Case Study Analysis of 2018 Winter Olympics Held at Pyeongchang

The 2018 Winter Olympics held at Pyeongchang, South Korea was a mega event featuring 102 events with over 15 disciplines in seven sports. The study applies the Event Life Cycle concept and explores the core management principles of creating, designing, planning, and sustainability of the game. The case analysis covers the event life cycle stages, including the formation stage, growth stage, staging, and future development of the event destination. The study concludes with recommendations on sustainability and creating a positive impact on the environment, economic and socio-cultural initiatives.

CASE STUDY ANALYSIS OF 2018 WINTER OLYMPICS HELD AT PYEONGCHANG
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Introduction
The 2018 Winter Olympics was an international multi-sport event held between 9 and 25
February in Pyeongchang country, Gangwon Province of South Korea
(Emery, 2011). The game featured 102 events with over 15 disciplines in seven sports. The
current case analysis of the sports event is undertaken to apply the Event Life Cycle concept and
to explore the core management principles of creating, designing, planning, and sustainability of
the game.
Analysis of Event Life Cycle Stages
The study of the 2018 Winter Olympics will be conducted using the event life cycle stages.
According to Getz (2008), as events of such mega size are known to be an essential motivator of
tourism, it is critical that the development and marketing of such destinations are carried out. The
planned events as this one have extreme importance on increasing the competitiveness of the
destination of South Korea, which had been since prolonged time averted by tourists (Getz,
2012, pp 171-187). The event life cycle stages will comprise the following segments as given
below;
o Formation stage of the Pyeongchang’s Winter Olympics:
The Idea behind bidding for Winter Olympics in South Korea came from varied stakeholder
groups, politician, business people as well as from sports federations (Shank and Lyberger,
2014). Pyeongchang had bid to host Winter Olympics in 2010 and 2014, but it lost out in final
rounds. Pyeongchang was finally elected to host Winter Olympics at the 123rd IOC Session in
Durban in 2011, by earning 48 votes, becoming the third Asian city to host Winter Games. The
idea was developed by politicians and business people to attract tourists in South Korea
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(Theodoraki, 2010). The business leaders and politicians had aimed to draw the world's attention
towards its country and create a separate image from North Korea in the mind of people.
The essential Feasibility depends upon the destination master plan, event portfolio, event image
goals, budgeting, and financial risks, city's infrastructure, venues, accommodation, transport, and
event strategy. South Korea has developed its infrastructure and place along with transportation
and housing such that the city can comfortably host the Olympic Winter games (Hayes and
Karamichas, 2011). A hosting of Olympics is a high investment venture, the entire feasibility of
this Olympic Games was dependent upon the creation of basic infrastructures for hosting of
varied game events. South Korea expertly handled the incident and hosted the mega event at its
newly designed Olympic stadium facility, hosting the games at various locations (Baumann and
Matheson, 2013).
o Growth stage of the Pyeongchang’s Winter Olympics:
Bidding campaign was launched by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on August 5,
2011. The Committee announced forming of the Pyeongchang 2018 coordination Commission,
for organizing the Olympics. The Committee was responsible for designing of a master plan and
designing of the venues (Cho, Min, and Kim, 2018, pp 267-287). The Coordination Commission
visited Pyeongchang in March of 2012, post which the construction of the Olympic village began
at a high pace.
The Commission designed venue master plan and post-event management plan at the Olympic
Village. The organizing Committee recruited university students in South Korea for spreading
awareness regarding the Games using social media and news articles. The outdoor snow events
held at Pyeongchang, and the super G-events held in the neighboring country of Jeongseon, and
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indoor events held at the Gangneung city. The associated plan needed for hosting of tourists,
spectators, athletes and organizers of the game, due to which hotels had to set up according to
international standards and security had been given (Barclay, 2009, pp 62-66).
Infrastructural development at various places took place, where individual sports events were to
take place. The entire Olympic village was transformed to accommodate tourists and athletes for
the gaming event (Joo, Bae, and Kassens-Noor, 2017, pp 1- 22). Apart from the hosting of the
games, major associated infrastructural facilities had e developed within the country which
boosted the country’s past economic status.
The Committee undertook event planning commissioned to design the entire event. As there were
brewing tensions in North Korea over the nuclear missile testing, the South Korean president
Moon Jae-in ensured security in the games (Feddersen and Maennig, 2012, pp. 113-138).
Though various first world counties decided to withdraw from the games at the first instance
later, they ensured their participation. bLater North Korea expressed its interests in participating
in the games.
The Committee and marketing took event branding strategy care for the 2018 Winter Olympic
Games were carried out across the entire globe with the selling of its tickets. The tickets priced at
US$18 to US$796. The opening and closing ceremony tickets priced at a higher price.
o Staging of the Pyeongchang’s Winter Olympics:
Event hosting was taken place at a different location for different sports. The opening ceremony
of the 2018 Winter Olympic was held at Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium on February 9, 2018,
which used approximately US$ 100 million facilities and was demolished post the games. There
were some participating countries and National Olympic Committees in the Games.
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o Future Development of the event destination:
Long-term destination positioning was aimed at creating a mindset regarding South Korea. The
effort to host Winter Olympic Games was to change perception regarding the country and attract
tourists in the location. The event was designed in a well-planned and beautiful manner such that
there is word-of-mouth and spread of word regarding the state (Merkel and Kim, 2011, pp 2365-
2383). The entire event and destination planning aimed at positioning South Korea as an
attractive tourists destination in Asia.
Post-event venue management was conducted by the Committee to ensure that there are proper
management and no incident taking place to create a negative impression regarding the country.
Tourism product development included extending some of the cultural and social features of
South Korea (Mitchell and Stewart, 2015, pp 1550-1561). For a prolonged period, South Korea
had been in war and had created a negative impression on the world, hence various tourism
product aimed at diverting tourists attention to the authentic dresses, amazing tasty cuisines and
the beautiful landscape in South Korea.
Recommendations
The issue of sustainability has become one of the leading stakeholder’s concerns as it leads to
becoming a major socio-economic issue. The concept of sustainability for the Winter Olympics
is based upon usage of the earth's resources which can be regenerated and creating waste at a rate
which can be assimilated by the environment without its impairment. Sustainability includes
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product characteristics and features along with exposure and risks faced. The stakeholder's
primarily, the sports federation need to be concerned regarding the use of various resources,
which might be tangible and intangible. The committee and the sports federation need to create
awareness regarding sustainable citizenship such that tourists and participating individuals, as
well as groups, can create a positive impact on the environment, economic and socio-cultural
initiatives. The mega event would attract tourists, spectators, and athletes from all over the
world. Thus they will be staying at hotels, motels, lodges and making use of transport, eating
food and so on, during the event. There will be associated carbon footprints associated with
every activity, which needs to be evaluated. Adequate recycling measures for various wastes
need to be adopted along with curbing measures to reduce as many wastes as possible.
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