computer and transmitted to the electronic box.

Collecting the car

The cars are normally parked near to user’s home or office in designated car park spaces. The electronic box is located in the member’s estate and the member can unlock the box when the member slots in their keyfob/ smart card. His booking particular will be copied onto the keyfob/ smart card and he can then collect the key.

Driving the car

During reservation period, member will just use the car just like his own.

Returning the car

When member has finished using the car, he needs to return the car back to the same location where he has collected the car. He also needs to place the key back to the electronic box.

The trip usage is automatically recorded and the member can view their usage record online.

Payment

The invoice is then generated and payment will be made through GIRO or credit card monthly to the car-sharing service companies.

If a member does not return the car on time, he will have to pay a penalty, which will be used to compensate the next member who had booked the car but was inconvenienced due to late return from the former member (Carsharing, 2013).

Benefits of car-sharing

Due to recent high COE, it is getting more and more difficult for one to own a car in Singapore nowadays. Some of the major social benefits of car-sharing are such as lower emissions, ease traffic congestion, convenience and cost savings for individuals and businesses, better utilization of land and energy resources and reduce the demand for car park spaces.

2.2.1 Less pollution to the environment

Motor vehicle usage is a major source of air and noise pollution in the world today. It has contributed 70% of the carbon monoxide, 45% of the nitrogen oxides, and 33% of hydrocarbon emissions in the world (Katzev, 2003). The combustion process of fuel in motor engines emit Carbon Monoxide (CO) will not only pollute the air quality, it also harm the human body through respiration (Sing Health 2013).

Motor vehicles are also a major source of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, which many claim is the principal source of global warming (Katzev, 2003). Besides carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide, other greenhouse gases such as nitrous oxide, methane and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) are also released from the combustion process of fuel in motor engines. These gases caused global warming to the Earth which the temperature will increase and trap the radiated heat from escaping out (Nutramed, 2011).

In the United State, low emission motor vehicles contribute to lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. AutoShare and U Car Share offer additional greenhouse gases reductions through partnerships with carbon-offset companies. Many customers report an increase in environmental awareness after joining a carsharing organization (Shaheen, North American car-sharing, 2008).

Noise pollution is also an issue to the environment. With more motor vehicles on the road, the noises created from the engine revolutions can be a nuisance to the environment. Especially during traffic congestion, the noise level can be high and it may disrupt the concentration of one’s mind.

With fewer vehicles on the road through car sharing, the level to Carbon Monoxide (CO) will eventually be reduced, thus causing lesser carbon monoxide emitted to the environment.

2.2.2 Less traffic congestions

http://driving-in-singapore.spf.gov.sg/services/driving_in_singapore/images/information/traffic_statistics/fatality.jpg

Figure .1 : Fatal and Injury Accident Rate Per 10,000 Vehicle Population (Source: Singapore Police Force, 2013)

Car-sharing helps to tame traffic because it reduces solo driving (Wang, 2011). According to the graph, Singapore has an increasing figure in vehicle population by 1.45% from 951,307 in 2011 to 965,192 in 2012 (Singapore Police Force, 2013). This is a great number for Singapore as our country is limited in land area and the increasing vehicle population creates more traffic congestions.

Traffic congestion is an increasingly serious problem in many cities. For example United States, traffic tie-ups, especially during peak hours timing, are estimated to cost the United States 1.2 billion hours of lost time and 2.2 billion gallons of gasoline each year, to say nothing of the estimated $30 billion annual loss in productivity alone (Katzev, 2013).

Due to the increasing numbers of motor vehicles on the road, the danger faced by the road users, especially motorcyclists are still an issue. Despite last year’s drop in the fatal and injury accidents, there are still a significant number of deaths on our roads. The increase in the number of traffic violations remains a concern as every traffic violation can potentially result in a fatal or injury accident and the loss of lives (Singapore Police Force, 2013).

As an alternative measure of reducing the amount of vehicle population, car sharing can provide road users with a choice. Some of Singapore car sharing companies such as CarClub provides to their customers a wide variety of motor vehicles to choose from to cater for different kind of occasions (CarClub, 2013).

Because the drivers of the car sharing scheme are charged accordingly to the amount of mileage logged, therefore drivers would plan their trip carefully in order to make unnecessary drive trips.

The implementation of car sharing can also reduce the amount of motor vehicles on the road if 5 people sharing a car to the common destination rather than driving on personal motor vehicles.

2.2.3 Reducing the cost of traveling to destination

Traveling to a destination by private vehicles can be costly. With Singapore implemented ERP (Electronic Road Pricing), It will be expensive to travel to CBD area during peak hours by personal vehicles. In addition, the cost of parking in business towers in CBD area can be costly too.

The cost of owning a private car can be a burden in Singapore. As the price of Certificate of Entitlement (COE) is hiking, a measure by the Singapore Government in order to maintain or reduce the amount of motor vehicles on the road, which can be costly. According to report, a price of a Cherry QQ in Singapore with COE can match up for a Porsche Boxster Black Edition in the US (AsiaOne, 2012); this shows how the soaring COE price has turned the ownership of motor vehicle as a huge expenditure.

Car sharing is different from rent a car from car rental, car sharing gives individuals access to a car for brief trips, in some cases as short as a half hour, charging only for the time and duration of each trip. In contrast, car rental companies charge the full daily rate, regardless of the duration or distance of travel. In addition, customers that rent a car must pay for the petrol cost required to fill the vehicle’s tank at the time it is returned, while the car-sharing companies pays all the costs of fuel, as well as insurance, vehicle maintenance, service, and repairs (Katzev, 2003).

As car sharing scheme in Singapore, drivers can save amount money on the cost of owning a private motor vehicles including maintenance fees, annual road taxes and motor vehicle insurance payable. Car sharing not only offers to non-car owners the driving experience; it has also offers a much cheaper alternative to travel to their destination that in private motor vehicles.

Car sharing has also provided Singapore a much cheaper alternative to travel than by taxi. Traveling by mode of taxi can be expensive. The rates and surcharges can add up to a high cost.

Surcharges such as peak hour charges, midnight charges and location charges are included in different timing and location.

Some of car sharing companies in Singapore such as CarClub provides to their customers with different price plans. CarClub comes with value plan and standard plan to cater to every customer’s needs. Value plan is cater for more for regular drivers whereas standard plan is cater more occasional drivers (CarClub, 2013). With different available price plans, drivers can choose the most appropriate plans to suit their driving frequency and save money. University students and low-income households also benefit from the flexibility and mobility that carsharing offers (Shaheen, North American car-sharing, 2008).

With the recently tightening measure by the Singapore government, it has become more difficult for low and middle income group to purchase a private motor vehicle as buyers have to foot a down payment of 40 per cent or more for a new vehicle and have a maximum of five years to service their car loans (ChannelNewsAsia, 2013). Therefore, car sharing can be a more afford to the market for low and middle income groups.

2.2.4 Better connection

Car sharing has provided users a better connection between different modes of transports, making it easier for the public to connect major transport nodes and therefore reducing the need to drive to their destination.

Car sharing can provide better access to place where has limited access. For example, HDB residential area where the distance to the nearest public transport node is far away, it may be difficult for elderly or disabled people to travel.

Motor vehicles in the car-sharing fleet are usually located close to the user’s residence, whereas those belonging to the rental companies are parked in central areas or major transportation hubs. Finally, those who want to rent a vehicle are required to complete time-consuming paperwork before they can drive the vehicle, whereas car sharers need only phone or go online to reserve a vehicle prior to using it (Katzev, 2003)

In Singapore, CarClub has offered their customers with over 60 HDB car parks around Singapore to pick up the vehicles and available on 24/7 which provides ease and convenience (CarClub, 2013).

Who benefits from car-sharing?

The ultimate purpose of car-sharing are reducing the number of cars, increasing the efficiency of transport infrastructure and also changing behavior through alterations in mobility patterns. This has actually benefits to environment, social and government.

2.3.1 Environment

2.3.1.1 Creation a Potential for Better Quality of Life and Urban Form

Car-sharing has proved its potential to reduce the negative impacts of social and environment. Monitoring of air quality takes place at stations around Singapore, and plays an important role in keeping the population up to date on haze conditions (National Environment Agency, 2013). Air emissions from the industries and motor vehicles are the two key sources of air pollution domestically (National Environment Agency, 2013). Each car-sharing vehicle can replace 4 privately owned vehicles (CarClub, 2013). Thus, car-sharing reduces the numbers of cars on the road; fewer cars equal fewer emissions of greenhouse gases. This means less pollution; decrease congestion on the road as well as reducing the amount of space used for parking and helps to regain space for environmental and other social uses.

2.3.1.2 Reduction of COa‚‚ Burden of Transport

Car-sharing is a pay-as-you-drive transportation service introduced to build a sustainable and environmentally-friendly urban community. This service provides an incentive for people to use car less and instead use public transport, a bike or walk. People have a greater variety of transport options available to them as when deciding the best way to reach their destination. Commuting by public transportation reduces your carbon emissions by 20 lbs per day, 4,800 lbs per year, which is more than if you weatherized your home, converted to fluorescent bulbs and replaced an old refrigerator, combined (PromotingPublic Transport, 2013).

2.3.1.3 Reduction of Energy Consumption

An environmentally friendly car-sharing operator provides a wide range of vehicles to choose. They can choose different types of vehicles to fit their needs. Example, a small city car is usually most energy-efficient and less pollution; an estate cars are likely to be necessary for family trips; and a van may require for group travel. Users choose the vehicle type that best meets their needs for a particular trip. This benefits consumers, and may provide external benefits by reducing the use of oversized vehicles when smaller vehicles are adequate (Litman, 1999).

2.3.2 Society

Car-sharing helps make communities more alive, attractive, safe, and less dependent on the private automobile, and contribute to a range of transportation, housing, economic development and social justice goals (City Car Share, 2013).

2.3.2.1 Save Money and Go Green

Car-sharing is an ideal for people who only need a car occasionally and or when the need arises. By car-sharing scheme, people still can access to a private car without having responsibilities of ownership such as obtain a Certificate of Entitlement (COE), car insurance premium, car maintenance and repair costs, monthly installment, season car parking charges and road tax. In Singapore, 87% of members in NTUC’s car-sharing co-op average only 2,000km in distance driven each year, which is much less than average mileage of the average private car owner (Singapore Environmental Vision, 2013). Car sharing saves you money, it’s greener, more affordable, and less stressful than driving and paying for a car you don’t even need anymore (Cereplast, 2013).

