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2. Think and answer:

  1. How well is hotel business developed in Russia?

  2. What kinds of accommodations do Russian tourist companies offer? What do you know about the quality of this service?

  3. What is a typical “packaged hotel” in Russia?

  4. Can you give examples of high class hotels in Russia?

  5. Does the price of accommodation in Russia reflect the quality of the service? Why (not)?

  6. What do you know about catering service in Russia hotels?

  7. Is it similar to that in international hotels?

  8. Do foreign tourists like Russian food?

  9. What Russian food is most popular with tourists?

  10. What problems do hotels in Russia face?

  11. How do they cope with these problems?

Part two

Listening and reading

Listen to the tape and read the text

Pre-reading

In economic terms, what do hotel rooms and airline seats have in common?

Location and price are two important factors people consider when choosing a place to stay. Which of these factors is likely to be more important

a) to a business traveller?

to a holidaymaker?

Why?

Skim and scan

a) How much can it cost to build a hotel room in central London?

b) Which night is likely to be more profitable for a hotel used mainly by business travelers – Monday or Friday? Why?

  1. What do a hotel's 'psychological characteristics' consist of?

Hotel operation

Hotels and other residential establishments share a number of marketing problems. In the first place, what is sold to the tourist is not a single product but the sum of a variety of different products, each of which could be the principal factor accounting for the customer's choice.

First and foremost, a customer's choice is likely to be based on location, a key factor in the profitability of the unit. Location implies both the destination (resort for the holidaymaker, convenient stopover point for the traveller, city for the business traveller) and the location within that destination. Thus the business traveller will want to be at a hotel close to the company he visits, the seaside holidaymaker will wish to be as close as possible to the seafront, and the traveller will want to be close to the airport from which he is leaving. In economic terms a "trade-off" will occur between location and price; the tourist, unable to afford a seafront property, will opt for the one closest to the front which fits his pocket. Location is, of course, fixed for all time. If the resort loses its attractions for visitors, the hotel will suffer an equivalent decline in its fortunes.

The fact that high fixed costs are incurred in both building and operating hotels compounds the risk of hotel operating. City centre sites are extremely expensive to purchase and run (estimates for central London have ranged as high as £130,000 per room for hotel construction), requiring very high room prices. The market may resist such prices but is nevertheless reluctant to be based at any distance from the centres of activity, even where good transportation is available.

The demand for hotel rooms will come from a widely distributed market, nationally or internationally, whereas the market for other facilities which the hotel has to offer will be highly localised. In addition to providing food and drink for its own residents, the hotel will be marketing these services to tourists or residents within only a short distance of the site. Clearly a very different market segment will be involved, calling for different advertising, promotion and distribution strategies.

Another characteristic of the product is that it is seldom uniformly in demand throughout the year. Tourist hotels in particular suffer from levels of very high demand during the summer and negligible demand in the winter months. Even hotels catering chiefly to business travellers, while they may experience consistent demand during the year, will find that demand is largely for Monday-Thursday nights and they will have a problem in attracting weekend business, a problem known as periodicity as apart from seasonality. This lack of flexibility in room supply and the fact that the product itself is highly perishable (if rooms are unsold there is no opportunity to "store" them and sell them later) mean that great efforts in marketing must be made to attract off-peak customers, while potential revenue has to be sacrificed during the peak season because demand is greater than supply. Even with creative selling, such as discounted winter-breaks which the hotels have now introduced, many tourist hotels in seasonal locations such as seasides will be lucky to achieve average year-round occupancy of more than 50 per cent. These hotels are then faced with the choice of staying open in the winter, with the hope of making sufficient income to cover their direct operating costs for the period, or closing completely for several months of the year. The problem with the latter course of action is that a number of hotel costs, such as rates and depreciation, will continue whether or not the hotel remains open. Temporary closure also has an impact on staff recruitment, with the attendant (difficulties of obtaining staff of the right calibre for jobs which are only seasonal. In recent years more and more of the larger hotels have opted to stay open year-round, with special packages designed to attract the off-season market. The increase in second holidays in Britain has helped in this endeavour.

We have talked chiefly in terms of the physical characteristics of a hotel which attract its market, but no less important are the psychological factors such as service, "atmosphere", even the other guests with whom the customer will come in contact. Any or all of these factors will be taken into consideration by customers in making their choice of hotel.

'The Business of Tourism', Holloway, J. Christopher (MacDonald & Evans),

2nd edn, 1995

Notes on the text

    1. first and foremost – прежде всего

    2. to localize – ограничивать распространение, локализировать

    3. negligible – незначительный, непринимаемый во внимание

    4. perishable – скоропортящийся

    5. calibre – достоинство, калибр

    6. endeavour – попытка, старание

    7. attendant difficulties – сопутствующие трудности