Books

of the budget - the ‘affordable and percentage of sales’ method and the ‘objective and task’ approach. The reviewer would add to Victor Middle- ton’s text the following observations:

0 setting the size of the marketing budget in many organizations, public and private. remains an art rather than a science and is too often a matter even of guesswork; and

0 getting the size of the budget, particularly the advertising budget, right is one of the things which marks out the true profes- sional with solid experience.

Doing this to ensure the right intensity of demand may be likened to calculat- ing the thrust needed in aviation to achieve take-off. If there is under- spending, it means, to pursue the anal- ogy, that the product does no more

than taxi to the end of the runway - a total waste. In this respect, marketing people would still seem to be depen- dent, to a large extent, on trial and error, as the early aviators were. That is why experience of what has worked before - varying from product to pro- duct and market to market-remains a most important factor. It is also why Victor Middleton’s contribution to- wards removing some of the present arbitrariness in this area is welcomed. Marketing in Travel and Towism puts all past and present offerings on the same subject in the shade and will surely become the classic work of re- ference for the next decade.

David Jeffries Visiting Professor

City University London, UK

Customer-directed marketing

MARKETING IN THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY by Ronald Nykiel Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York, 7 989,305 pages, $27.95

Dr Ronald Nykiel is a Senior Vice President with the Stouffer Hotel Company in the USA and so is well qualified to write a book on marketing in the hospitality industry. He uses a disarmingly simple approach, leading his reader logically from chapter to chapter. Each chapter begins with a reminder of what has gone before, this is followed by the purpose and the objectives and finally a reprise of key words and concepts which have been introduced in the preceding pages. In addition, for the student, there is a short list of assignments.

Nykiel draws liberally on case ex- amples, failures as well as successes, some actual and some theoretical, to illustrate various marketing techni- ques. He introduces checklists which are fundamental to success and SO

often not used properly by the marke-

ter. These checklists for sales and for increasing sales, for advertising and for brochure production are carefully developed and comprehensive in their coverage.

The chapters on market segmenta- tion, pricing and pricing strategies are particularly well developed. The copy throughout has been carefully honed with nothing superfluous, and where jargon is introduced it is always care- fully explained, eg *segmentation - a portion of the total market that has customers with common needs’. In the chapter on understanding rates there are clear explanations for corporate rate, rack rate, preferred rate, super- saver, weekend rate, summer rate and club level rate, all used in the hotel industry and similar explanations are developed for rates charged by car- riers and rental car companies.

In many ways this is a primer for someone entering the marketing field or wanting a guide to marketing tech- niques. Nykiel clearly assumes that the marketing concept is fully under- stood and embraced by the organiza- tion. This in my experience is not

necessarily so. Marketing is the con- cern of the whole organization - the entire executive hierarchy. The suc- cess of all marketing operations de- pends on the effective and efficient coordination of all those elements which it embraces and all those tools which are at the disposal of the marke- ter. It is an attitude of mind of the management of an organization and the marketer should have a large say in the way the product is developed and presented and the prices charged as well as in the way they are distri- buted and promoted. Unless the orga- nization has knowingly accepted the marketing concept it is unlikely that the marketer will be able to influence those areas of the operation which are outside his immediate control. The marketing orientated organization en- sures that marketing is involved in all the operations - from the process of creating the product to ultimate con- sumption by the consumer. All too often those charged with operations act independently of the marketers, and pricing is often in the control of the financial side of the organization and imposed on the marketing team.

Nykiel rightly says that the custom- er is king and in the checklists which he developed in the chapter ‘Practical steps to maximise marketing’ he pro- vided many examples of the additional steps which can be taken to ensure ‘positive consumer reaction’ as well as those designed for more competitive marketing.

I was surprised at the scant refer- ence to familiarization trips and attendance at workshops and trade shows in those sections of the book devoted to selling to the travel trade. The chapter on selling covers organiz- ing the sales effort. face-to-face sell- ing, telephone sales and sales through direct mail, and there are chapters devoted to advertising, public rela- tions. promotions and packaging as well as print. Some guidance on how to get the best out of travel trade familiarization trips and. just as im- portant. out of a journalist’s visit should have been covered.

Just as there is an implicit assump tion that the marketing concept is fully understood, there also appears to be an assumption that the consumer will

176 TOURISM MANAGEMENT June 1989

visit the destination. Nykiel says ‘a

consumer’s perspective of the industry

and its products and services will

change based upon the reason or

purpose of his or her away from home

venture’, but there has to be a reason

for that consumer wishing to travel

from A to B - leisure, an activity

holiday, a convention, business, visit

to a trade fair and so on. Above all.

the destination itself in the case of the

leisure traveller must be appealing.

