August Discounts

[BrundallNavy]

I see quite a few yards are offering a 20% discount on hiring during August, also seems to be lots more short breaks on offer.  Is it much quieter this year that the yards are struggling.

Doug.

[NorfolkNog]

Hmm, interesting one. A quick general search on Hoseasons site shows only a few available next couple of weeks and around 20 for the last 2 weeks in August. A lot seem to be Horizon craft for some strange reason. Otherwise fairly evenly spread. That doesn't include Herby Woods of course. 

[fishtone]

The river was certainly not quiet yesterday, but the majority of boats were day boats. More people seem to be going for cottage holidays and if day boat not included they hire one.

[Matt]

Even for the South we found last week relatively quiet for school holidays. Spaces to moor all evening everywhere we stopped.

I wonder if short breaks are becoming more of the norm which makes getting "down south" all that bit harder.


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[NorfolkNog]

Quite possibly, good thinking 

[Broads01]

The weather makes a big difference in my experience. A good spell brings out the privateers and last minute bookers. It's been mixed of late so that would make it quieter. 

[LondonRascal]

I am not sure about it being quieter at the moment (or generally this year) but I do think the usual 'peak' periods of holiday are changing. Sure you've still got the school holidays but I have noticed a marked change since 2013 for example in the early and late season traffic.

These periods always used to guarantee to be quiet, with a wide choice of boats not to mention the cheaper prices - but now I notice more and more boats about be it in early March or end of the season in late October outside the school holiday periods. 

I also think once people would take a week, maybe two even and that was not so surprising but these days it is clear short breaks are very much in favour and multiple visits to the Broads in a year. If you can save big for having a new build boat for 4 nights not 7 why not? You also see how usually it only is Wednesday and Sunday where no boats are turned around because people want more choice in start dates and duration.

I'd imagine that there are going to be some 'flash sales' coming from Herbert Woods and Barnes Brinkcraft  between now and September.

[Timbo]

I'd be really, I mean really interested to see some figures on tourism to The Broads for this season. Not that I don't doubt they will be heavily edited.

On current information, there has been a 23.8% increase in the number of British holidaymakers vacationing in the UK. According to ABTA and Sojourn, over 50% of those British holiday makers staying in Britain are planning holidays of three days or less. That's an increase of 8% on last year. These figures are partly a result of the pound being worth, well, not quite next to nothing but it's getting there.

As a result of the drastic fall in the value of the pound, the number of foreign visitors to the UK is up by some 20% according to the Office On National Statistics. Although the number of visits from Europe fell from January to May, since May we have seen an 8% increase in European visitor numbers over those in 2016. Visits from our American cousins have jumped rapidly this year, a 34% increase. Holiday visits from tourists from the rest of the world not including Europe and America have had two surges, being 21% up from January through to May and have increased to 34% up over last year for the last three months.

Looking at domestic holidays in the East of England, trips in 2014 were 9 million rising to 9.7 million in 2015. In 2016 and 2017 the East of England has fallen to an estimate for year end of 9.3 million. A stark contrast to other areas of Britain. The West Midlands, for example, seeing a 20.55% increase in visitor numbers and a 26.7% increase in customer spend. Yorkshire and Humberside seeing an 18.95% increase in visitor numbers and an 11.23% increase in visitor spending.

Looking at the figures, from a marketing standpoint, someone's got their strategy wrong. I suppose figures from the Tourism Alliance, of which organisations ranging from English Heritage to National Trust and just about every regional tourism organisation, with a notable exception, is a member, might be an indicator of what activities  'customers' are looking for in a holiday might be quite pertinent?

Top of the list at 34.58% is 'Just relaxing'. I think most people will agree that The Broads are good at this activity. Sight seeing comes in at a close second at 31.56%. Another top Broadland activity. Right at the very bottom of the list of what activity customers want to do on holiday we find 'visit a county park or nature reserve'. Just 7% of holiday makers want to do this activity.

