1. ID No: 0594617 Lecturer:Donna O’Donnell
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The four main factors surrounding the success of a man-made purpose built
tourist attraction today are the development of the attraction, the management of
the attraction, the appeal of the attraction to visitors and the marketing of the
attraction (Middleton, Fyall, Morgan and Ranchhod, 2009). This essay will be
evaluating Kelly Tarlton’s Sea Life Aquarium as a man-made purpose built
attraction within New Zealand and using supporting evidence, critique each area
of the attraction’s design in order to decide whether Kelly Tarlton’s is a good
attraction or not. The four main areas of focus within this evaluation will be
development, product, marketing and management. Development will assess
criteria including location, accessibility, investment and parties involved in the
development. Product will identify the all the key areas the visitors will experience
right from when they arrive on site to the products and services that Kelly Tarlton’s
have to offer the consumer as well as any unique selling points. Marketing will look
at the different ways in which the Kelly Tarlton’s marking team market their brand
to the public and the types of target markets the company aims to. Finally
management will cover areas including the management structure of Kelly
Tarlton’s and staff turnover. Taking an analytical approach to each of these four
key areas, this essay will assess whether Kelly Tarlton’s Sea Life Aquarium is a
good visitor attraction or not.
Kelly Tarlton’s Sea Life Aquarium, first opened to the public in 1985 and is one of
New Zealand’s most well-known man-made attractions having celebrated its 30th
anniversary in January 2015. The idea was to build a unique aquarium which
nobody had ever seen and construction was carried out in 1984 on a 2.4m
diameter tunnel and a moving walkway. The attraction was built inside a group of
redundant storm water and sewage tanks near Mission Bay at Takaparawha Point
and took ten months to build and cost three million dollars. (Dougan, 2015).
According to (Middleton et al., 2009), the choice of location when it comes to
building an attraction is one of the most pivotal factors which contributes to the
attractions success. It is fundamentally important that not only is the location
suitable for that attraction but also that the attraction needs to be strategically
placed so it is accessible to visitors by different means of transport and close to
other tourist hotspots. In this instance, the location of Kelly Tarlton’s was well
chosen as it is only 15 minutes’ drive from Auckland’s CBD and very assessable
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by either public bus, train or private vehicle. In conjunction to this, Kelly Tarlton’s
has a public bus stop located about ten metres from the attraction itself of which
buses frequently run to and from the Auckland CBD. There is also extensive
customer parking on site for visitors who wish to travel by car. Furthermore, Kelly
Tarlton’s also has a free shuttle which runs to/from their attraction to/from Quay
Street in the Auckland CBD. Moreover, Kelly Tarlton’s is very strategically placed
as it sits right by the waterside of the Auckland Harbour with a stunning view of not
only the harbour itself but also the Auckland Harbour Bridge and Auckland City
beyond which further adds to ambience of the attraction.
In addition, a further factor to take into account during the development of an
attraction, is the business’s affiliation with other companies and organisations.
First and foremost as of 2012, Kelly Tarlton’s are owned by Merlin Entertainments
which have significantly contributed to Kelly Tarlton’s development over the past
decade. Merlin Entertainments, is second largest visitor attraction management
company in the world. They run 110 attractions in 23 countries across 4 continents
(Merlin Entertainments Group, 2015). Being associated with such a renowned
company, has seen Kelly Tarlton’s more widely recognised on an international
scale where as previously, their attraction had a more local/national catchment
area. In addition, in 2011 Merlin invested 5.5 million dollars into Kelly Tarlton’s to
redevelop and relaunch the business into a world class attraction (Scoop Media,
2012). This investment allowed Kelly Tarlton’s to add extensive additions to the
theming, ambience and create a new layout and exhibit structure. Another
association that Kelly Tarlton’s are involved with, are the Sea Life Trust. Working
with this company, helps Kelly Tarlton’s promote one of the main aims of their
company which is to educate people on the protection of various marine species
and the affect that we have on their environment. Through the Sea Life Trust,
Kelly Tarltons also have established the Sea Life Conservation Fund which is an
independent, environmental non-profit organization dedicated to conserving and
protecting New Zealand's unique aquatic habitats and the incredible animals that
live in them (Merlin Entertainments Group, 2015). Working alongside
environmental organizations not only helps promote Kelly Tarlton’s as an
attraction, but also opens a door to one of their large target market areas of
students. Moreover, the Department of Conservation has so much recognition for
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the educational work that Kelly Tarlton’s does within schools that in 2015 they
contributed 100 thousand dollars towards the development and delivery of Kelly
Tarlton’s mobile outreach programme which is designed to directly deliver marine
conversation education into schools and community centres (Department of
Conservation, 2015).
One of the most vital parts of an attraction is the products and services they have
to offer, as the actual product itself is a combination of a variety of different areas.