2.3.2.2 Provide Mobility

Car-sharing provides access to a vehicle for low-income households and others without a car, helping them to fully participate in the region’s opportunities (CityCarShare, 2013). Low-income households may not be able to afford the expenses as a car ownership, thus public transport maybe their only option. Car-sharing can provide access for job interviews, serve as an “emergency ride home”, and meet the demand for occasional shopping and leisure trips (CityCarShare, 2013). With car-sharing scheme, they are now financially possible to join, in turn improving mobility by providing access to a vehicle.

2.3.2.3 Improves Commuting Options

Car-sharing offers a commuter option that may work better than other methods of transportation. With a car-sharing option, a public commuter is empowered to decide the best way to reach his or her destination, i.e. by bus, MRT, taxi or to drive a car (CSAS, 2013). Currently, there are about 300 car-sharing vehicles located in over 100 locations in Singapore (Land Transport Authority, 2013). It is very convenient for users to access a car-sharing. Also, car-sharing provides the flexibility and convenience of a car when driving is a better choice compared to the buses, MRT or taxis.

2.3.3 Government

Transport issues affect the average Singaporean in a very intimate manner.

This document is based on the Harvard Business Case study about Carnival Cruise Lines Applegate, Kwortnik, Piccoli, 2006. It is written as a master thesis for the Master of Information Management (MIM) studies by Christianne Aussems, Nathalie Claes, Eric Janssen and Corne van Schaik, under the supervision of Piet Ribbers, Professor of Information Management, all at TiasNimbas Business School in Tilburg.

1.1 About this report

This report describes the information management strategy for Carnival Cruise Lines (CCL) for the period 2007-2011. It proposes changes in organization, management, systems, and governance structure for CCL and describes the implementation plan, including prioritization and a costs and benefits analysis. The target audience of the report is Myles Cyr, CIO of Carnival Cruise Lines, and in addition for the strategic management level of CCL.

1.2 Assignment description | Aim and Scope

[Bob Dickinson informed the board about the goals for the next years. He wants Carnival Cruise Lines to stay the market leader and to improve the repeat guest rate. He is convinced that the potential value of customer data is growing. Therefore he is looking for a way to manage customer relationships more adequately. In the meeting he also mentioned the desire to reduce the gap between quality improvements and customer perceptions of the services.

Myles Cyr agrees on establishing a new sales strategy for the years to come and on the necessity to know the customers better. He wants to incorporate an overall vision on and evaluation of the information architecture and the existing information systems.

At this moment he and Dwayne Warner are thinking of starting the preparation an extensive revision (possibly a rebuild) of the shipboard systems (Property Management System and Point of Sale Systems) including the replacement of the Sail & Sign card (with magnetic strip) by a chip card in combination with the introduction of portable equipment based on the IP protocol.

Myles Cyr explicitly asks to elaborate on the opportunities of IS to contribute to the business and to the value chain. The board is expecting that the relative IT operating costs can be reduced in the next years. He expects an analysis and evaluation of the current state of IT/IS. What is good? What possible weaknesses are there? What problems have to be solved? Which improvements are opportune? He expects a balanced report containing your proposals to enhance the quality of data processing and information provisioning (including handling customer data). Carnival Cruise Lines can only resist and beat the market forces, if the company is innovative, acts agile and reacts fast and effectively to changes in the markets.]

Topics to be incorporated in report:

-Existing bottle necks that have to be removed.

-Changes in organization, management, control concept and governance.

-Changes in systems, data processing and data provisioning.

-Change management process to meet the proposal.

-Implementation plan including prioritization.

-Risk assessment of the components of your advice.

-Improvement of security and risk management (especially privacy protection).

-Costs and benefits analysis of the proposed alternatives.

1.3 Structure

Beschrijven van fase naar fase Cindy

1.4 Approach

To gather extra information on IT in the cruising sector there was the opportunity to do qualitative research at another cruising organization being Royal Caribbean.

Gekozen voor andere maatschappij om huidige bedrijfsvoering niet te verstoren/verontrusten?

The research performed here was qualitative research trough semi structured interviews As described in the bookaˆ¦ p467. For this research the entire IT executive team (see appendix) was found willing and able to participate.

Interview guides were created, for these interviews. These described the goals and topics of the interview and the questions to be asked. This gave the researchers a structure to ask the questions, not to forget important questions and not to get distracted from the goals of the interview. On the other hand this approach also gave flexibility to discuss unforeseen but relevant topics.

On forehand it was not clear for all the interviewees what their role and responsibilities where and what to ask them . This approach also gave the flexibility to start the interview with just a few questions but in the end having gathered a lot of information. Being able to interview more than 10 different IT executives in different roles and on different levels also gave an insight on important topics on that moment.

Interview guide interview minutes

For the execution of the interviews there was a clear division of the roles between the interviewers, there was one interviewer in the lead for asking the questions, one checking whether all the questions were asked and one making notes for the meeting minutes.

Ruimte

Literatuur

1.5 Constraints

Timing

Tool selectie reeds gedaan

2. Carnival Cruise Lines Today

Carnival Corporation & plc is a global cruise company and one of the largest vacation companies in the world. Carnival generates all of its revenues from the cruise industry. The companies wide-ranging product offerings provide guests with exceptional vacation experiences at an outstanding value. The success in providing quality cruise vacations has made Carnival the most profitable company in the leisure travel industry. Carnival’s stock is dually listed on both the New York Stock Exchange and on the London Stock Exchange under symbol CCL. Carnival is the only company in the world to be included in both the S&P 500 index in the United States and the FTSE 100 index in the United Kingdom (Carnival Corporation & PLC, 2012).

Carnival Corporation operates a fleet of 100 ships, with another seven ships scheduled for delivery between now and March 2016. With approximately 200,000 guests and 77,000 shipboard employees, there are more than 277,000 people sailing aboard the Carnival fleet at any given time (Carnival Corporation & PLC, 2012).

For the purpose of our report it is crucial to understand how the Carnival Cruise Lines corporation works today. We need to understand how the various aspects of the business are set up and how they work together. Only after a true understanding of the current situation, we can come with proposals for improvement and indicate the impact on current ways of working.

In literature one can fine many models that can be used to look at an organization with an internal perspective. In appendix X we provide an overview of some management models we have found in literature, with an explanation why, when and how it should be used. Since our report needs to cover the implementation of a new IT management strategy, we have decided to use McKinsey’s 7S model. This model, developed in the 1980’s, involves 7 factors, which can be categorized as hard and soft elements. Hard elements can be identified and influenced more easily. They would be driven by the organization charts and reporting lines within the business and they may include the systems you use to get work done. Soft elements are, by their very nature, more difficult to manage and may be affected by the culture of the organization. But you have to apply yourself to these as much as the hard elements, as they provide the support structure for the successful implementation of any change, and they are all interdependent on each other.

Figure X 7S framework (McKinsey)

The hard elements in the 7S-model are Strategy, Structure and Systems; the soft elements are Style, Shared Values, Skills and Staff. In order to understand the 7S-model better a brief explanation is given below.

Hard elements:

Strategy – by using mission and vision the organization’s objectives become clear.

Structure – how is the organization structured and which hierarchical layers are there

Systems – all formal and informal methods of operation, procedures and communication flows

Soft elements:

Style – this is about leadership and management styles

Shared values – the standards and values and other forms of ethics within an organization in which vision, corporate culture and identity are the key elements

Skills – these concern both the skills of the organization and those of the employees

Staff – this is about the employees, their competences and job descriptions

2.1 Strategy of CCL

The mission of Carnival Corporation is to take the world on vacation and deliver exceptional experiences through many of the world’s best-known cruise brands that cater to a variety of different geographic regions and lifestyles, all at an outstanding value unrivaled on land or at sea (Carnival Corporation & PLC, 2012).

The vision statement of Carnival is the following: to consistently deliver fun, memorable vacations at a repeat value.

Derived from this mission and vision, Carnival Cruise Lines has set up the following strategic objectives:

to be the leading cruise operator in all segments entered and to maintain the most up-to-date fleet of cruise ships in the world

to develop new cruise segments and innovative cruise packages to reach a larger number of potential and past cruisers

employ sophisticated promotional efforts to achieve a greater awareness by the public concerning the availability and afford ability of cruise travel

attract the first-time and younger cruisers (Carnival), experienced cruisers (Holland America), upscale cruisers(Seaborne), and cruisers wanting a sailing vacation (Windstar)

promote cruises as an alternative to land-based vacations

provide a variety of activities as well as ports of call

be innovative in all respects of operations of the ship. BRON

Dominant market share

Carnival’s biggest strength is its huge scale and scope. It is twice as large as its biggest competitor and competes in nearly every market and segment worldwide. This gives Carnival enormous power over the cruise industry as a whole. It enables the company to undertake projects that grow the industry, gives it a platform for continued mergers and acquisitions activity, and helps Carnival negotiate with major manufacturers of cruise ships (Levin, Jones, & Slade, 2011).

Strong acquisition strategy

Carnival has the ability to obtain companies through acquisitions. By using an acquisition strategy, the Corporation has been able to position itself in each geographical market in the world and rank itself as number one in the cruising sector.

Comprehensive portfolio

The corporation has a large fleet capacity and operates 11 of the most recognizable cruise brand names. Carnival’s portfolio of brand names appeals to almost every niche market, from budget minded, contemporary to luxury cruises. Each cruise line operates globally and is targeted at one or more nationalities (see Appendix X).

2.2 Structure of CCL

Carnival Corporation & plc has two main headquarters, Carnival Place in the US and Carnival House in the UK. The constituent Corporation and plc are separate listed companies with different shareholder bodies, but they jointly own all the operating companies in the group. Carnival Corporation owns the majority stake. As part of the merger between Carnival Corporation and P&O Princess Cruises in 2002, it was agreed that P&O Princess would be relisted as Carnival plc in London, remaining a separate company with a predominantly British shareholder body. Both headquarters have their own management team, strategy, and IT organization.

Uncoordinated business operations

Historically, Carnival has been run by the Arison family as a coalition of largely independent businesses. Each cruise line largely manages its own customers, marketing, distribution, sales, ports, and logistics. This approach has had benefits: internal competition means that each line operates better than any would in isolation. The business operations of the cruise lines are not centrally managed. Better coordination of these business operations could generate additional benefits for Carnival (Levin, Jones, & Slade, 2011).

Strong financial position

Carnival is one of the most profitable cruising companies. The company’s average net income (FY2005 to FY2009) amounted to 18.1% compared to the industry standard of 6.3% (Marketingteacher, 2012). The firm is dual listed on the New York Stock Exchange and the London Stock Exchange under the symbol CCL. Since the company is dual listed, it has the ability to raise more funds from investor than its competitors. With this also come greater stability due to different markets being affected by different economic occurrences, political issues, and society’s views (Corporate information, 2006).

Decreasing profit

The profit of Carnival has diminished over the last years. The net profit was $1,790 million in FY2009, a decrease of 23.2% as compared to 2008. Another weakness is that Carnival reports their financial statements in dollars. About half of their revenue is generated in a non-US currency, but is reported in terms of US dollars. The value of the dollar against Euro appreciated from 1.60 in January 2010 to 1.53 by April 2010 against the Pound. If the dollar strengthens it would record a lower revenue than is actually earned (Marketingteacher, 2012).

Clear focus cost leadership

Carnival Cruise Lines has a clear focus on Cost Leadership, i.e. CCL offers its product to the mass market. Therefore the highest focus is put on the price and keeping the price as low as possible. Once the customer is on board the ship, additional revenue is created by having the customer pay for everything that was not covered in the base price. Carnival is such a large company that it has significant cost advantages over most of its competitors.

Strong marketing

Carnival invests explicitly and effectively in print and television media. Their promotions target the lifestyles of each group of customers (Marketingteacher, 2012).

Over-dependence on US market

Carnival derives a majority of its revenue (nearly 52%) from US customers. In 2009 the revenue from the North American market registered a double digit decline. The over-dependence on the US market makes Carnival vulnerable to the economic fluctuations of the American economy and this company is dependent on customers’ disposable income] (Marketingteacher, 2012).

Poor safety record

There is no public database of major cruise accidents, but Carnival has a notably worse safety record than other cruise companies. The Costa Concordia tragedy has been the most recent in Carnival’s safety woes.

The Center for Disease Control does track all major viral outbreaks on cruise lines. In the 2009-2011 period, Carnival-owned companies accounted for 56% of all viral outbreaks, compared to a 48% average market share. The company is also thought to have a worse safety record for persons lost at sea, especially in the Carnival brand: of the 179 disappearances since 2000, Carnival Cruise Line alone accounts for nearly 30% of them (Levin, Jones, & Slade, 2011).

Incidents/Bad press

In 2009, Carnival experienced bad press when three passengers fell off ships in a three week period. There were a total of 22 incidents of passengers falling overboard in 2009. In December 2008, passengers on the Carnival owned Oceania cruise ship were attacked by Somali pirates. Such events reflect negatively on the company and the industry.

2.3 Systems in CCL

Within Carnival Cruise Lines every brand is seen as a separate business unit, with its own profit and loss statement.

Decentralized systems

This decentralization translates into a decentralization of systems as well. Decisions aren’t always communicated from the one cruise line to the other, which leads to duplication of effort. This decentralization of the business organization translates to the IT organization as well. Every brand has its own IT department with own systems and infrastructure.

Legacy systems

There are many legacy systems, since there aren’t many players in the cruising sector, most of the strategic important applications are custom made. This leads to a spaghetti landscape in which integration is very difficult and which affects the speed to market significantly.

No integrated CRM system

Carnival doesn’t use an integrated CRM system for the whole corporation. Customers from the one cruise line aren’t recognized as a repeat customer with a different cruise line within the group, this has an immediate effect on the pricing for repeat customers.

The yearly capital planning of investments is done on US and UK Headquarter level as well as on the different cruise line level. This will most likely lead to lack on synchronization and duplication of costs and efforts.

2.4 Style within CCL

The leadership style at Carnival Cruise Lines can be called family-like. People with the right skills are hired and are giving the support and room to do their jobs correctly. This family-like leadership style is a management style that Ted Arison already used when he was still steering the company. Ted Arison had a non-hierarchical approach to management, meaning that he delegated a lot of work downwards in the organization, allowing him to oversee the bigger picture.

People are encouraged to be hands-on and take calculated risks. Taking risks also means that mistakes can occur, however Carnival uses a no blame culture through which people feel empowered (Managementparadise, 2012).

Carnival has a separate training and development department set up in the organization. The corporation invests heavily in coaching of high potentials by giving them learning opportunities that are fit for their personal needs.

2.5 Shared values of CCL

Derived from the mission and vision of Carnival (see 2.1.1) the company has set some company values that wear a high priority. These values are: Honesty, integrity, fairness, hospitality and teamwork. The values are deemed important to do their job in a correct manner.

Carnival, as all other cruise lines in the industry, takes much proud in the focus they put on the environment. They invest heavily in health and safety, both for customers and for employees. There is a very strong focus on the environment and to work in a greener way. Charity is also one of the key components of their social responsibility strategy.

2.6 Skills at CCL

Working in the leisure industry requires some specific skills that you cannot always learn. Most important skills that someone working in the leisure industry would need, are the following:

Customer focused

Empathy

Team work

Stress resistant

Multi-cultural

Service orientation

Multi linguistic

Since Carnival Cruise Lines wants to be seen as the cruise line that delivers fun, the attitude of the employees is very important as well. The employees need to be cheerful and enthusiastic.

2.7 Staff at CCL

Cruise ships typically operate with three classes of crew. The first is the officers: these professionals are highly paid and given ultimate command of the ship. The second is entertainers and wait staff: typically lower-paid, but from the same countries as the cruisers that they serve. Finally, most of the ships’ crew is drawn from developing countries. While pay is low, the salary can represent an attractive opportunity for these workers, who often work 10-month contracts without being able to see their homes and families. Turnover is high, and few of the crew see working on a cruise ship as a viable long-term career. Staff remains 24/7 on board of the ship, have their own cabins at the lowest two decks of the ship. Only officers are allowed to mix between guests, this at special occasions and in formal attire. Other crew members have dedicated times during which they can be present on guest decks.

Operational excellence & experience

Carnival has achieved below-industry-average costs and above-average revenue historically. This is largely due to the company’s immense experience in owning and operating cruises, as well as some smart strategic plays. That advantage makes expanding into new markets vastly easier for Carnival than for a smaller player or upstart firm.

Carnival has the largest pool of data to draw on to determine what does and does not work and has the most experienced marketers of cruises in the world. These ‘soft’ advantages let Carnival potentially segment its customers more efficiently than competitors (Levin, Jones, & Slade, 2011).

3. Carnival Cruise Lines Competitive Position

5 forces model of Porter (Levin, Jones, & Slade, 2011)

According to Michael Porter, the state of competition in an industry depends on five basic forces (Porter, 1980). These forces are: Bargaining Power of Suppliers, Bargaining Power of Buyers, Threat of New Entrants, Threat of Substitutes, and Rivalry among Competitors. The collective strength of these combined forces determines the ultimate profit potential of an industry. The following paragraphs are based on Levin et al. (Levin, Jones, & Slade, 2011) and interviews at Royal Caribbean.

3.1 Bargaining power of suppliers

Supplier Power within the cruise line industry is moderately strong. Most of a cruise ship’s supplies are bought on an open, competitive market. The threat of integration by these suppliers is very low. One notable exception is Carnival’s new builds. There are only 6 major shipyards that have recently built cruise ships, and 2-3 more that either perform conversions or have built ships before 2000. Capacity and capability at these main builders is also limited, so Carnival Corporation relies on a limited number of manufacturers for its new builds. The high supplier power within the shipbuilding is weakened because the relationship is symmetrical: cruising is a similarly concentrated market. Additionally, the massive purchase value of a new ship provides a sizeable incentive for ship suppliers to provide cruise liners with competitive pricing.

Additionally, cruise ship companies such as Carnival face extensive switching costs, both in building and running a ship. Switching a ship’s manufacturer is hugely expensive for cruise companies because, typically, the shipbuilder owns the right over a ship’s design, which means that, in switching shipbuilders, cruise line companies have to incur high monetary and time costs in redesigning the ship. Such a switch can cost the cruise line company millions of dollars. Further, there is high input differentiation between ships, meaning that, while there are alternatives for the majority of supply components (both in ship construction and in cruise service), the cruise ship company markets specific ships and amenities to the consumer, thereby increasing switching costs and supplier power.

3.2 Bargaining power of buyers

Buyer power within the cruise line industry is relatively low. By contrast to most other vacations, more than two thirds of cruises are still booked through travel agents. Further, customers are spread around the world and do not have any mechanisms through which they can express a collective voice or exert collective power, leaving them with minimal control. Additionally, customers do not have the ability or resources to create the cruise experience by themselves – it is, by nature, a highly packaged deal. In addition, the experience offered by a cruise is very unique, and differs from other types of vacations enough that customers who prefer cruises are likely to choose them over other types of vacations, so long as the cost is not a substantial barrier. Buyer power is increased by internet search engines which enable comparisons of price and specifications across multiple locations, brands, and companies. In addition, the continued high reliance on travel agencies increases buyer power because travel agencies make volume purchases and can demand lower prices based on the volume of customers they refer to specific companies.

3.3 Threat of new entrants

The risk of entry of new competitors to the cruise line industry that could provide a plausible threat to Carnival Corporation in core markets is low. Entry into the high-end cruise line industry requires capital of approximately $1 billion since it costs, on average, $400 million to build a ship. Further, large cruise ships employ hundreds of sailors and crew that are trained for sea duty, which creates an additional cost. Since brand recognition is very important in the cruise line industry, it would take a new competitor valuable time to build an identity and reputation in order to be able to compete with the incumbents. Lastly, there are strict government and international regulations that are involved with a cruise company. Obtaining proper permits to operate, as well as the political connections, would also cost a company a large amount of time and resources. In Asia, however, Carnival might be more concerned about new entrants. Asian operations, markets, and customers are much less defined than in the Americas or Europe, and expectations of cruise quality and scale are lower. There are numerous Asian entrepreneurs and companies that might be able to tap into this fast-growing market.

