CHM601: Contemporary Hotel Marketing

Running head: CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Consumption Pattern of Luxury Travellers
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................2
Literature review:.......................................................................................................................2
Characteristics of the luxury tourism industry:..........................................................................2
Effect of changing demands of luxury tourists on their buying behaviours:.............................3
Methods of investigation:...........................................................................................................4
Findings:.....................................................................................................................................4
Conclusion:................................................................................................................................5
References:.................................................................................................................................6

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Introduction:
The objective of the research is to study the investigative steps, which determine the
characteristics, demands and purchasing behaviour of a target market. The paper is set against
the background of growing expectations of luxury tourism, which is the target market. The
problem statement of the assignment is “The characteristics, demands and the buying
behaviour of luxury tourists have evolved to a great extent which is posing challenges before
the tourism and hospitality industry to change their strategies.’ The research aims to find out
how the demands and consumptions patterns of the luxury tourists have changed over time
and is having significant impact on the tourism and hospitality industry. The researcher has
used both secondary and primary sources to gain information on the topic. The secondary
sources of information consist of newspapers, reports, books and journals. The primary
sources of surveys, interviews and questionnaire.
Research Questions:
1. What are the characteristics of luxury tourism market?
2. Compare between the new and traditional demands of the luxury tourists and its impact on
the tourism industry.
3. How has their changing demands influenced their purchasing behaviour of the luxury
tourists?

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Literature review:
Characteristics of the luxury tourism industry:
Lu et al. (2015), state that luxury tourists demand luxury resorts and premium
services. The luxury tourism industry earns billions of dollars annually by serving these upper
class customers who prefer to visit places which are rare and exotic like deserted islands.
They further state that luxury tourists expect premium services from the staff of the hotels.
Kucukusta, Heung and Hui (2014) state that hotels in order to satisfy these high end
customers, create service strategies like provision of coffee machines and personal bars.
Fitzsimmons (2017) contradicts these opinions and state that the characteristics the of luxury
tourism industry has undergone drastic changes. He states that tourists today want to enjoy
cultures and traditions of the places they visit. They want to experience unique, traditional
and extraordinary experiences of visiting exotic places like islands. Line and Hanks (2016)
state that luxury tourists are increasing become conscious about sustainability and demand
the resorts to have more natural and greener look. This analysis shows that today luxury
tourism industry considers sustainability and experiencing local flavours more important
compared to traditional tourism market which more importance to luxury hospitality services.
Kajima, Tanaka and Uchiyama (2017) points out that modern luxury tourist segments
prefer consuming local services like trekking on a mountain resort. This leads to
multinational hotels investing in acquiring services of the local firms like trekking companies
and local farmers selling authentic local food products. Robbins and Gaczorek (2015) state
that, this acquisition of services of local firms by MNC hotel chains result in collaboration
between them and leads to economic development of the former. Thus, modern luxury
tourism leads to sustainability and environment friendly operations of the tourism industry
(Logan 2015).

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Effect of changing demands of luxury tourists on their buying behaviours:
Fitzsimmons (2017) states that luxury tourists today consider experiencing beauty of
places they visit as important factor while holidaying. According to Lu et al. (2015) luxury
tourists laid emphasis on materialistic aspects like highly furnished rooms and superior room
services while holidaying. Fitzsimmons (2017) points out that the modern luxury tourists
want to experience the cultures and traditions of the places they visit like food and locally
product. This change in demand has tremendously influenced their purchase patterns.
Steenkamp and de Jong (2013) while conducting investigation about the purchase patterns of
the tourists points out that they consider authentic experiences of a place they visit as signs of
luxury. They purchase services, which allow them to enjoy local entertainment facilities like
scuba diving rather than expensive physical commodities. Thus, the changes in the demands
of the luxury tourists have also changed the types of products they buy. They buy services,
which allow them to enjoy authentic local forms of entertainment like scuba diving
experiences at a beach resort.
Methods of investigation:
The researcher opted for a situation analysis investigation of the luxury tourism
industry and the changing trends of the luxury tourism industry. He collected value pieces of
information about the luxury tourism industry by conducting exhaustive research from
secondary sources like books, journals, newspapers and websites. He conducted
investigations about the changing expectations of luxury tourists by researching these
qualitative sources of information. The researcher also aims to conduct a primary research
like interviewing luxury tourists to gain more in depth information about the changing
patterns of the luxury tourism industry.

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Findings:
Secondary sources:
The researcher has conducted exhaustive research of secondary sources of
information to arrive at the findings. The secondary sources consist of articles by authors like
Fitzsimmons and Kucukusta, which shed light on the changing demands of the international
luxury tourists. The researcher also went through international dailies and government
websites to provide authentic data in the paper (Robertson, 2017). The above discussions and
analysis of the secondary sources reveal that luxury tourism and the demands of the luxury
have evolved. One can interpret from the comparison between the traditional and the modern
luxury tourism attributes that the tourist today want to experience the beauty of the tourists
destinations. One can also interpret that the need to offer tourists more natural and authentic
environment has encouraged the trend of eco-friendly green hotels. It can also be pointed that
the need of the luxury tourists to indulge in local experience facilitate partnering of
multinational hotels chains and local firms like amusement parks and theme villages. This
collaboration has led to sustainable development of these farmers, local amusement parks and
sellers of local traditional goods.
Primary sources:
The primary sources the author used to gain information were interviews, surveys and
questionnaire. The primary sources gave the author opportunity to speak to luxury tourists
and acquire valuable information about the changing patterns of holidaying. The resultant
discovery from the research is that the tourists consider indulging in the authentic experiences
in the tourist places as signs of luxury. This has encouraged the hotel industry to become
more sustainable and lay emphasis on facilitating positive experiences for tourists like
arranging for trips to local villages and local food.

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
Conclusion:
It can be summarised from the above discussion that demands, consumption patterns
and the attributes of the luxury tourists have evolved. The luxury tourists today, prefer
indulging in local experiences like deep sea diving. This results in collaboration between
local firms and multinational hotels to provide these tourists authentic experiences of places.
This collaboration encourages economic development of the local firms which drives the
tourism industry towards sustainability.

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CONSUMPTION PATTERN OF LUXURY TRAVELLERS
References:
Fitzsimmons, A. (2017). 7 Luxury Travel Trends for 2017. Nationalgeographic.com.
Retrieved 23 October 2017, from
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/top-10/seven-luxury-travel-trends-hotel/
Kajima, S., Tanaka, Y., & Uchiyama, Y. (2017). Japanese sake and tea as place-based
products: a comparison of regional certifications of globally important agricultural
heritage systems, geopark, biosphere reserves, and geographical indication at product
level certification. Journal of Ethnic Foods.
Kucukusta, D., Heung, V. C., & Hui, S. (2014). Deploying self-service technology in luxury
hotel brands: Perceptions of business travelers. Journal of Travel & Tourism
Marketing, 31(1), 55-70.
Line, N. D., & Hanks, L. (2016). The effects of environmental and luxury beliefs on intention
to patronize green hotels: the moderating effect of destination image. Journal of
Sustainable Tourism, 24(6), 904-925.
Logan, A. J. (2015). Sustainable tourism awareness and environmental practices in luxury
safari lodges (Doctoral dissertation, University of Cape Town).
Lu, C., Berchoux, C., Marek, M. W., & Chen, B. (2015). Service quality and customer
satisfaction: qualitative research implications for luxury hotels. International Journal
of Culture, Tourism and Hospitality Research, 9(2), 168-182.
Robbins, D., & Gaczorek, J. (2015, June). Luxury and sustainability in tourism
accommodation—an exploration of how to reconcile apparently incompatible
objectives using a case study approach. In Conference proceedings of BEST EN Think

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Tank XV: the environment-people nexus in sustainable tourism: finding the balance,
James Cook University, Townsville(pp. 166-186).
Robertson, B. (2017). 5 Luxury Travel Trends To Watch. [online] HuffPost Canada.
Available at: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/brian-robertson/luxury-travel-
trends_b_8079184.html [Accessed 26 Oct. 2017].
stb.gov.sg. (2017). CHINESE TRAVELLERS: RESPONDING TO CHANGING DEMANDS.
[online] Available at: https://www.stb.gov.sg/Documents/TIC%202017_Greater
%20China.pdf [Accessed 26 Oct. 2017].
Steenkamp, J. B. E., & de Jong, M. G. (2013, May). A global investigation into the
constellation of consumer attitudes toward global and local products. American
Marketing Association.