These areas may include but are not limited to, the quality of advertising during
promotion, effectiveness and appeal of signage, accessibility of the attraction, the
attraction’s location, the attraction’s physical appearance and ambience, the level
of customer service offering during the consumption of the product and the
general layout of the attractions displays, presentations and on site facilities
(Swarbrooke, 2002). On arrival of visitors to Kelly Tarlton’s, the most important
factor associated with a visitor’s first visual impression will be the entrance. In
relation to Kelly Tarlton’s, the entrance to their product is very clearly exhibited,
both on the front of the entrance itself, inside the entrance to the attraction and
throughout the parking facilities on site. The company’s website is also advertised
on the front of the entrance and outside the entrance there is signage promoting
the Kelly Tarlton’s free shuttle service and its service times as well as the
Auckland Explorer Bus service and its prices. There are painted penguin shaped
footprints throughout the parking facilities leading to the entrance of the attraction.
Just inside the entrance, there is clear signage giving visitors information on the
attraction operating hours and direction to the general admission lane and the
prepaid express lane as well as the variety of admission prices and methods of
payment. There is also a variety of different signage, which cover any other
information that visitors may want to know including a daily schedule for talks on
different marine species and daily feedings of the different types of specimens
including the penguins.
Within the attraction itself, Kelly Tarlton’s displays 30 live animal exhibits which
showcase up to 2000 fish of 40 different species at once time, 4 species of shark,
stringrays and the world’s largest Antarctic penguin colony exhibit. The sharks,
stringrays and fish can be viewed through a 114m long underwater plexiglass
tunnel in the shape of the figure eight which has a conveyor belt. Aside from the
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tunnel which is one of Kelly Tarlton’s main attraction features, one of their unique
selling points is the Antarctic Ice Adventure and Scott Base. The exhibit allows
visitors to view a colony of King and Gentoo penguins. This feature is a unique
selling point as it displays New Zealand’s only colony of Antarctic Penguins.
Accompanying the two previously mentioned selling points, are a fish gallery and
seahorse kingdom which contain an area of smaller aquariums filled with sea
horses, moray eels, crayfish, stonefish, pufferfish, red bellied piranha and an
octopus. The octopus named Rambo, has recently caught the attention of visitors
and other marine organisations for being the first octopus in the world to learn how
to take photos with an underwater camera which was a unique selling point for
Kelly Tarlton’s in its own right (Walters, 2015). A Further unique selling point is
Phoebe a 250 kg short-tail stingray who has been with Kelly Tarlton’s since it first
opened over 30 years ago and has since had 56 babies.
Another important key feature as stated by (Swarbrooke, 2002), are activities
surrounding the attraction itself. These can often be unique selling points used in
packaging the attraction’s product and furthermore, be used as a tool in further
extending the appeal of their attraction to other target markets. Kelly Tarlton’s offer
visitors to scuba dive with the sharks up close in personal or if they prefer snorkel
with the sharks within a cage. Another popular activity on offer, is the Penguin
Discovery which allows visitors to get up close with the King and Gentoo penguins
while being supervised by staff. Kelly Tarlon’s also offer a 25 minute tour where
visitors will be shown how everything works in the back of house areas, see the
shark tunnel from above and get to feed the fish in the largest tank. A further
important part of activities within an attraction are events and functions. Currently,
Kelly Tarlton’s is available for hire for a variety of functions including family
sleepovers, dining functions, cocktail parties, private walkthrough experiences and
birthday parties which the primary area of focus in their current brochure on site
(Kelly Tarlton's Sea Life Aquarium, 2015). For functions, Kelly Tarlton’s can
accommodate anywhere from 10 to 500 guests at a time. One of the features
which makes it ideal for functions, is that it is underground which means functions
will be unaffected by weather conditions and moreover, reduces the effect of
seasonality due to bad weather (Merlin Entertainments Group, 2015). Activities,
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functions and events encourage secondary spending by the public which can be
an important source of revenue for the attraction during the off peak season.
As mentioned earlier, Kelly Tarlton’s plays host to an extensive variety of target
markets. Traditionally, Kelly Tarlton’s aimed to focus at a 50/50 base target market
between domestic and international visitors. When the attraction first opened it
attracted 900,000 visitors in its first year and since then more than 11 million
visitors have walked through its doors. Over the past decade, Kelly Tarlton’s has
attracted 350,000 visitors on an annual basis. 70% of these visitors have been
domestic, and 80% of those domestic visitors have been from inside the Auckland
region. Being that Kelly Tarlton’s carries an extensive educational focus, one of
their major target markets is school children. Other target markets include families,
tertiary students and international tourists who are either passing through
Auckland or staying within the Auckland area during their visit to New Zealand. On
the educational side of the target market, Kelly Tarlton’s has become very
technologically savy. Most of its displays and exhibits throughout the attraction,
have interactive monitors and videos to further educate visitors, especially children
on the numerous different marine species on site. (Merlin Entertainments Group,
2015).