So, the current marketing campaign reflecting Broadland is targeted at 7% of potential customers. Visitor numbers are falling in the face of stiff competition from other areas in a market climate where visitor numbers both domestic and foreign are increasing. Incidentally, the East of England employs 115,111 people directly in tourism and generates £6,216 million in income. That's a lot of people dependent upon tourism for their income.

Time to leave the marketing to the professionals, before it's too late.

 

[grendel]

Tim, is what you are saying, that by branding the broads as a National Park, they have made it a less attractive place to visit?

[BrundallNavy]

Barnes have already got a 20% discount for August along with quite a few other yards.

i for one would be a bit miffed if I had booked a top range boat for August at a cost of around £2000 early in the year only to find I could have saved £400 that's most people's spending money.

its a dangerous game offering discounts in high season as people will expect them again next year. Will we see more last minute bookings in future.

Doug.

[Poppy]

12 minutes ago, grendel said:

Tim, is what you are saying, that by branding the broads as a National Park, they have made it a less attractive place to visit?

Anybody who believes that the battle for National Park status is all about marketing is, I fear labouring under a misapprehension.

It's a vanity project  pure and simple, with all the 'wants' of the environmental lobby driving it forward !

[JennyMorgan]

42 minutes ago, grendel said:

Tim, is what you are saying, that by branding the broads as a National Park, they have made it a less attractive place to visit?

To many people, yes. Not everyone wears walking boots and anoraks don't cha know! Maybe I'm wrong but the terms National Park and , for example, stag parties are a complete oxymoron. As much as I knock the term Broads national park I actually enjoy my visits to the Lake District & Snowdonia NP's but I don't go there for unbridled, mindless 'fun' in the way that many people appear to expect it to be today, I go there to 'cure my soul '! 

[Broads01]

9 hours ago, brundallNavy said:

Barnes have already got a 20% discount for August along with quite a few other yards.

i for one would be a bit miffed if I had booked a top range boat for August at a cost of around £2000 early in the year only to find I could have saved £400 that's most people's spending money.

its a dangerous game offering discounts in high season as people will expect them again next year. Will we see more last minute bookings in future.

Doug.

Spot on Doug, I'd feel the same. I much prefer Richardsons policy of not offering last minute discounts on the basis that their prices are low in the first place. 

[Timbo]

8 hours ago, grendel said:

Tim, is what you are saying, that by branding the broads as a National Park, they have made it a less attractive place to visit?

Only partially Peter. The marketing and promotion of The Broads are something that has been 'niggling' at me ever since the Broads Authority jumped into a 'marketing pool' they are not qualified to paddle in. As Poppy points out the Broads Authority have an ulterior objective wrapped up as a marketing strategy, but let's put the ambitions of Crocodile JP to one side.

Having 'assumed' the responsibility for marketing, whether part of their remit under the Broads Act or not, the Broads Authority are approaching marketing an industry that generates £6,216 million for the region annually in a similar fashion to the village jumble sale. We are talking a few crappy, and I do mean crappy, photo opportunities for the local press. A re-branding of the organisation the first resort of the terminally clueless followed by fitful spits and spats on social media with an open day...not on an actual Broad? We are talking amateur hour. All of this pushing a concept and not marketing, promoting or supporting the business end of what the area has to offer.

So when those tourism figures arrive for 2017 we need to see figures that reflect the 23.8% percent increase in staycation visitors across the UK and we also need to see that the current marketing of The Broads is actually working, so let's give them an easy target of just a 2% increase in visitor numbers above the national average. So figures for 2017 will see a 25.8% increase in visitors, with a corresponding increase in visitor spending.

 

 

[SteveO]

Not surprised that the National Park thing figures so low in people's reasons for visiting the UK.  Many countries, including the USA do "nature reserves" so much better than we do.

[Vaughan]

I agree with all of the above, but there are also other problems for the boatyards.

Broads boating is a seasonal business, which attracts a lot of regulars, so prices for next year have to be decided, and announced, by early September of this year, in order to fill in the bookings over the winter. That's a long time ahead, for a business to have to estimate what its price will have to be, especially in this fast-changing world. It is easy to get it wrong, and this year, it seems they may have done.

