Notes on Tourism products and their characteristics.

1. CHARACTERISTICS OF A
TOURISM PRODUCT.
:By Mthokozisi Masuku
Bsc (Hon) in Hospitality and Tourism student.

2. What is a product…..
 A product is anything that can be offered to a market for attention, acquisition, use
or consumption that may satisfy a want or need. It includes physical objects,
services, persons, places and ideas.
 Service is an act, deed or performance that one renders to the other and does not
necessarily result in the ownership of a tangible object or anything (Kotler,2012)
 A tourism is made up of both tangible and intangible elements.

3. Tangible elements
 Attractions
 Infrastructure: roads, airports, water, electricity etc.
 Superstructure: hotels, restaurants
NB: Infrastructure provides a base for the development of superstructure facilities.
NB: The tangible aspects however, good cannot guarantee satisfaction.

4. Intangibible elements
 Hospitality/courtesy
 Friendliness/ human warmth
 Ambience: the general atmosphere of a place and the effect that it has on people
(the mood of a place).
*The way tourists are treated and how they feel influence their overall reaction.

5. The unique characteristics of a tourism
product.
 1. Perishability
 2. Intangibility
 3. Variability/ Heterogeneity
 4. Inseparability
 5. Seasonality

6. 1. Perishability
Tourism products cannot be stored or kept for later use e.g. an airline seat unsold is
revenue that cannot be recouped. This leads to the high risk nature of the tourism
industry.
Managing perishability: if service providers are to maximise revenue, they must
manage capacity and demand since they cannot carry forward unsold inventory.
*There is need for marketers in the industry to devise complex pricing and promotion
strategies in order to maximise sales during the off season periods .
*Promotions to increase demand of the product, discounts e.g. weekend discounts.

7. 2. Intangibility
Tourism products cannot be touched, evaluated. It is an experience based industry and
hence it’s products cannot to touched but are rather experienced e.g. one cannot
touch a trip to Victoria Falls.
Managing intangibility: marketers of tourism products need to make use of printed
literature, videos that help to make tourism products more tangible to the customer.
- Use promotional materials such as brochures
- Employee’s physical appearance
- Service firm’s physical environment
- The physical surroundings should be designed to reinforce the product’s position in
the mind of the customer (product positioning).

8. 3.Variability/ Heterogeneity
 The tourism industry is a service oriented industry and as such, guest experience
varies from one guest to another, for example the way people are greeted varies.
 This makes the control of quality service provision to be difficult as compared to
manufactured products which can be standardised, making quality control much
easier.
 A smile cannot be standardised; one cannot specify it’s length, width etc. A smile
should come out naturally; it is difficult to order people to smile.
N.B. The service outcome is not uniform, it varies with time, the personality and mood
of the person delivering the service.
Managing Variability: crafting standard operating procedures to act as manuals for all
employees in service delivery.

9. Variability cont...
- Monitoring customer satisfaction through suggestion boxes, complaints and
customer surveys.
- Create positions that attract good employees e.g. promotions
- Good hiring and training procedures. Hiring processes should identify and result in
hiring service oriented employees.

10. 4.Inseparability
 A tourism product is produced and consumed simultaneously; both the service provider
and customer must be present for the transaction to occur.
 The tourist should visit the production point (destination) in order to consume the
product.
 Workers involved in delivering the service are part of the product.
 Customers are involved in the production process.
 Customers are part of the product.
 The major implication is that employees are part of the products; the menu may be very
good but if served by a rude waiter this will decrease the overall experience.
Managing inseparability: recruiting the right people who are trainable and have the right
attitude e.g. headhunting the right employees.

11. Inseparability cont….
- Empowering frontline staff to enable employees to make decisions during the
production and consumption process.
- Hotels can use technology and training to provide employees with the right attitude.

12. 5. Seasonality
 The demand for tourism products is seasonal in nature and as such, the industry
experiences fluctuations in demand creating lack of continuity of operations.
 Seasonality affects many things that include employment, energy consumption,
host communities and the general flow of supplies.
Managing seasonality: maximise revenue during peak periods.
- Discounts during off-peak periods
- Develop new products for the off-peak periods to increase revenue streams.