Grand Hotel Sunderland Marketing Plan: A Comprehensive Analysis

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MARKETING PLAN DEVELOPMENT
FOR GRAND HOTEL, SUNDERLAND
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Word count- 2549 words

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Company profile..............................................................................................................................3
Mission statement............................................................................................................................3
Market environment analysis...........................................................................................................3
SWOT Analysis of Grand Hotel Sunderland...............................................................................3
PEST Analysis of the United Kingdom hospitality industry.......................................................4
Marketing plan.................................................................................................................................8
Marketing objectives...................................................................................................................8
Market segmentation, targeting and positioning.........................................................................9
Marketing strategies...................................................................................................................11
Monitoring and control..............................................................................................................12
Summary........................................................................................................................................12
Reference list.................................................................................................................................14

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Introduction
The following assessment aims towards the development of a strategic marketing plan for the
Grand Hotel Sunderland, in order to enhance their customer engagement and sales during the
Tall Ship Race event 2019 being hosted in Roker Beach, Sunderland. In brief, it initially
performs an overall market environment analysis, which is followed by the development of a
strategic marketing plan.
Company profile
Grand Hotel Sunderland is one of the most established dominants in the hotels and
accommodation industry of United Kingdom. The company was formerly known as Grand-
Marriot Sunderland, and was reinstituted by parent organization Britannia Hotels in 2008
(Britanniahotels.com, 2019). The hotel is centrally headquartered in the premises of Sunderland,
United Kingdom. As per reviews, the company is centrally focused on facilitating high-quality
hotel services to their customer base.
Mission statement
As per official reports, the mission statement of the Grand Hotel Sunderland is to provide high-
quality hospitality experiences to their customer base in exchange of fair prices. The company is
further invested into providing hygienic meal products to their customers, in order to not
compromise with their nutritional requirements in a significant manner (Britanniahotels.com,
2019). The company aims to transform into a dominant tourism destination sustainably in the
long-term.
Market environment analysis
SWOT Analysis of Grand Hotel Sunderland
SWOT ANALYSIS OF GRAND HOTEL SUNDERLAND
Strengths
 The Grand hotel Sunderland is situated
in Sunderland, which is favorable to
Weaknesses
 The acquisition of Grand-Marriot by
Britannia Hotels co. has lowered their

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increase customer engagement and
sales during Tall ship Race 2019
 The organization is popular for their
services quality and hygiene standards,
which provides them a competitive
advantage (Britanniahotels.com, 2019)
 The maintenance and management
staff of the Grand Hotel is highly
experienced in their field (Neupane,
2015)
reputation and affected sales, due to the
controversial reputation of Britannia
Hotels
 The company lacks an in-built parking
space, which compels the customers to
park their vehicles nearby the hotel
premises
 The pricing for their additional services
such as gym membership and spa are
comparatively costlier (Roper, 2018)
Opportunities
 Due to Sunderland being one of the
largest tourist locations of United
Kingdom, Grand Hotel has the
opportunities of marketing themselves
optimally to gain higher sales
 The company can consider strategizing
their service prices competitively to
encourage higher sales
 The company can develop an in-built
parking space in order to optimize
customer engagement
Threats
 The hotel and tourism industry is
highly competitive in nature, which is a
potential threat for Grand Hotel
Sunderland (pwc.co.uk, 2019)
 The organization is exposed to threats
of substitution by cheaper hotel chains
with equivalent services
Main competitors
 Roker Hotel
 Hilton Garden Inn Sunderland
 Travelodge Sunderland
Table 1- SWOT ANALYSIS OF GRAND HOTEL SUNDERLAND
Source- Developed by the learner
PEST Analysis of the United Kingdom hospitality industry
PEST ANALYSIS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

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Political
environment
 Although the political environment of United Kingdom believes in
the implementation of a free market sphere, the United Kingdom
environment is focused on the business operations of the private
organizations commencing in their market. This is to ensure that the
businesses being undertaken in their market sphere are for their best
interests.
 The hospitality industry of the United Kingdom is mildly affected by
the latest immigration policies developed by the UK government.
The government has set several limitations of immigration of labor
external from the European Economic Area, which has been recently
witnessed to cause crisis of skills in the hospitality industry of
United Kingdom. In specific, a 10% shortage has been noticed in the
hotel managerial staff of UK hospitality industry, whereas a 6%
shortage has been witnessed in the catering manager workforces
(Bha.org.uk, 2019). On the other hand, the chef and bartenders
shortages have not been whatsoever. This can be threatening to
Grand Hotel Sunderland regarding optimization of their operational
efficiencies for higher organizational productivity.
 The UK hospitality industry has been further severely affected by
the Digital Economy Act 2010 implemented by their government.
According to the act, the main purpose was to minimize the
possibilities of illegal file sharing and transfer, and infringement of
copyrights that occur in the present-day generation. However,
provision of Wi-Fi to the customers has exposed the hotels in United
Kingdom to this legislative violation. In brief, various studies have
criticized that as the customer utilize the internet for their personal
interests, the hotels ultimately becomes involved in the law violation
activities without active involvement, which further disrupts their
reputation (Aldrich et al., 2017). This can be highly threatening to
the Grand Hotel Sunderland regarding establishing their reputation,