We never used to offer a discount on the brochure price, for reasons mentioned here by others, but things have also changed a lot since some of the big yards were taken over by tour operators. For them, the marketing is different. For them, it is "bums on seats". If they can half fill a chartered aircraft at the full price, then they have covered the costs. Anything else that they can bring in with discounted offers to fill the rest of the plane, is clear profit. Same thing applies to the hotel room allocations on beach resorts. Unfortunately this approach to marketing seems to be creeping in on the Broads. I fear that it will only cause "tears before bedtime".

When you talk of an 18 week average season, you are assuming that the 8 peak price weeks will be booked. You then fill in as many as possible of the cheaper weeks on either side of the high season. If, however, you have got an 18 week average but your peak weeks have not filled up, then you are having a bad season. It would seem that this is what has happened this year, since September is already fully booked.

For whatever reason it may be, it would seem the peak prices have been set too high for the existing market. This may reflect on the level of next year's prices. I have an easy "rule of thumb" for this situation. I just go down the river on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday when there are no "turn-rounds", and see how many boats are moored up, unlet, in the boatyard basins. If the basin is empty then all is well. If it is still half full of boats then they are having a bad season and it doesn't matter what "percentage figures" the tourist office may care to quote.

Like others here, I don't think that the BA style of National Park marketing will have any influence at all over the typical inland waterways boating customer.

[JennyMorgan]

The weather has not helped as far as last minute bookings are concerned, that must be obvious. On the other hand those with a good memory will remember the good weather we enjoyed earlier in the year, presumably that didn't cause a flutter of early bookings. 

I don't see the agencies as having got it wrong but I do think the industry as a whole, yards and infrastructure, are tending to pull in opposing directions. This has not been helped, in my opinion, by the Authority dabbling in areas with which it clearly has no expertise or empathy, those areas being marketing and the Broads themselves. 

Pirates and national parks, an odd pairing. Pirates OR national parks, perhaps that should be the question. At one time the Broads was a giant holiday resort, and great fun it was too. Now it's a faux national park, perhaps not so much fun. If the Broads is a national park, which it isn't,  then it needs to live down its past. You only have to click on U-Tube and the Norfolk Broads in particular in order to see folk's general perception of the Broads, and that does not accord with being a national park.  

Personally I would wish that the Broads, in my later years, was quieter more akin to folk's perception of a national park,  but the reality is that the Broads is the Broads and that is what people have come to expect and that is what the industry should be marketing. People don't often come here with binoculars and guide books.

Then there is the small matter of pricing. The other day my wife and I took our three youngest grandchildren to Pettits at Reedham. Wow, over sixty quid for admission! It's actually great fun for young children but I'm sure that your average teenager would consider it uncool in the extreme. As for older folk, not really much on offer, especially for an 'animal' park. All the walkways are pea-shingle, arghh, wheelchair and buggy friendly it is not! What with petrol, food and ice creams it was easily a hundred pound day out. Our choice but we live here, we don't have holiday accomodation on top of that. Two or three days out on top of general holiday costs and it soon becomes obvious that a holiday in Norfolk is far from cheap. As for Pettits, poor value in my opinion, especially compared with other attractions in the area. Mind you, it is right next door to the Humpty Dumpty brewery so granddad went home happy.

As for those 20% discounts, I have long been of the opinion that if a company can afford to knock off 20%, let alone 50%, then it is charging too much, even far too much in the first place. Personally I don't like to be ripped off and I see companies offering big discounts as rip off merchants, they would have charged me full price if they could have.

 

[MauriceMynah]

I have never owned a boatyard so am not qualified to make comment. Nor have I been employed in "Marketing" so can't really comment on that side either. So, having given you my qualifications, this is my comment.

If out of season boats are fully/strongly booked but peak season is weak in bookings, one of two things must apply.

a,  The "peak season" has been wrongly identified and is actually outside the time thought, or

b,  The business has priced itself out of the market, or

c,  The business has misunderstood it's customers to find it's not the family holiday they thought but one for more senior customers. (Stag and Hen parties excepted) (or should that be "accepted")

 

Ok, that's three things, but I believe it's a combination of "b" and "c".

