Choosing the Right Promotional Tool in the Hotel Industry: The Case of the Chinese Consumer.

The rapid growth of the Chinese tourism has stimulated competition within tourism-related industries, such as the hospitality industry. The purpose of this study is to examine the Chinese consumer reaction to different promotional tools used by hotels in China and, thus, to provide a deeper understanding for marketers of how to use sales promotion effectively to generate appropriate consumer responses. An experimental survey was administered yielding a total sample of 319 Chinese customers, who were probed using different types of sales promotion tools. Data analysis indicates that bonus packs (e.g. a 3-night stay at a hotel for the price of 2) induced the highest consumer perceived value, brand switching, and purchase acceleration intention, whereas price discounts resulted in the highest intention to spend more. Although this study has its limitations given its reliance on a convenience sample, it offers insightful practical implications for hotel business owners in Asia regarding targeting the right customers with the right promotional tools, where it is proposed that bonus packs successfully attract new Chinese customers and price discounts support in generating more sales.

The hospitality industry

This study of independent Portuguese hotels‘ positioning strategies regarding adopting, or not, a soft brand affiliation seeks to determine what motivates this choice. Surveyed hotels were asked to enunciate the benefits and disadvantages associated with their strategic decision, and other difficulties experienced in their business. The results indicate that international brand awareness and the hotel owners‘ long-term goals are the core factors affecting the choice. In practice, we conclude that there isn‘t a ‗one size fits all‘ strategy. Nevertheless, affiliated hotels experience an operational advantage over non-affiliated ones stemming from the affiliating organization‘s accumulated experience in sales, distribution channels and marketing resources.

The Brazilian class C women perception regarding premium mass products in the beauty industry

Recentemente, os mercados emergentes se tornaram um alvo potencial para a indústria da beleza e o Brasil está se tornando um mercado lucrativo para os produtos cosméticos Premium (Euromonitor International, 2013). A população de baixa renda no Brasil representa 70% de seus habitantes ao considerar as classes C, D e E (Barki e Parente, 2010), sendo a classe C representada por 56% da população (Neri, 2012). Este é um mercado potencial para as empresas multinacionais (MNCs), que enfrentam desafios de fazer negócios no país, visto que a classe C opta por gastar parte de sua renda com produtos relacionados a beleza (Silva e Parente, 2007) e ainda há um pouco conhecimento sobre o comportamento de consumo na base da pirâmide. Portanto, o objetivo deste estudo é investigar e descrever o comportamento de consumo das mulheres brasileiras da classe C no setor de beleza, em relação aos produtos Mass Premium, melhorando o conhecimento no que diz respeito a essa população e ao tema proposto. Para atingir esse objetivo, o autor utilizou uma metodologia baseada em uma análise descritivas qualitativa em que foram entrevistadas 20 mulheres de todas as faixas etárias, que pertencem à classe C brasileira e citações foram usadas para fornecer a confirmação dos resultados da análise. Os resultados sugerem que, ao longo dos anos, houve de fato um movimento de trade up no consumo de produtos de beleza. Além disso, foram identificados cinco aspectos principais, que conduzem decisão de compra das mulheres de classe C, no setor de beleza: confiabilidade, qualidade, status, autoestima e bem-estar. Apesar das limitações de um estudo exploratório, espera-se que a pesquisa aumente o conhecimento sobre o mercado da base da pirâmide, especialmente no que diz respeito à indústria da beleza.

The infuence of production systems in postponement make-to-stock compagny in the graphic industry

The supply chain management, postponement and demand management operations are of strategic importance to the economic success of organizations because they directly influence the production process. The aim of this paper is to analyze the influence of the postponement in an enterprise production system with make-to-stock and with seasonal demand. The research method used was a case study, the instruments of data collection were semi-structured interviews, document analysis and site visits. The research is based on the following issues: Demand Management which can be understood as a practice that allows you to manage and coordinate the supply chain in reverse, in which consumers trigger actions for the delivery of products. The Supply Chain Management is able to allow the addition of value, exceeding the expectations of consumers, developing a relationship with suppliers and customer's win-win. The Postponement strategy must fit the characteristics of markets that require variety of customized products and services, lower cost and higher quality, aiming to support decision making. The production system make-to-stock shows enough interest to organizations that are operating in markets with high demand variability. © 2011 IEEE.

Employment and labour markets in the Dominican Republic: an overview of the literature

Includes bibliography

The Costa Concordia disaster and the cruise industry: An analysis of risks and challenges in Latin America and the Caribbean

This FAL Bulletin analyses the relevance of the cruise industry for the region and particularly for Caribbean countries. The article begins with an overview of the tourism industry, followed by a discussion of the relevance of the cruise industry for the region, and finally an approach to maritime education and training.

ADOPTING LEED CERTIFICATION IN LODGING FACILITIES: GREENING THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

The research intended to analyze the adoption process of the green certification "Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design" (LEED) from the hotel sector establishments that has already adopted it. For its concretization it was proceeded a bibliographical research, secondary fact-gathering in journals, institutional sites and documentaries, and primary fact-gathering by means of semi structured interviews carried out with responsible people of the certified hotels and of the responsible entity of the certification in Brazil (Green Building Council Brazil). There were 21 interviewee, being 02 of the GBC Brazil and 19 of means of lodging (31% of the certified). For data analysis, it was utilized content analysis technique with the aid of ATLAS.ti software. The results permitted to identify the chronology of the processes of certification and the profile of the hotel categories that adopt the LEED program. Beyond that, the interviews enabled the discussion of the initial motivations for seeking the certification, as well the advantages and the obstacles perceived regarding its adoption.

Working in verticalized platform vessel: an ergonomic approach in the oil industry

In this paper we point some aspects of workers activities in offshore units in the oil industry. These units became more verticalized and have a greater number of operating systems. Our goal is to present the main difficulties that workers face in these units.

An application of combinatorial optimization in the printing industry

Offset printing is a common method to produce large amounts of printed matter. We consider a real-world offset printing process that is used to imprint customer-specific designs on napkin pouches. The print- ing technology used yields a number of specific constraints. The planning problem consists of allocating designs to printing-plate slots such that the given customer demand for each design is fulfilled, all technologi- cal and organizational constraints are met and the total overproduction and setup costs are minimized. We formulate this planning problem as a mixed-binary linear program, and we develop a multi-pass matching-based savings heuristic. We report computational results for a set of problem instances devised from real-world data.

Endogenous Growth in the Presence of Informal Credit Markets: A Comparative Analysis Between Credit Rationing and Self-Revelation Regimes

This paper examines whether the presence of informal credit markets reduces the cost of credit rationing in terms of growth. In a dynamic general equilibrium framework, we assume that firms are heterogenous with different degrees of risk and households invest in human capital development. With the help of Indian household level data we show that the informal market reduces the cost of rationing by increasing the growth rate by 0.7 percent. This higher growth rate, in the presence of an informal sector, is due to the ability of the informal market to separate the high risk from the low risk firms thanks to better information. But even after such improvement we do not get the optimum outcome. The findings, based on our second question, suggest that the revelation of firms' type, based on incentive compatible pricing, can lead to almost 2 percent higher growth rate as compared to the credit rationing regime with informal sector.