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considering the fact that the acquisition of Britannia co. is already
controversial.
Economic
environment
 As per the opinion of Dhingra et al. (2016), the GDP of United
Kingdom has been recorded to reach £2.1 trillion. This implies that
United Kingdom is a highly developed market sphere for businesses
to commence operations. Furthermore, reports have stated that the
inflation rate of United Kingdom had witnessed a significant
declining rate of 2.1% (Dhingra et al., 2016). Altogether, Grand
Hotel is open to opportunities regarding optimization of customer
engagement and sales.
 Due to being one of the most popularized tourism destinations across
the globe, the tourism in United Kingdom has been witnessed to
grow rapidly that equivalently increases tourist spending as well. In
specific, a larger rate of tourist spending has been occurring amidst
United Kingdom since the great recession and drastic fall in the
value of sterling’s against dollars and euro. In this regard, the natives
had stopped visiting international destinations for vacations. As per
the opinion of Dhingra et al. (2016), the margin of tourist spending
in United Kingdom has crossed £10.5 billion, which has
significantly leveraged the sales in their hospitality industry. This
opportunity is highly advantageous for Grand Hotel Sunderland in
terms of increasing their sales margin largely.
 The recent increase in Value Added Tax had resulted into a
significant decline in the consumers spending budget. As per the
opinion of Driffield and Karoglou (2019), the 20% hike in VAT had
severely discouraged the consumer from engaging into more
spending activities and lowered their budget to a critically low
manner. In this regard, the United Kingdom hospitality industry is
critically affected as the consumer behavior has changed, which
restricts them from resting in high-quality premium hotels in United
Kingdom. Although the low budget hotel and accommodation

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organizations are reaping great benefits through this initiative, the
premium service organizations are severely affected. Due to being a
provider of premium services, Grand Hotel Sunderland is also
mildly affected by this imitative.
Socio-
demographic
environment
 The living standards of the citizens of United Kingdom are
comparatively high and deluxe. As per the opinion of Rubin et al.
(2016), it is because the average annual income of an average full-
time employee working in United Kingdom has been estimated to be
£28,677. Furthermore, the population of United Kingdom has also
calculated being 66.3 million inhabitants in 2019 (Bha.org.uk,
2019). Altogether, it implies that it is a highly profitable area for
major hotel organizations such as Grand Hotel Sunderland.
 Furthermore, United Kingdom is also classified one of the 10 most
educationally developed nations, which is because their literacy rate
has been calculated to be 99% in 2019 (Bha.org.uk, 2019). This
further implies that the Grand Hotel Sunderland is enabled to
employ a highly skilled workforce that can help them in enhancing
their customer engagement and sales through effective and strategic
measures.
 Furthermore, various reports have stated that United Kingdom is a
place of culture, which further states that the country is mostly
engaged in hosting various festivals. In this regard, studies have
confirmed that the UK hospitality industry had acquired the most
profitability during the 2012 Olympics sports events. As the number
of festivals and events such as Tall ship race arise in the provinces of
United Kingdom, more and more visitors and tourist are
automatically attracted to be a part of it. In this regard, hotel
businesses such as the Grand Hotel Sunderland can acquire a huge
benefit in terms of customer engagement and sales through this
festival. Location also plays a major factor in this aspect, which is
highly beneficial for Grand Hotel due to its central location is in

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Sunderland, which is very close to Roker beach (Chen et al., 2015).
Technological
environment
 As per the opinion of Rahimi and Kozak (2017), United Kingdom
can be best described as one of the most developed nations, in terms
of technological development. Since the year 2011, United Kingdom
has been recorded to invest around £28 billion in terms of
investment on technological advancement (Dhingra et al., 2016). In
this regard, London itself is internationally popularized as the
technological hub of United Kingdom. Furthermore, studies confirm
that the country is constantly broadening its technological horizons,
which can be beneficial for Grand Hotel in terms of optimizing their
organizational productivity and customer satisfaction at the same
time. Regardless, Tan (2017) had confirmed that the technological
development of United Kingdom is still behind comparatively
advanced nations such as United States of America, South Korea etc.
Table 2- PEST ANALYSIS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY
Source- Developed by the learner
Marketing plan
Marketing objectives
The following plan aims to fulfill these underlying objectives, which are as follows-
 To optimize the customer engagement of Grand Hotel Sunderland during the Tall ship
race festival by 25%
 To increase the product/service sales margin of Grand Hotel Sunderland during the Tall
ship race festival by 20%
 To broaden the customer base of Grand Hotel Sunderland through acquisition of 1,000
potential customers