My parents always booked to go just outside the school holidays so there would be "fewer screaming kids" about. I suspect that might apply to quite a few of the bookings. Also one needs to remember that families with young children are frequently a bit "strapped for cash" and has been pointed out a broads holiday can be pretty expensive.

Luckily however as I have said, I have no experience of these things so am not qualified to make comment. :)   

[JawsOrca]

There is nothing "fun" about high season on the broads.  The broads are far far nicer out of season with the best time june or september..  perhaps lots of people are sharing the same idea and staying away.

[Vaughan]

1 hour ago, MauriceMynah said:

So, having given you my qualifications, this is my comment.

And a very astute comment, John. Do you want a job?

In my post above, I was trying to explain why there are last minute discounts in August this year, but your comment covers much wider aspects.

As for (b), you can never tell, but it is quite possible.

I think (a) and (c) can be covered by the same answer :

For as long as I can remember, the industry has been trying to level out the peak prices, so that families don't have to pay nearly twice the price just because their kids are on school holiday. In practice though, in such a seasonal business, it has never been fully possible. You have got to aim to make your money at the time when you can expect to be fully booked.

There are indeed, different customers for different times of year and this is quite marked, especially on the French Canals, where our marketing is worldwide. You will get young people at Easter, when it is cheap, followed by the Brits and the Dutch around Whitsun. The Germans (the best customers) start arriving in June and go through to the end of August, interspersed with Italian families and rich retired Americans. Also a big market from Australia. In September the Brits return for the first half of the month and then, all of a sudden, it all changes and the French turn up! They know the weather is better in October and the prices are the cheapest! We call fill the fleet in October with French regulars. They don't need much service as they have all been before many times, but we get to know most of them as good friends.

But we know what would happen if we started to load the prices in October - they wouldn't come any more!

So I am afraid it is all a bit of a juggling act and I can't give you a definitive answer. If I could, I'd be rich!

[MauriceMynah]

Jaws, it is my experience that September is the busiest month of them all.

[JennyMorgan]

I often wonder what folk expect of a 'family' holiday on the Broads. The Swallows and Amazons market must be on an annual decline as tastes change. There is just one major family attraction on the Broads, something of a theme park, the owner of which is keen on the national park tag. Strange really, Disneyland doesn't sell itself as a national park. Something of a contradiction of identity going on there. However, back to family holidays on the Broads, what are they? What does the Broads really offer families? I really do think that Maurice has come up with the pertinent bullet point in C, The business has misunderstood its customers who find it's not the family holiday they thought but one for more senior customers. Senior customers tend to avoid traditional family holiday times. I know that I do.

[Gracie]

Honestly Jaws, how old are you???  Just kidding of course but have to say that, for us anyway, there's nothing quite like watching people messing about in boats, just being moored up and watching people cruise past (and messing up ), being in a convoy of boats private and hire cruising along a stretch of river, the sound of a boat engine gives me goose pimples (note to self, need to get out more) I love the hustle and bustle of it all.

Then there's September and October, what a time to be out on the rivers, quieter, less manic but so beautiful in the Autumn months, Then there's April, May and part of June, no fishing but magical just the same and a little quieter

Each to their own, I'm certainly not knocking anyone's preference, there's just so much to enjoy any time of the year and long may it be so

Now then Jaws, have you received your bus pass yet??  

Grace

[Poppy]

5 minutes ago, Gracie said:

Honestly Jaws, how old are you???  Just kidding of course but have to say that, for us anyway, there's nothing quite like watching people messing about in boats, just being moored up and watching people cruise past (and messing up ), being in a convoy of boats private and hire cruising along a stretch of river, the sound of a boat engine gives me goose pimples (note to self, need to get out more) I love the hustle and bustle of it all.

 

Grace

It's the sound of rigging on a sail boat creaking that does that to me - but I know that has other effects on our Gracie

[Bound2Please]

9 minutes ago, Gracie said:

the sound of a boat engine gives me goose pimple

Maybe darlin we should record a few just for you then to listen to

 

Charlie :default_kiss: