Chapter 11 blog

http://www.bcbusinessonline.ca/bcb/top-stories/2008/09/03/meeting-challenges


Summary:
The article I read on www.bcbusinessonline.com by Peter Mitham talked about the challenges BC tourism will meet and the affects of convention centers and hoteliers. In this summer, a strong dollar, high fuel prices and economic storm clouds south of the border dogged B.C. tourism operators. The favorable exchange rates sent domestic travelers south of the border. In recent years, 80 per cent of B.C.’s foreign visitors came from U.S; however, since the US dollars were equal to the Canadian dollars, the visitors in U.S were no longer came to Canada. Therefore, these trends are going to make it very difficult for the convention business and hoteliers. Competition among small-scale convention centers is already a fierce battle, and the economic pressures gathering steam only promise to make it more so.

Connection:
The connection between the article and the information in the text is merchandising. As the article mentioned above, BC will lose a lot tourists from U.S since the exchange rates goes to 1:1. This will not only effect the convention centers and hoteliers, but also will effect the merchandisings in B.C. Many merchandisers in B.C. have their stores locate around the tourism places, but since the tourism rate went down, the merchandisers may not earn as much as they want. On the other hand, if the merchandisers will only made little amounts of sales, their gross profits will decrease.

Reflection:
The article above should attract the attentions of marketing departments in the companies. Before the tourism in B.C. will meet challenges, the people in marketing departmenst should make good plans in order to face the rescissions follow by. Especially to some merchandisers who have their stores around the tourism places or some merchandisers put their main forces on earning tourists’ money. By the way, the two plans any merchandisers can use are: first, you may decrease your inventories because you may not sale as much as before; second, you may want to design a good promotion plan in order to attract as many customers as you can.