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Market segmentation, targeting and positioning
Figure 1- STP ANALYSIS FRAMEWORK
Source- Developed by the learner
Segmentation- As per the case scenario, the main customer segment for Grand Hotel will be the
visitors and native citizens that visit the Tall ship race. In this regard, the market segmentation
has been conducted based on the demographic, geographic, psychographic and behavioral factors
of the customers (Jogaratnam, 2017).
Demographic segmentation
 Young adults (19-23)
 Adults (24-35)
 Mature (36-50)
 Senior citizens (50 and above)
Geographic segmentation
 Native citizens
 International tourists
 Locals
Psychographic segmentation
 Exotic travelers
 Family men
 Corporate workers
Behavioral segmentation
 Socially active
 Culturally devoted
 Travel lovers
Market segmentation
Market targeting
Market positioning

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Table 3- MARKET SEGMENTATION OF GRAND HOTEL SUNDERLAND
Source- Developed by the learner
Targeting- The Grand Hotel Sunderland fundamentally required targeting customer segment that
can be highly profitable for their business operations. As discussed above, an average corporate
employee in United Kingdom earns around £28,677 per year on average. Furthermore, it has
been previously acknowledged that the local tourist spending of United Kingdom had also
crossed £10.5 billion, which implies that citizens prefer to travel amid their national boundaries
progressively. With respect to this, the customer segment that has been targeting in the analysis
is the adult corporate employees that are socially active and prefer to travel a lot.
Positioning- The brand positioning of be entirely based on the behavior of their targeted
customers, in order to gain their attraction and significant manner. As the customers are
significantly attracted, the organization is enabled to capitalize on their interests and
requirements precisely. In this regard, the discussion above implies that the customer segments
of Grand Hotel are socially active. With respect to this, the organization can exploit popular
social media marketing methods in order to attract a larger number of customers during the Tall
ship race event. Furthermore, word-of-mouth advertising can also implement to attract the social
circles towards their product offerings (Roper, 2017).

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Marketing strategies
Figure 2- 4P MARKETING MIX STRATEGY FRAMEWORK
Source- Developed by the learner
Product- The product offerings of Grand Hotel are highly diverse, as per their product and
services portfolio. In specific, the hotel provides highly exclusive services such as in-built heated
swimming pool, leisure club, sauna bath, steam bath facilities, gym membership etc. The hotel
also facilitates a meeting venue space for corporate event purposes. On the other hand, the hotel
also comes with an officially attached restaurant that provides high-quality meals to their
customers that are high in nutritional values. The hotel also has an attached bar that serves
alcohol and other beverages. Furthermore, the organization also facilitates Wi-Fi services to their
customers at fair prices. As per reviews, the hotel management is highly concerned about the
maintenance of a hygienic environment all the time.
Price- As per the marketing plan, the hotel would be focused on the aspect of competitive
pricing in order to acquire a higher competitive advantage against their rival companies during
the Tall ship race. It has been acknowledged from the market analysis that the biggest competitor
of Grand Hotel Sunderland is Travelodge, as it is a cheaper alternative hotel for customers with
similar services. As per the opinion of Ramanathan et al. (2016), the Travelodge hotel offers
PRODUCT
PRICE
PLACE
PROMOTION

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basic accommodation services at £19. Therefore, the pricing of accommodation would be £18 for
Grand Hotel during the Tall ship race event. Lowering the pricing would attract higher number
of customers, which would be further helpful for the company in terms of maximization of
customer engagement. As more customers are engaged, the sales margin of Grand Hotel
Sunderland would automatically increase in a progressive manner.
Place- The geographic positioning of Grand Hotel would be highly advantageous for the
organization during the Tall Ship race event. This is because the event will be taking place in
Roker beach, which is situated in Sunderland. The hotel is not very far from the main event
space, for which the hotel will be opportunities to accommodate more visitors in their premises
in comparison with the rival companies.
Promotion- The Grand Hotel Sunderland can exploit popular social media platforms in order to
promote their product offerings to their targeted customers significantly. Platforms such as
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snap chat can be used to advertise the lowered price offers to
their targeted socially active customer base (Božič and Knežević Cvelbar, 2016). Furthermore,
word-of-mouth advertising can be implemented where renowned British travel bloggers ad
celebrities can be associated with their marketing campaign. The social figures can tweet or
share their views about their experience in the hotel, which can attract a larger number of
customers. Furthermore, the company can distribute brochures to the visitors during the event to
attract customers.
Monitoring and control
The marketing division of The Grand Hotel would be hiring five HRM executives that would
look after the internal management of the operational activities of the organization during the
campaign to ensure optimum performance. Furthermore, three field executives would be hired to
distribute the leaflets to the visitors during the event to attract larger customers. Furthermore, two
social media executives would be hired to commence the social media promotion activities. The
entire activities would be monitored by the management executives of the organization precisely.
Summary
Based on the analysis presented above, conclusion can be drawn that Grand Hotel Sunderland is
exposed to high opportunities during the Tall ship race event. The market analysis has helped