3.4 Threat of substitutes

There are many substitutes, such as all inclusive, Club Med, and alternative vacation packages. However, market research indicates that cruise lines provide higher customer satisfaction than land based vacation packages. Cruisers express an overall 94.8% satisfaction rate with their experiences. Any vacation can be substituted for, and there is not a high cost to change, which makes the threat of substitution seem very high. This trend has fueled the continuing evolution of the cruise vacation experience. Over the years, cruise lines have expanded itineraries to include more diverse ports of call and have introduced innovative onboard amenities and facilities to compete with land based travel. These onboard experiences include cell phone access, Internet cafes and Wi-Fi zones which allow passengers to feel as if they are connected on land. They have also added onboard experiences such as rock-climbing, bowling alleys, surfing pools, multi-room villas, multiple themed restaurants and expansive spas, health and fitness facilities that easily rival land-based options (CLIA, 2012) Although there are many substitutes to the cruise line industry, they cannot replicate the cruise line experience.

3.5 Rivalry of competitors

Carnival is the leading company within the cruise line industry due to its multiple fleets and significant international presence. There are significant barriers to entry and exit within the cruise line industry, which has resulted in a high concentration ratio. The cruise line industry is effectively an oligopoly market, where several major cruise liners make up more than 90% of the market shares. Carnival is constantly engaged in marketing and pricing battles with these competitors, making internal rivalry central to the industry. Additionally, cruise lines have historically been subject to heavy mergers & acquisitions activity, and Carnival sometimes competes to acquire even more share.

Overall, Carnival’s branding is strong within the industry, and even stronger within its market category (contemporary). When compared to its competitors, Carnival continues to remain a formidable force in the cruise industry.

Figure X: 5 forces model for Carnival Cruise Lines

4. Cruise Industry Developments

We will use a PESTEL analysis to provide the context of the cruising industry as a whole, in order to understand the organization’s role in relation to the external environment. The PESTEL analysis provides a context for the organization’s role in relation to the external environment. The PESTEL analysis technique is often used in conjunction with a SWOT analysis to assess the situation of a business. PESTEL covers Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal and Environmental factors. The analysis consists in carefully determining all factors and finding out exactly in what way and to what extent these factors influence the company. Each category of factors is of crucial importance to advanced strategic management (Marketingminefield, 2012).

Figure 2 gives an overview of PESTEL factors for the Cruise Industry. The PESTEL analysis is further explained in the following sections of this chapter.

Political
Economic
OPPORTUNITIES

Growing market in Asia

Multiple trade organizations and lobbyist:

-Cruise Lines International Association

-Florida-Caribbean Cruise Association (trade organization)

-International Council of Cruise Lines; Cruise industry lobbyist

-North West & Canada Cruise Association (trade organization for Hawaii and Pacific North West)

-Passenger ship Association

-International Maritime organization (IMO) part of the United Nations

OPPORTUNITIES

Profitable business; cruisers spend typically more on vacation then non cruisers

Pricing based on data analysis

Big market share to capture; cruising industry is the fastest growing branch of the total leisure industry

THREATHS

Global economic recession

Decrease in growth for South of Europe due to bad economy

High fuel prices

THREATS

Geopolitical instability

-Terrorism actions

Tax loopholes

Social
Technological
OPPORTUNITIES

Strongly favorable Demographics

Changing consumer trends: more focus on health, spa arrangements, more diversity in dining and other selling points

Changing role of travel agent

Number of online bookings is increasing and increasing more every year

OPPORTUNITIES

Changing consumer trends: Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), connectivity

Technological development in satellite communication:

-State of the art technology possibilities on the ship

-Higher connectivity on the ship

THREATHS

Due to the exploding market in Asia, systems need to be set up in Chinese characters. This is a challenge for most systems

Outsourcing level 2 &b 3 support is difficult because the knowledge is very specific

THREATHS

Overblown media attention when something happens on a cruise ship

Environmental
Legal
THREATHS

Events in the outside world (9/11, Costa Concordia crash and Ash cloud Iceland)

OPPORTUNITIES

Complex diversity of environmental, health and safety legislation

Figure X: PESTEL analysis Cruise Industry

4.1 Political Factors

Political factors represent the way and extent to which a government influences the economy and the business. Specific areas are: labor law, tax policy, tariffs, trade restrictions and environmental law.

Geopolitical Instability

[In 2011, the Arab Spring revolutions ca

Introduction

Given the continued volatility within the UK job market, the opportunities for a university graduate continue to evolve. Ultimately, the nature of the marketplace will continue to rise to meet social and economic challenges, thereby mandating that participants are aptly suited for the responsibilities of the future. Lau and Schaffer (1999) recognised that success in a career of choice offers personal needs fulfilment through long term evolution of workplace achievements and accomplishments, ultimately culminating in power acquisition for the properly situated professional. My long term objectives is to frame my career around such variables, supporting my professional goals and principles while at the same time ensuring that substantial growth and opportunity evolve through my career choice. The following five positions represent key industries within the current UK market, each challenging the participant to invoke a broad skill set to enhance their long term career objectives.

Hotel Manager

Given the variability within the hotel industry and the season-specific integration of tourism into an operating scheme, the potential for gaining logistical experience and expanding my management skill set within this environment is exemplary. The completion of my degree is an essential part of job acquisition within the hotel industry, and although the management position might not immediately avail itself to me, the long term goal of achieving this notorious job title will present motivational encouragement and strategy in my daily operations. As recognised by MacCannell (2002), the prevalence of tourist egoism in the hotel environment is one which challenges staff to bolster and support such powerful internal demand structures, aligning with tourist expectations to prospect for repeat business. As a hotel manager, my duties would include a coordination of all staff members affiliated with our guests, and therefore, exemplary service levels would need to be evolved from my direction. The potential for substantial tourism growth considering the coming 2012 Olympic games offers opportunity for positioning within an expanding industry, one which would support my long term career objectives. Aligning my skills with an industry with such broad opportunities would also ensure that as alternate positions across the globe arise that I would be uniquely suited for that market by virtue of experience.

Tourism Officer

Perhaps the most widely sought opportunity for graduates and professionals of these five, this position entails an integration of a wide number of skill sets and strategic methods. Within the community, the tourism officer plays an essential role in guiding the expansion of tourist commerce and supporting local businesses and facilities through attractive event and festivals. In a recent study Desforges (2001) noted that financial reward is an extremely important variable within tourist endeavours, oftentimes relying on strategic politics to evolve into a socially beneficial medium. Optioning the personnel management abilities which I have learned over my brief, but well experienced positions in the UK work force, the officer position would require staff management, budget alignment, and full spectrum training programmes. This challenging, yet rewarding occupation would integrate my written abilities, planning foresight, and organisational skills to prepare and guide the tourist programmes of a particular local authority. The highly competitive nature of this position challenges me to fully develop my expectations and long term strategy prior to offering my CV for review. Ultimately, I believe that my creativity, local knowledge and interest, and resourcefulness will be assets in acquiring such a position. Over the course of the coming months at the university, it would be wise to participate in community events and begin to source industry relationships in order to ensure that opportunities arise upon graduation.

Outdoor Pursuits Manager

Perhaps the most interesting and personally rewarding position within this grouping is the one which would take me into the outdoors and fulfil my passion for adventurous activity. Requiring technical skill sets including budgeting, people management, and leadership, my commitment to these duties would be more than just job specific. In fact, assuming such a role, the physical challenges alone would encourage me to devise new methods of exercise and diet in order to maintain appropriate energy and stamina. Public speaking would become an inherent participle in this role, challenging me to step outside of my comfort zone and encourage participation through vocal support and direction. Forsyth (1997) recognised that sustainable tourism and environmental responsibility are essential factors in the new realm of eco-tourism. Through my role in outdoor pursuits, whether team building for groups or comporting a family reunion on a sightseeing hike, the need for environmental awareness and education would be a skill set that must be further developed. While there is limited opportunity within this position to surmount a corporate ladder, the potential for entrepreneurism in the long term would enable me to pursue an objective of business ownership and coordination.

Travel Agency Manager

Perhaps one of the more intriguing positions listed here, this opportunity would rely on my knowledge of both the UK travel sector but international destinations as well. Ensuring that my breadth of venue understanding was at par with industry standards, familiarisation visits to new destinations would assist in developing my knowledge set. This job would incorporate a broad range of my skills including organisation, sales abilities, and management of a sales team. As targets become an increasingly important qualifier within this industry, recognising the methods behind sales and tourism opportunities will continue to enable my management of a team of sales professionals. Destination sourcing offers a unique perspective of consumer motivations and would continue to enable my utilisation of personal interests and professional resources over the long term scope of my career. Recognised by Gille and Riain (2002) the nature of globalisation entails a reorganisation of self and community, expanding horizons and encouraging international participation. In this role, it would be my responsibility to ensure that these connections are deeply entwined in the personal objectives of my clientele.

Public Relations Account Executive

The final career opportunity, and perhaps divergent from the others in terms of sector, the role of P.R. account executive would offer substantial opportunity to utilize my personality, range of communication skills, and intense drive for success to develop and support public relations campaigns. In this role, business to business sales and networking would become extremely important facets of my daily routine, encouraging a working understanding of purchasing motivations and the key challenges which face each industry in our society. Managing events and press conferences in addition to location coordination for photo shoots or media programmes would also integrate my organisational skill set as well as enhance my understanding of the workings of public scenarios. Hiring staff and event for these events would also challenge my human resource skill set and enable an organisational perspective which could translate into further career evolutions. Buck et al. (2003) challenge that the employment philosophy of a firm or corporation is “embedded within its organisational blueprint” thereby entailing a focus on strategy, media expectations, and client perspective when aligning staff with PR activities (p. 532). The public focus of this position is an exciting offering which would continue to involve my evolution as both speaker and participant within the scope of media relations and operations. This position would be both challenging and rewarding as the broad spectrum of daily operations would enable my participation in highly social and publicly visible events.

Conclusion

Each of these opportunities presents a substantially different perspective of how my post-university career could evolve. The nature of the UK job market is constant evolution; therefore, over the coming several months, there are many new positions which may develop and with them, the opportunity to enter at the cutting edge of industry. Regardless of destination, my path must be one which is both personally and professionally rewarding. From this expectation, I will carefully make my decision according to the merits of each position and their support of my goals. As long term career development is also an essential part of the reward spectrum, I must align myself with a strong industry in which I can continue to develop my professional skills. Networking and social development will further assist in identifying key participants who can offer sustainable choices in future career developments. While all five of these positions offer well suited principles for my inherent skill set, several such as hotel manager and travel agency manager and PR account executive are substantially more attractive due to their public focus and wide sphere of influence. While my future may remain uncertain, the opportunities afforded by my university graduation are not, and I look forward to their realisation over the coming year.

References

Buck, T; Filatotchev, I; Demina, N; Wright, M. (2003) “Insider Ownership, Human Resource Strategies and Performance in a Transition Economy.” Journal of International Business Studies, Vol. 34, No. 6, pp. 530-549

Desforges, Luke. (2001) “Tourism Consumption and the Imagination of Money.” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, Vol. 26, No. 3, pp. 353-364.

Gille, Z; Riain, S.O. (2002) “Global Ethnography.” Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 28, pp. 271-295.

Lau, V; Shaffer, M. (1999) “Career Success and the Effects of Personality.” Career Development International, Vol. 4, No. 4, pp. 225-231.

MacCannell, D. (2002) “The Ego Factor in Tourism.” The Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 29, No. 1, June.

Will Stevens

A resort town is a town or city that relies heavily on the tourism as a main driver to its economy. Considered among the oldest resort towns in the United States, Cape May, New Jersey is situated at the southern tip of the state of New Jersey, and has provided beachgoers with a beautiful town since the mid 1700’s. Owing to its rich history as a whaling community, its role in both of the world wars, superior bird watching landscape, its recognition as a National Historic Landmark, and New Jersey’s large tourism industry, Cape May continues to enjoy success as a popular summer destination.

According to The City of Cape May, the history of Cape May can be traced all the way back to the late 17^th Century when the land was first settled. Its status as a beach destination began in the mid 1700’s when horse-drawn carriages arrived from Philadelphia. Over time, hotels were built and the Cape became the major beach destination for cities such as Philadelphia, New York, Baltimore, and Washington. It wasn’t until 1863, however, when the railroad between Philadelphia and Cape May was completed, that families began building summer vacation homes down the shore. Several fires have engulfed Cape May, and have resulted in the towns desire to maintain a “small town” feel and not have to compete with the high rise hotels that other resort towns have. This decision is crucial to the history of Cape May architecture and is the main reason why the city is considered a National Historic Landmark. The Cape May canal, Cape May – Lewis Ferry, and the Cape May Coast Guard Station have also contributed to the history of Cape May. (City of Cape May)

In Philippos J. Loukissas’ journal article about the impact of regional development, he states, “An increase in connections with the outside world also is assumed to have the positive effect of introducing new ideas into the community.” This hints at the importance of the Janelle model used be economic geographers, and can be applied to this history of Cape May as well. When the railroad between Philadelphia and Cape May was finished, this only further deepened the ties between the new places, and began the construction boom of vacation homes down the shore. Alternatively, the completion of the of the Garden State Parkway and the initiation of services on the Cape May – Lewis Ferry have done wonders to connect Cape May and provide greater tourist exposure. The Garden State Parkway allows easier vehicle access with connectivity to the rest of the New Jersey highway network, and the Cape May – Lewis allows Delawarean residents and travellers further south to access the Cape by way of the Delaware Bay.

Tourism is obviously a major component of Cape May’s history, but it is also important to understand its role in New Jersey’s economy as a whole. In 2008, tourism expenditures in New Jersey were $38.8 billion supported by over 70 million visitors. Kenneth McGill even states in his report about New Jersey tourism that, “NJ Tourism is larger than the entire GDP of 120 countries.” And that, “1 in every 9 NJ workers owes his/her job to tourism.” McGill also states that New Jersey’s tourism industry is 2.1 times more concentrated than the US average, meaning that the percentage of workers directly or indirectly employed by the tourism industry is 2.1 times greater than the average US state. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the core tourism industry is the third largest private sector in the state, supporting over 350,000 jobs. Another staggering statistic presented by McGill is that other than investments and business travel, the in-state contribution to the total tourism expenditure is only 20%, while the out-of-state contribution is more than 3 times that, at 64%, while Diane Wieland states that over 75% of visitors to Cape May County come from out-of-state.

When comparing the tourism statistics of Cape May County to those of the entire state of NJ, it is clear that the economy of Cape May is heavily reliant on the activities of the tourism industry. In McGill’s report on the tourism industry in New Jersey, it is stated that 48.1% of the entire economy of Cape May County can be attributed to the travel and tourism industry. This is the largest percentage of all counties in the state, and shows just how important the industry is to southern New Jersey. McGill and Diane Wieland confirm the importance of Cape May as a summer resort town and popular vacation home destination in their statistics. McGill shows that over 50% of rental income of the entire state comes from Cape May County alone. Wieland also shows that nearly half of all rental and 2^nd home properties in all of New Jersey are located in Cape May County. In fact, according to Wieland, 47% of all residences in Cape May County are considered 2^nd homes or vacation homes. (Wieland)

Tourism in Cape May is not limited to just beachgoers looking for a relaxing vacation. The Delaware Bay, especially the New Jersey banks, is world-renowned locations for bird watching. In Joanna Burger’s report on the affects of tourism on the local ecology, she mentions that the Delaware Bay area benefits from its low-lying mud flats and coastal marshes that are conducive to migrating shore birds. It was not until recently, however, that experts have realized that the millions of birds that pass through the Delaware Bay are attracted there by the abundance of horseshoe crab eggs in the springtime. The city of Cape May has taken advantage of this unique characteristic and has encouraged eco tourism to the area. (Burger)

My own experiences have been greatly influenced by the touristic, seasonal nature of Cape May. My grandparents first purchased a property down the shore over 30 years ago, so the beach has been a big part of my family’s lives since before I was born. We have been taking weekend trips down the shore for my entire life, and I have spent the entirety of the summer, from when school gets out until Labor Day, in Cape May for almost 10 years. Our house isn’t big by any means, but it has enough beds that most of our family can be down simultaneously, and we have regularly had about 10 people on any given weekend. I can say with confidence that my family conforms to the typical summer vacationer stereotype. My grandparents will usually head down before Memorial Day to open up the house and get everything set up for the summer. Memorial Day is the first big weekend of the summer, and we are all usually down there. My sister and I are the only two that stay with my grandparents for the entire summer, and we enjoy seeing our parents and aunts and cousins on weekends that they come down and visit. My sister and I also contribute to some of the tourism statistics that I stated earlier. Both of us have seasonal jobs that rely completely on the summer tourism activity in Cape May. My sister is a beach tagger, collecting money for the city of Cape May for people to use the beaches, and I was a lifeguard at a local campground. Both of these jobs are only sustainable during the summer months as the population of Cape May swells.

Much of mine and my family’s experiences can be explained in Reiner Jaakscon’s article called “Second Home Domestic-Tourism”. Many passages from his article relate directly to my life and experiences down the shore. “The second home offers a sense of identity at many levels, approximating in microcosm a concentric-circles model of ethnocentricity.” (Jaakson 378) This is true with many small towns, but especially true with Cape May. It is nice to be able to identify with other people who have shore homes and also spend their summers down the shore; comparing experiences through a shared commonality and lifestyle. “The very idea of a second home that is used primarily, if not exclusively, for leisure and recreation has an element of make believe.” (Jaakson 379) The fact that it is the summer means that I have no other responsibilities other than to relax and enjoy myself. Because I am not in school five days a week means that my time spent in Cape May is used as a sort of escape from the real world where I can go to the beach and swim in the ocean and sleep in as long as I want and enjoy the hot summer weather.

Our summer home provides me with a relaxing retreat from normal life, but it also allows our family to be much closer. “The second home provides for family togetherness of a different kind from that available in the city.” (Jaakson 379) This is especially true for my family. We are a very close family anyway, all living within 15 minutes of each other at home, but the closeness of our beach house allows us to have tighter bonds. “The smaller physical space and the immediate outdoors facilitate a closer family togetherness” (Jaakson 380) These two quotes from Jaakson perfectly encapsulate the dynamics within my family. While we live close together at home, we don’t visit each other often. It is a completely different story in the summertime. My sister and I are excited to spend time with our aunts when they come down and visit, and I enjoy spending time with my cousins when they are down too. Our summer home provides a platform for all of our family to come together and spend time with one another.

Throughout its history, Cape May has evolved from a whaling community into one of the nations oldest beach towns. Its location at the southern tip of New Jersey and its long-standing popularity with Philadelphians and other out-of-state tourists have cemented Cape May’s position as one of the most popular summer beach towns in the country.

Works Cited

Burger, Joanna. “Landscapes, Tourism, and Conservation.” Science of the Total Environment 249.1-3: 39-49. Print.

“Cape May History.” The City of Cape May. Cape May City, 2009. Web. 15 Apr. 2014. .

Jaakson, Reiner. “Second-Home Domestic Tourism.” Annals of Tourism Research 13.3 (1986): 367-91. Print.

Loukissas, Philippos J. “Tourism’s Regional Development Impacts a Comparative Analysis of the Greek Islands.” Annals of Tourism Research 9.4 (1982): 523-41. Print.

McGill, Kenneth. “NJ Tourism: Holding Its Own During Difficult Times.” VisitNJ.org. State of New Jersey, 2008. Web. 15 Apr. 2014. .

Wieland, Diane. “Tourism Impacts in Cape May County.” Cape May County. Cape May County, 2006. Web. 15 Apr. 2014. .

Wood, Ida Leigh, Jerry Tirrito, and Mariana Leckner. “New Jersey Coastal Community Resilience Demonstration Project Report.” NJ Sea Grant Consortium. N.p., Dec. 2010. Web. 15 Apr. 2014.

CAMERON HIGHLANDS

Cameron Highlands, in bahasa called ”Tanah Tinggi Cameron” is one of Malaysia’s most extensive hill stations. The size of Singapore, it occupies an area of 712 square kilometers (275sqmi). To the north, its boundary touches that of Kelantan; to the west, it shares part of its border with Perak.

Situated at the northwestern tip of Pahang, the “Camerons” is approximately 90 kilometers (56mi) from Ipoh or about 200 kilometers (120mi) from Kuala Lumpur. It is the smallest constituency in Pahang.

Discovered by Sir William Cameron in 1885, the outpost consists of three districts, namely Ringlet (5,165 hectares), Tanah Rata (2,081 hectares) and Ulu Telom (63,981 hectares). Its eight sub-districts are Ringlet, Tanah Rata (the administrative centre), Brinchang, the Bertam Valley, Kea Farm, Tringkap, Kuala Terla and Kampung Raja. All are at different elevations ranging from 1,100 meters (3,600ft) to 1,600 meters (5,200ft) above sea level.

The mean annual temperature of the retreat is about 18°C (64°F). During the day, the temperature seldom rises above 25°C (77°F); at night, it rarely drops to as low as 9°C (48°F) at the higher reaches.[2]

The resort has a diverse population of more than 38,000 people. It comprises Bumiputra (Malay (7,321); others (5,668)), Chinese (13,099), Indians (6,988), non-Malaysian citizens (5,193), and other nationalities (202). Most of the residents here are entrepreneurs, service industry employees, farm workers, retirees or government servants. The languages spoken are Malay, Mandarin, Tamil and English. Islam, Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, Christianity and Sikhism are the main religions of the haven.

Developed in the 1930s, the tableland is one of the oldest tourist spots in Malaysia. Apart from its tea estates, the plateau is also noted for its cool weather, orchards, nurseries, farmlands, waterfalls, rivers, lakes, wildlife, mossy forest, golf course, hotels, places of worship, bungalows, Land Rovers, museum and its aborigines (Orang Asli).

The Cameron Highlands can be accessed by road via Tapah, Simpang Pulai, Gua Musang or Sungai Koyan. Tapah and Simpang Pulai are the two approaches from Perak. Gua Musang and Sungai Koyan are the entryways from Kelantan and Pahang, respectively.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cameron_Highlands

There are few places which you need to visit or do when you are at Cameron Highlands. The most attractive place is tea plantations. No trip is call complete without a trip to tea plantations. You can visit the factories to learn about the tea making process and you can also sit down and enjoy a cup of tea at the cafe. The view overlooking the plantations is beautiful and perfect for the picture album.

http://superwomanohsem.blogspot.com/

If you like to eat strawberry, don’t forget visit the strawberry farm. The climate in Cameron Highlands is excellent for year-round strawberry production and this has encouraged many farmers to cultivate this fruit. In fact, strawberry production is such a big business over here. The people of Cameron Highlands have associated themselves very closely with this fruit. Hotels are named after strawberries, clothes come in strawberry prints, and there are strawberry toys, strawberry souvenirs, even pillows, strawberry farm visits, strawberry jam, ice cream and a whole range of Malaysian food fashioned with this berry.

Most strawberry farms are concentrated at Tanah Rata, Brinchang and Kea Farm. During higher production season from May till August, many of these farms offer strawberry picking by hand to attract visitors. Visitors wishing to indulge in this activity are charged between RM50 to RM60 a kg of fruit plucked.

Three of the most popular strawberry farms where visitors can do interactive visits are Big Red Strawberry Farm in Brinchang, Kasimani’s Farm close to the Golf Course and Raju Hill Strawberry Farm near Kea Farm.

Meanwhile, there have another attractive places which you can visit – vegetable farm. It’s located throughout the highlands and most of the farms allow visitors in. Drive up to Tringkap or Kuala Terla to get a roadside view of the larger vegetable farms.

Due to the increasing tourist arrivals, there have been smaller farms cropping up all over the highlands. These farms produce everything from flowers and vegetables to strawberries. These are primarily for walk in tourists. The other bigger farms which produce vegetables for the nation’s consumptions are usually not on the tourist map and are located in the interiors or Kuala Terla and Bertam Valley.

If you want to explore the real Cameron Highlands, then a visit to the Time Tunnel Gallery is a must for you. Take a peek into Cameron Highland’s past through the old photographs and stories that many people do not know about. A lot of the photos depicting the past are from personal collections of the locals who’s been here since the pre-war days.

You can also see some of the familiar items from the yesteryears. For those who grew up in the 40?s to 80?s, this will be a walk back in memory lane. It is a unforgettable and sweet memories for the visitors.

Local produce markets can be found all over the highlands and these are one of the spots tourists flock to get everything under one roof. There are many of these markets sprouting over the past few years and almost all are located along the main road so you can’t miss them. The most popular tourist market is at Kea Farm but you can also find some smaller ones almost everywhere you look.

KEA FARM MARKET

Kea Farm Market is a highly popular among local tourists for its highland vegetable produce. Kea Farm is a bustling open market in Cameron Highlands, located 3km north of Brinchang town. This vegetable and fruit market along the highland’s main road is located close to the Copthorne Hotel (formerly Equatorial Resort). Here, farmers sell the best of their products throughout the day, offering to buyers cabbages, fresh carrots, an assortment of other highland greens, corn, strawberries, flowers, souvenirs, honey and potted plants.

Kea Farm at an altitude of 1610 meters above sea level (5282 feet), is also the highest village in Peninsular Malaysia, and lies close to the popular Sungai Palas Tea Estate and the highest mountain in Cameron Highlands, Gunung Brinchang (2031 m). Some other tourist attractions within its vicinity include Rose Center and the Butterfly Garden.

On Saturday nights, the weekly night market comes to life in Brinchang night market. This is where you can find all the produce of Cameron Highlands sold in one place. You can get everything cheap here if you know how to bargain. This is also a place to get some good “pasar malam” food. The Night Market will be open daily during the school holiday and public holidays.

The mossy forest is an amazing nature Cameron Highlands is bestowed with is indeed the main reason for its touristic appeal and top in its natural attraction list must surely be its Mossy Forest. Depending on its location, this forest may also be called Cloud Forest, Elfin Forest, or Upper Mountain Forest with all displaying similar characteristics and vegetation that can only be found in a constantly cool, windy, wet, and misty environment.

In Malaysia, the Mossy Forest occupies the ridge and valleys at elevations above 1,800 metres where it is constantly shrouded by mist and lower clouds with temperatures ranging between 10 to 18 degrees Celsius. The Mossy Forest of Cameron Highlands is located at the ridge of the 2032 metre-high Mount Brinchang, the highest mountain in Cameron Highlands. Here, the view of the hills and valleys below and the plains at the distance are magnificent and sunrises and sunsets are amazing.

For those who dare venture at night, the sight of the stars and Milky Way above on clear days and the lights of Ipoh city far below, are exhilarating sights. Distance views apart, the forest here is simply enthralling with a thick layer of softspongy moss draping every tree and the ground as well. The trees here are also stunted, rarely above 10 metres tall and mostly of the laurel family with rhododendrons which are showy when in bloom, tiny orchids, pitcher plants and other epiphytes, thriving in this environment.

The Mossy Forest of Brinchang is actually one of the easiest spots in world to access a mossy forest with a tarred road reaching right to the peak of the ridge here. There are daily guided tours to the mossy forest organised by various tour operators in Cameron Highlands who will take tourists through the forests using a 400 metre long wooden walkway which was specially built through the forest for a very up, close and personal view of this natural wonder.

One of the attractive places are Lavender Garden. Opened in 2013, Lavender Garden which is Cameron Highland’s newest attraction is located just before Tringkap town when travelling from Simpang Pulai. It is a floral themed park with cemented terraced hill slopes where ascending row upon row of flowers are grown, offering a dazzle of colours for visitors to admire and photograph.

The lavender itself isn’t as plentiful as one may expect with artificial lavender scent permeating the air at the entrance but live lavender plants can be seen planted in a large plot at the centre of this park. There are also many types of flowers grown here such as gerberas, camellias, roses, peonies and yellow daisies.

An apiary and a small gift shop selling lavender products are among the other offerings while potted lavender plants are sold for RM15 each. Visitors can also self-pick daisies for RM2 per stalk or 6 for RM10. There is a gift shop selling lavender products and a cafe offering good strawberry milk shake, and Lavender ice cream for RM5.50

The centre opens daily and charges RM5 per adults and RM3 for children.

The star attraction at the Agro Technology Park in MARDI Cameron Highlands must surely be its pergolas of Butterfly Jade Vine and Lady Slipper vine, both displaying spectacular cascading flower trusses.

The Lady Slipper vine or also know as Clock Vine or Doll’s Shoes is a native to India and its spectacular yellow and reddish-brown flowers that hang in pendent racemes are exotic indeed. Even more exotic looking are the turquoise claw-shaped flowers of the Butterfly Jade Vine which resembles a butterfly when two flowers are put together. The pendent-like trusses can carry up to 75 or more individual flowers and can reach up to three metres long.

Other lovely and showy display of blooms enticing visitors for a photo or two are its colourful busy lilies, roses and dahlias. The centre also grows and displays a variety of other exotic sub-tropical flowering plants, herbs, highland fruits and vegetables including strawberries, and potted plants for sale.

MARDI Cameron Highlands was established by the Malayan British administrators in 1925 and was then known as the Federal Experimental Station for agricultural produce. The Agro technology Park is located within the station and was officiated in2003.

The park houses some of the oldest tea bushes in the country which was grown here during experimental stages when the plant was introduced in the country in 1925. It also has experimental greenhouses for temperate fruits such as apples and persimmons.

The Agro technology Park which is about a kilometre from Tanah Rata also boasts an English Garden, strawberry farm and production centre, vegetable and cut flower production, green house research facility and the sales centre. It even offers accommodation in the form of ‘English Cottage’.

Visiting hours are Monday to Thursday from8.00am to 12.45pm / 2.00pm to 5.00pm and Friday 8.00am to 12.30pm / 2.30pm to 5.00pm. Entrance fee to the park is RM3 and can be purchased at its information centre.

As we used questionnaire in our research, and we asked different questions from 39 visitors in Cambridge city centre for observing their opinions. Pie charts are used to display results in visual form. All information gathered from visitors, converted in to pie charts and displayed above. Pie charts are showing opinions obtained from real visitors with the help of questionnaire.

Very first question was about their general information. General information included nationality, age and occupation. Nationality asked from visitors. Among the 39 visitors, our sample, 44 percent were female and 56 percent were male. Age of 41 percent were in between 18 to 30 years and 26 percent were in between 31 to 40 years. 12 percent were in between 41 to 40 and remaining were above 41.

Question about occupation, 36 percent visitors said that they are currently unemployed and 31 percent visitors were students. 10 percent were businessmen and outside the Cambridge and 21 percent are doing job anywhere. 13 visitors out of total 39 said that they are visiting very first time Cambridge and 9 visitors sad they have second trip. 6 visitors said they have third trip and 11 visitors are enjoying their fourth or more trip.