Tourism is not a sunny beach. a grand

hotel, a flight or indeed any particular

attraction. It is a satisfying activity at a

desired destination. The complexities

of tourism are substantial because a

vast range of options. services and

suppliers are involved. Furthermore,

in creating any one tourism product,

many interests are involved which are

interdependent, yet independent of

each other and often in competition.

The unique and indispensible role of

the National Tourist Office is that of

the destination marketing authority.

Yet Nykiel makes little or no refer-

ence to the destination marketing

organization. In a 25page glossary

only the British Tourist Authority and

the United States Travel Service fea-

ture and neither appears in the index.

The National Tourist Offices prom-

otional resources represent a coopera-

tive marketing opportunity for car-

riers, accommodation and entertain-

ment providers in as much as the NT0

provides a coordinated approach to

marketing, product presentation and

development. The NT0 also provides

a collective basis for research and for

monitoring visitor satisfaction. Above

all, it has the primary responsibility to

act as the inviting host on behalf of the

resident community and its visitor

resources. While the National Tourist

Office would not attempt to do the job

of other interests, it should provide

many opportunities for cooperative

marketing activity.

Notwithstanding this, Marketing in the Hospitality Industry is a good read

including a number of new ideas which

I shall certainly put into practice.

That, after all, I suppose, is what

makes a good book.

Alan Jefferson Director of Marketing

BTA, UK

Neo-colonialism in

TOURISM AND DEVELOPMENT IN THE THIRD WORLD by John Lea Rout/edge, London and New York, 1988, paperback, 88 pages, f 5.95

This slight volume is intended for stu-

dents, evidently beginners in both

tourism and Third World studies. It is

not based on original research, but

seeks in some 80 pages to summarize

the major findings of existent studies

on tourism in the Third World and to

spell out the policy implications of

these studies for Third World govern-

ments. The book is written in a simple

style and uses numerous didactic de-

vices to get its points through - it is

replete with case studies bracketed out

from the main text, and with dia-

grams, lists of ‘key ideas’ and review

questions. While there is little doubt

that the author will succeed in con-

veying his points even to the dullest

student, the quality of his exposition

and its practical value remain in

doubt.

The book opens with a brief outline

of what the author calls ‘two broadly

different ways of thinking about inter-

national tourism’ (p 8), namely, a

‘political economy approach’ (pp 1 l-

16) and a ‘functional approach’

(pp 16-17). The former is claimed to

be broader in scope and generally

taking a negative attitude to tourism,

as a form of neo-colonialism. The

latter is said to be more narrowly

orientated to the economic aspects of

tourism and more friendly to the in-

dustry. The author develops the con-

trasting arguments of the two

approaches in his chapter on the eco-

nomic impacts of tourism (pp 37-50).

but fails to take an explicit stand re-

garding their respective validity - even

though he is vaguely critical of tourism

throughout the book.

The other chapters are fairly devoid

of theory. They deal with the factors

which generate tourist demand and

the supply of touristic facilities

(pp 22-36). with the environmental.

BOOA-S

the Third World

social and cultural impacts of tourism

(pp 51-73) and with tourism planning

and management (pp 74-81).

The author illustrates his exposition

with secondary data from a variety of

reports and studies of Third World

tourism. Most of these pertain to three

world tourism regions - Africa, the

Pacific Islands and the Caribbean.

While the information he provides is

basically correct and up-to-date, it is

also partial and disconnected. There is

no attempt to present a coherent pic-

ture or propose a sophisticated and

continuous argument regarding the

state of Third World tourism. The

many condensed renderings of other

researchers’ typologies, arguments

and findings. without relating them to

one another or evaluating their valid-

ity and significance, endows the book

with a catalogue-like quality. The im-

pression readers will get will be neces-

sarily unbalanced and partial.

The author seeks to draw attention

to the problematic and damaging im-

pacts of tourism on Third World coun-

tries. This is a salutary effort. especial-

ly since the book will probably be read

by students who may eventually be-

come tourism practitioners. But in his

zeal the author is often simplistic, and

owing to his lack of direct experience

with the situations he describes, he

may become unwittingly misleading.

He thus presents the lurid story of a

15year old prostitute in a Bangkok

brothel (p 68). apparently unaware of

the fact that Thai brothels serve

almost exclusively a local rather than a

foreign tourist clientele.

These are serious drawbacks - but

the most damaging fault of the book is

that it manages to make an exciting

and potentially promising field of so-

cial research dull and unattractive.

This book will therefore hardly serve

to inspire students and researchers to

devote their time and energy to its

further investigation.

Erik Cohen The Hebrew University

of Jerusalem Israel

TOURISM MANAGEMENT June 1989 177