How well an attraction is marketed and the channels used to market their
product(s), can have a substantial impact on the numbers of visitor that attraction
receives (Middleton, Fyall, Morgan and Ranchhod, 2009). As today’s society has
become very technologically focused, a major part of marketing is associated with
online social networks. Currently, Kelly Tarlton’s promotes its business through
Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Trip Advisor, of which Kelly Tarlton’s won a
certificate of excellence on during 2015 (Kelly Tarlton's Sea Life Aquarium, 2015),
(Trip Advisor, 2015). As it is impossible to literally take the product to the
consumer in the case of Kelly Tarlton’s, promotional channels for its marketing
often carry as much interactive media content as possible in order to promote their
product(s) such as Youtube and Virtual Tourist (Virtual Tourist, 2015). Other forms
of marketing Kelly Tarlton’s has used include their free shuttle service which is
designed in the form of a shark so sticks out well in public. They also market their
product using the Auckland Hop-on, Hop-off Explorer bus which is a tour of which
the Auckland Explorer considers Auckland city’s top ten tourism attractions. Kelly
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Tarlton’s is the second stop on the tour. Kelly Tarlton’s is also promoted in the
Auckland harbour 360 discovery cruise brochure (Auckland Explorer Bus, 2015;
Harbour Discovery, 2015). Moreover, Kelly Tarlton’s were the winner of the
‘Innovative Marketing Campaign’ award which was given at the 2010 Tourism
Industry Awards. This award was given for their ‘Oceans of Things to Sea and Do’
marketing programme which targeting the domestic tourism market within New
Zealand, giving them a reason to keep returning to Kelly Tarlton’s (New Zealand
tourism guide, 2015).
Finally, the fourth area of importance within an attraction is the management
structure. In the case of Kelly Tarlton’s, at the very top is Merlin Entertainments
who consist of 6 non-executive directors and 11 executive directors who each
have a particular responsibility or area of expertise whether it be financial,
developmental of particular attractions or directorial. In particular with Kelly
Tarlton’s the managing director is Nick Mackenzie who is in charge of the
continued development of not only Kelly Tarlton’s but all attractions within the SEA
LIFE brand plus half a dozen other attraction brands (Merlin Entertainments,
2015). Development from Merlin includes product relaunch, expansion,
rebranding, ensuring attractions are profitable and reaching revenue targets and
investments where necessary Merlin Entertainments, 2015). Below Merlin, within
Kelly Tarltons itself the company has its own development director and directors in
other key departments including finance, marketing and sales. Beneath those
roles are the standard department managers for each area of the attraction
including front of house for example the front desk and gift shop and back of
house which involves taking care of sea life and putting on demonstrations for the
visitors (Merlin Entertainments Group, 2015). Kelly Tarlton’s currently has 40 full
time staff, 50 casual/part time and approximately 100 staff total (including
management). The management structure of Kelly Tarlton’s is quite complex,
especially now that it now is Merlin Entertainments’ management which has
ensured that the company continues to develop and continue drawing in visitors.
In conclusion, looking back over what was discussed, Kelly Tarlton’s is a now well
established on a local catchment area scale as one of Auckland’s top attractions
having been in business over 30 years. It is located in an excellent location based
on the nature of the attraction and is in an area which is highly accessible by both
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public and non-public transport means. Kelly Tarlton’s have a positive business
relationship both with the owners Merlin Entertainments and with the Department
of Conservation who have both contributed towards Kelly Tarltons’ being a well-
known local and national attraction within New Zealand. Within the attraction itself,
there are numerous unique selling points which distinguish Kelly Tarlton’s as one
of the top attractions within Auckland including visitors being able to see New
Zealand’s only colony of Antarctic penguins. The attraction offers a diverse variety
of both educate and entertain visitors. Kelly Tarlton’s is primary catchment area in
regards to marketing is local although they are beginning to promote the brand on
a more national scale. Kelly Tarlton’s reach the chosen target markets through a
variety of social media including facebook and trip advisor and through use of the
company shark shuttle bus. Furthermore, they continue to reach the younger
target market through school educational programmes. Management within the
company is quite vast and complex, however this has allowed Kelly Tarltons to
grow and flourish as a local attraction. Reviewing the way Kelly Tarlton’s have
developed the products, marketing and management and management of the
company as an attraction is it safe to say Kelly Tarlton’s are definitely one of the
top attractions within Auckland however on a national scale, as most tourists come
to New Zealand for the unique culture and because of its unique green
environment, Kelly Tarlton’s still has a way to go before it can be considered a
‘good attraction’ in comparison to all of the natural attractions Aoteroa has to offer.
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