In the question in which type were asked, 33 percent were enjoying their independent trip and just 18 percent said they were with their friends and family. Large portion of visitors, 31 percent, were on their educational trip, trip to Cambridge University, ant 13 percent visitors were on business trip. How long they stay here? 13 percent said just for half day and 26 percent said for full day. 38 percent were living more than 2 days in Cambridge and 8 percent answered, not yet decided. In the question, what they do in Cambridge, 8 percent said enjoying boat tour and 18 percent said they are enjoying weather by walk. 36 percent said they are here for train trip and 31 percent said on road. 2 percent use to spend time by horse carriage trip.

What services they used in Cambridge? All visitors vote for sightseeing tour with 5 percent, local transportation with 20 percent, food and beverages with 31 percent, accommodation with 9 percent and 24 percent they consumed other facilities and services. Unique question, did they enjoy Cambridge? 92 percent, definitely, said yes. 8 percent respond with No, due to some reasons. Quality of services used, good response seen in Cambridge’s favour. 0 percent vote for low quality, 8 percent vote for fair and 39 percent visitors said quality of services was good in Cambridge. 20 percent said quality of service was very good and 8 percent vote for excellent. 25 percent give no answer to this question.

In the last, simple question were asked and that is will they visit Cambridge again? 58 percent, more than half of total visitors said yes of course they will surely visit. 28 percent said it depends on future conditions, they are not sure yet and 21 percent said you way, they are now finding new better place for tour.

With the help of questionnaire and other methods used in our research, Tourists’ motivation and experience towards Cambridge, different opinion collected from real visitors. Results showed that most of visitors are male, under 40 years age, students, employed and businessmen, and visiting Cambridge for more than 2 time and willing to revisit it again. Reasons behind these answers are somehow related to culture and nature of Cambridge. Cambridgeshire is famous for University initially and then city of technology. Students like to visit the university and more than 25,000 students are resident of Cambridge. University of Cambridge is included in world’s top five universities. That’s why major portion of visitors is consist of students in different area.

Cambridge city is also famous for technology. Software and bioscience are core industries operated in Cambridge and that’s the reason of business trips. All technology related organizations have offices and research centres in Cambridge. Meetings and convocations are being held in this city. Other reasons behind these results are games being held in Cambridge city. Cambridge city is famous for cricket, football, rugby, water sports and varsity sports. Varsity sports are sports play under Cambridge University against different universities and have lots of attractiveness for the visitors inside and outside the Cambridge city. Strawberry flavour music and art festival are also reason behind motivations for the visitors coming in Cambridge.

Questions about services used in Cambridge and quality of used services indicate that visitors like the way they enjoy in Cambridge and they liked food, transportation system and accommodations in Cambridge and they selected these services and facilities as a good quality services. This is also reason behind the motivation of being visited Cambridge again and again and some visitors visited Cambridge for more than 4 times due to facilities provided here. Cambridge skyline, Quayside, Silver Street, King’s Parade and Trinity Street, places famous for trips in Cambridge and different festivals and events are also reasons behind the tours and trips in Cambridge.

Conclusion

From the questionnaire, what we collect from the real visitors and tourists is data of our research and. Conclusion can be easily drawn through or finding as reasons are simple and logical behind the motivation for tourism in Cambridge. Visitors are most likely, students, businessmen, sports lovers, independents, willing to stay here for longer period because of verity of services provide and quality of services used. Primarily there are some reasons visitors used for motivation to visit Cambridge. Results shown that visitors from different area have same characteristics and main factor forcing behind motivation is age and occupation of sample visitors. Under 40 years are in large quantity visiting Cambridge and by occupation, students and businessmen are large art of tourist. People who are free also visit more Cambridge. University of Cambridge and industry of technology is main source of motivation for tourists. City of sports, festivals and events are also motivation for visitors and people who like picnic and visiting different places used these motivations for Cambridge.

Question asked from sample visitors, did they like trip in Cambridge, showed the density of likeness Cambridge and question, will they visit again, showed the attractiveness of tourists toward the Cambridge. Overall, research helped to indicate the source of motivations behind the visit to Cambridge. One finding is, friends and family tours are more preferable from the tourist because of nature and culture of Cambridge city. Results indicate that tourists are more willing to use this place again for their trips and visits. Due to technological city, business world compellingly need to have visit this place.

Recommendations

Cambridge city is a great place to visit for family tours, educational tours, sports and music lover. Cambridge is not place where you can find some historical places ad old thing. Cambridge is full of urban tourism and based on new beauty. As Cambridge city is famous for education and technology, government must take more steps to increase efficiency in these areas because people point of view about Cambridge is good and green. Events and festivals are another sources of motivation for tourists. Local authority should promote events in worldwide in order to increase the strength of visitors.

Varsity sports can be used as another main source of motivation for tourists because varsity sports are included large numbers of games and there is need to launch them as a regional festival. From the evaluation of people’s opinion, most of them said that beside the spots, technology and educational motivation, there is also need to motivate children for tourism. Creating attractiveness for children and young generation can be great source of tourism.

Improvement in facilities and supporting services can also help to increase the attractiveness of visitors. There is need to plan for vocations in order to grape more visitor’s time and money. With beginning of 20th century, economy was rapidly growing so managing Cambridge is quite easy in betterment of tourism. Use of different ideas in tourism plan, can influence in future. Entertainment companies can be used for attracting tourists.

The organisation we have chosen to study and write this essay about is Cadburys world and the key performance objectives we agreed together are cost, speed and quality. Cadbury’s world is a leading tourist destination in the U.K and boasts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. Due to its high volume Cadbury’s world has to have set implementations to keep customers arriving at their doors each day. For example they have to produce new material to keep customers happy and for them to know that they are trying new things, also they have to regularly update their factory in which they do tours as people will not want to keep on seeing the same things and thus not wanting to return to the venue.

They have to focus on all of their performance objectives to gain maximum sales in tickets and to keep everyone happy whether this is staff or customers. Cost, speed and quality are three of the most important performance objectives, if one or more where not carefully planned or in order then the business will lose out on massive profit margins and could possibly fail as a business.

Quality is probably the most important factor to a tourism destination especially to a company like Cadbury’s world. It is pivotal as if people don’t feel as they have been treated in the way they thought they would be or feel that they did not get value for money then they will not be interested to return to the venue again. Also they will tell others about their bad experience and will try to avoid them to go so that they do not share the bad experience that they did. With quality being at high standards they have to train staff to perform in a certain way to impress the guests, this interlinks with cost as they will have to send staff on courses or hire a trainer in customer service. Both ways will cost more money to the business.

Quality makes customers have high standards, and a quote from Cadbury’s World about high standards says:

‘In a competitive business environment it is the quality of customer service that will enable an organisation to achieve commercial success. Customers expect high standards and it is important that employees are aware of their role in maintaining a high standard of customer care. This therefore supports the image of Cadbury World and enables the business to achieve its’ objectives.’ (Cadbury’s World, 2006 with high standards the business has to perform to its maximum day in day out to reach the level of customer service that they want.

Cost

Cadburys world have to rely on some factors like quality, speed and cost to keep competitive amongst other tourist destinations. Their cost has to be right because if it’s too little people will think it is not going to be much as its cheap where as if its high people will be put off as they might not be able to afford the day out, also the business at the end of the day has to make a profit out of the venue so has to put a price which will cover their costs of such things as employee’s wages, new machinery and updates to the attraction. If they don’t cover their costs of everything then they will have to cut back and the company will not be able to expand in the way it wants to.

Speed

The speed factor is vital as they have to keep up to high standards given by the management team to the company as a whole. If the company does not meet the speed factor set by managers then it will inevitable have a knock on effect to the business as if one objective is not complete then another cannot be started, if this happens it can cost the company a lot of money in the long run. Also speed affects the customers that are in the venue, for example there is not a large amount of room in each part of the factory thus the company needs to keep customers going through at regular intervals to ensure space is filled correctly, this will also ensure customers have a better experience as they will not be overcrowded once in the venue.

In a company like Cadbury’s word they have to set themselves high standards to gain maximum input from employees. A quote from Cadbury world supports this by saying:

Delivering superior business performance. In 2008 and 2009 we are hoping to increase our sales by another 5%’. (Cadbury’s World, 2009). This way people know what they have to do in their job to be successful and have a target that they have to try and reach.

These three topics (quality, speed and cost) all interlink with each other in many different ways and if one is affected then they all will be affected. However it could be argued that the two which interlink the most are cost and quality. This would occur in every business not just in Cadbury’s world. In Cadbury’s World they try to have the highest level of quality and obviously this cost a lot more to achieve this. But I believe it is the best way to be as they need to gain maximum customers to gain money to cover costs of running the factory. Selling their tickets at a reasonable price like they do is also extremely important as customers will feel they have had a really day out at a fantastic price and had great value for money.

There is a basic model that all organisations can use.

http://www.ammanagementassistance.co.uk/coreimages/opman.png

A general model of operations management and operation strategy. Slack, Chambers and Johnston,(2007)

I am now going to discuss the operations strategy part of the model.

Capacity and facilities (size, timing, location)

Cadbury world is in an ideal location; situated in Bournville, Birmingham it has several motorway connections such as the M5 and the M42. Cadbury World is a fifteen minute walk from Bournville train Station and there are several bus stops just outside the main entrance. It’s fully signposted and all you need to do is follow the Cadbury World fingerposts and wall-signs that direct you through the grounds. Because Cadbury world is located just off a canal you can also get to it by barge which you leave just behind the building. The nearest airport is Birmingham international which is about 30 minutes away by taxi. Cadbury aims itself to be an educational attraction so their opening times are vaguely structured around school times. They have different opening and closing times each month. January they are generally closed apart from 4 days at the end of the month. The earliest they open is 9am and the latest they close is 5pm. This could be a problem attracting families in the week as some parents may be at work during the opening times. Cadbury world is home to the biggest Cadbury shop in the world, and a cafe. There are 11 different exhibitions to visit as well as a play area, a tasting area and a ride that tells you a story as you go around. As it is an indoor attraction there is a limit on how many people they can have in there at any one time. In 2011, a record breaking 590,000 people visited Cadbury world. The cost strategy comes into capacity as if they are running the attraction at full capacity they are going to be making a good profit although quality and speed could suffer as there will be more queues and staff may let quality slip as they will try to reduce queues. On the other hand, if Cadbury world is running at a low capacity they will not be making much profit and will paying staff when maybe they are not needed but speed and quality will be improved as there will be less queues and staff won’t be as busy so can take more time to concentrate to improve quality.

Job design

In any organisation there are several different jobs which all need different designs. At Cadbury world there are a lot of different jobs available some are on the production line which means they actually make the products, cafe jobs, jobs in the shop, customer service jobs, meters and greeters, managerial jobs etc. To be able to design a job companies need to look at their performance objectives.

As discussed earlier, the basic performance objectives are;

Quality

Speed

Dependability

Flexibility

Cost

Although all of the performance objectives are important in Job design we thought that there were 3 main performance objectives for Cadbury World.

Quality

Speed

Cost

We chose these as the quality of service and product needs to be the best it can all the time, we chose speed because it is an indoor attraction so if speed wasn’t an issue queues would be too big and people would leave and we chose cost as it is very important to an attraction especially if there primary focus is as a product.

As well as looking at the performance objectives they also need to look at health and safety, the quality of working life and job division.

Quality- The ability of staff to produce high-quality products and services can be affected by job design. This includes avoiding errors in the short term, but also includes designing jobs which encourage staff to improve the job itself in such a way as to make errors less likely.

Speed- Sometimes speed is the dominant objective to be achieved in job design. The job needs to be done at a quick speed but not too quick that it jeopardises quality which in turn could affect cost if chocolate is wasted. If too slow customers could leave the queue once again affecting cost as they would lose money.
Cost- All the elements of job design will have an effect on productivity, and therefore the cost, of the job. Productivity in this context means the ratio of output to labour input: for example, the number of customers served per hour. This is when rate of pay will have to be decided depending how business is doing compared to how many staff are employed.

Health and safety- Job design must not endanger the well-being of the employee, other staff of the operation, the customers who are visiting Cadbury world, or customers that have brought any products made by Cadbury.

Quality of working life- The design of any job should also consider job security as people may not want to work there if it only temporary or seasonal, intrinsic interest, variety, opportunities for development for example do they hire internally for manager positions, how stressful the job is or can be and the attitude of the staff.

Motivation is important in organisations, if people are not happy in their job and no longer feel motivated. Quality will suffer having negative effects on cost and speed. Most companies have job enrichment opportunities , promotion opportunities and reward systems.

Hackman and Oldham designed a job design model to make the design process easier. (see appendix 1.)

Process design

Design must reflect the needs of customers, applies to all of Cadburys products, services and processes and starts with a concept and ends with the final design.

Quality – Cadbury world is a high volume-low variety attraction so quality is exclusively concerned with error-free service so they need to make sure all exhibitions are working correctly. Although on a larger scale, Cadbury is primarily product focused so we can assume on the whole it is a low volume-high variety process.

Speed – As Cadbury world is an indoor attraction with limited capacity some wait is expected in some exhibitions, although an instant delivery in some high volume-low variety operations is expected. But when talking about Cadbury as a product speed would mean an individually negotiated delivery time in low volume-high variety operations.

Cost – The unit cost for Cadbury world will once again differ from Cadbury’s products. The cost varies with both the volume of output of the operation and the variety of products or services it produces. High-volume operations like Cadburys world usually offer the same services. Cost per unit of output is therefore usually quite low like Cadburys world. Furthermore, Cost is relatively constant in high volume- low variety organisations. Whereas, Cadburys have a lot of products which means that running the operation will be expensive because of the flexible and high skill levels employed.

References

Cadbury World (2012) Cadbury World [Online] Available from: http://www.cadbury.co.uk/ [Accessed: 19/12/2012]

Mondelez international (2012) Mondelez international [Online] Available from: http://www.mondelezinternational.com/home/index.aspx [Accessed: 19/12/2012]

Slack, N. Chambers, S. And Johnston, R. (2007) Operations management. 5th edition. New York: Pearson publishing.

IN-FLIGHT MODULE

Cabin crew is primarily aboard an aircraft for the safety and welfare of the passengers and for their comfort. If there were no services of food or drink during a flight, there would still have to be a minimum presence of cabin crew for safety, which is a legal requirement. (essence-learning.com, 2014)

The role can be physically and emotionally demanding. Cabin crew are expected to deal with all passengers diplomatically, even when feeling the effects of travelling through time zones and spending extended periods of time on their feet. (targetjobs, 2014)

Some of these roles include supplying passengers with newspapers, magazines and in-flight amusement, checking the state and provision of emergency equipment and information for passengers, demonstrating emergency equipment and safety procedures administering first aid and dealing with emergencies, greeting passengers as they board and exit the plane, showing passengers to their seats and providing special attention to certain passengers, such as the elderly or disabled and producing written flight reports after completing a journey. (targetjobs, 2014)

As cabin crew, their responsibilities are to greet the passengers as they board the aircraft, direct them to their seats and ensure that the entire luggage is safety stored away in the overhead cabins. Once all the passengers are on board then the cabin crew demonstrate the emergency procedures whilst the plane is preparing for takeoff. During a flight thecrew membersassist passengers, make calls on behalf of the captain, serve food, drinks and sell duty free goods. (essence-learning.com, 2014)

In case of emergencies, cabin crews are there to reassure passengers so that they follow the correct emergency procedures. The crew may have to deal with several emergencies such as cabin fires or first aid situations. At the end of a flight cabincrew membersare there to make sure that passengers disembark the aircraft safely. Thecrew membersare then asked to complete a written report that records all details of the flight. (Essence-Learning.com, 2014)

Cabin crew also make periodic announcements to passengers about flight conditions and arrival times. They also make sure that passengers with special needs are cared for in an appropriate manner. (anon, 2014)

The chain of command on any aircraft is;

Captain
First officer
Cabin Manager
Flight Attendant

The overall responsibility for the safe operation of an aircraft and the safety of its passengers lies with the Captain, but you as operating crew are responsible to the Captain in being capable through your flight attendant training to be able to fulfill your safety responsibilities. (flight-attendant-careers.com, 2014)

Within the cabin crew job market, airlines employ a vast number of people into cabin crew support roles. These support positions provide a great way to gain cabin crew experience, and learn about how the airline industry works. (cabincrew.com, 2014)

Many airport-based ground staff performs these support roles. Jobs in the industry which fall into the category of cabin crew support include crew planning, crew control, human resources and crew training. There is a great deal of planning and scheduling work that goes into flights, so administration staff will be on hand to assist at pre-flight briefings, ensuring air cabin crew are being correctly assigned their working positions, and understand any changes to how the flight will be managed. (cabincrew.com, 2014)

Airlines frequently use codes in the form of abbreviated words or letters. This list covers some of the most frequently used words. The following computer codes are used in messages from airlines:

CHNT – Change Name To

ETA – Estimated Time of Arrival

FLTFO – Flight Info

HTL – Hotel

MCO – Miscellaneous Charge Order

NOSH – No show

OW – One-way

PNR – Passenger Name Record

RCFM – Reconfirm

SPAV – Space Available

SSR – Special Service Request

TKT – Ticket

WCHR – Wheel Chair

FLY – Finley in Australia

EVE – Evenes in Norway

TOY – Toyama in Japan

DAY – Dayton in Ohio, United States

NYC – New York City

AVML – Asian Vegetarian Meal

BBML – Infant/ Baby Food

CHML – Child Meal

DBML – Diabetic Meal

FPML – Fruit Platter Meal

SFML – Seafood Meal

Types of duties cabin crew may have to undertake cabin crew seat and working position; roster duty example stand-by duty.

There are two types of standby, Home reserve and Airport reserve.

Home reserve means that you are on standby at home ready to take a call on your mobile phone or landline from flight scheduling that may assign you a flight or upgrade your status to field reserve.

Field Reserve on the other hand, means that you are on standby but in the flight operations building at the airport with your flight handbag, trolley and suitcase, ready to be assigned any flight that needs to be covered.

Duties before the pre-flight briefing include, checking roster and updates, check health, safety and security notices, check flight details (crew names, crew positions, departure gate, and aircraft registration. Importance of time keeping prior to a pre-flight briefing: to be prepared; consequences of late arrival example cabin crew offloaded from other flights, late departure of aircraft, disciplinary action. (anon, 2014)

Elements of a pre-flight briefing include introduction to the crew, operating positions and responsibilities, uniform standards checked, aircraft information, health, safety and security memos, updates and notices read and understood, order of bar, meal and duty-free service and Safety and Emergency Procedures (SEP) scenario questions. (anon, 2014)

Elements of post-flight briefing include reconciliation paperwork for bars and monies handed in, flight paperwork completed and filed example cabin defects reported and flight evaluation. (anon, 2014)

Receive and relay safety equipment and procedures (SEP) during a pre-flight briefing include respond to Safety and Emergency Procedures (SEP) scenario questions example safety, security, in-flight medical care, location of emergency equipment, respond in a timely manner, with composure and professional attitude. (anon, 2014)

Complete documentation relating to a pre-flight briefing in readiness for the flight include flight detail form (crew names and signatures, rest and duty hour, number of crew bags, equipment and security checks completed), toilet servicing form. (anon, 2014)

The importance of timekeeping includes, being prepared, consequences of late arrival example offloading of crew, late departure of aircraft.

Personal presentation: on and off duty and during stopovers, uniform standards, dress code for training and stopovers, adhering to grooming standards, professionalism, personal appearance, importance example creating a positive organizational image, maintaining organizational standards. (anon, 2014)

Importance of task management and prioritization of tasks include routine and non-routine tasks, prioritize tasks in order of importance, and prioritize tasks in order of legal and regulatory requirements. (anon, 2014)

Customer relationship management: following company procedures and industry standards; providing excellent customer service; ensuring passenger welfare; importance example to keep customers, to reward loyal customers, to attract new customers. (anon, 2014)

References

http://www.flight-attendant-careers.com/flight-attendant-training.html

http://www.essence-learning.com/blog/duties-and-responsibilities-of-a-cabin-crew

http://targetjobs.co.uk/careers-advice/job-descriptions/277171-airline-cabin-crew-job-description

http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/airport_code.htm

http://www.edexcel.com/migrationdocuments/BTEC%20Specialist%20Qualifications/BA025387-BTEC-L2-Introduction-to-Cabin-Crew-spec.pdf