As in any other industry Quality Management is also an essential element in the Tourism sector as in the case of Snow Canyon, Virginia. The quality of services offered and customer satisfaction are key factors affecting the growth and survival of the business. Quality may be defined as the feature or attributes of a product, package, or service which excogitates its ability to adhere to the expressed or implied needs and requirements.
To meet the demands and wishes of a client various tools based on Total Quality Management (TQM) are developed, where, Total indicates “the enclosure of all divisions of the business and the entire staff” (Litvin, 188-197). Quality stands for “the unswerving readiness of all operations to meet the quality standards and the demands of internal and external customers/guests” (Litvin, 188-197). And, Management refers to the “accountability and inventiveness of the top management in the context of systematic quality development” (Litvin, 188-197).
Total Quality Management encompasses three facets:
- “Quality Target
- Quality Development
- Quality Assurance” (Litvin, 188-197)
Quality Target refers to the self-sown high standards of service to gratify the needs and demands of every guest or client and also the staff. Quality development refers to the energetic development of the worth of services and its continuous upgrading of the standards. Quality assurance refers to the habitual scrutinizing of the standard of service as well as reactions if irregularities gradually sneak in. Thus to meet the quality of service the business has to generate a stirring vision and facilitate others to realize it. It needs to promote excellence and empower quality people, pledge a long-term assurance to quality, and devote time, energy, tolerance, and determination. (Siomkos, 101-108)
In the tourism industry, the final consumer is the tourist. Thus contentment of the tourist is the primary objective of the business. From the perspective of the guest, services are thought of as a complete package comprised of individual services. These individual services are all interconnected and form a chain of services: prior information from a Tourist agency, journey towards the holiday destination, stay at the vacation resort, food at the restaurant, outings, and excursions and lastly the trip back home.
All specific services leave their mark on an individual level and even on the entire holiday experience. Putting into practice a total quality system is a complicated task, but it must be executed with precision. To compete and survive in the actual tourism arena the total quality management is vital and the organization must be conscious of the issues involved and realize their importance. (Litvin, 188-197)
Company Background
Snow Canyon is a four-season resort situated in Virginia. It provides a number of services which include skiing, golfing, rock climbing and bathing in spas. It aims at offering a complete experience to the guests visiting the resort. It is established as a premier skiing resort with its tallest mountain being 3,800 feet high (DePaul 11). Its offers high-quality skiing and snowboarding experiences with slopes open from 9 in the morning till 4 in the evening. It boasts of having five lifts that carry tourists from the bottom to the top of the slope with Paradise being lifted with the longest vertical drop (DePaul 12).
Problem
In the actual order of events, tourists arrived at the skiing spot early in the morning with the entering rate peaking at 11 in the morning with 8 people entering per minute. The entering rate fell sharply to less than one person at half-past twelve in the afternoon and again shot up at twelve past one in the afternoon to 3.8 people entering per minute.
The management plans an expansion of the resort’s capacity by installing a high-speed chairlift named Paradise Express at the paradise slope to draw more skilled skiers and snowboarders. The plan involved the installation of a lift that would carry visitors to the top in less than four minutes so that they could spend more time actually skiing instead of having to wait and waste time for lifts. (DePaul, 1-4)
In this context, three options were considered.
- Option One: Buying a new engine for the current lift which enables the lift to run 50% faster.
- Option Two: Increasing the chair capacity to four people per chair.
- Option Three: Replace the old chair lift with a new high-speed six-person chair lift that travels at a speed that is two and a half times the speed of the current lift. The lift would initially have 44 chairs which could be extended to 52 with the growth of the business. This option also includes a plan to extend the skiing area by 15% (Siomkos 101-108).
Recommendation
In option one, if the speed of the lift is doubled the time for a one-way trip is reduced by half. This would allow the lift to make only 13.2 one-way trips in an hour. Thus the lift would take 4.545 minutes to reach the top with a maximum capacity of 486 skiers at a go with a chair capacity of three. With each skier taking 20 minutes to ski down the slope and an average of 3 minutes to reach the lift once he reaches the bottom, it would take him a total of 23 minutes to reach the lift from the time he starts skiing. Let’s suppose, there are more than 1000 people at the bottom at a certain point in time.
After the first 486 people would be loaded onto the lift, the second 486 people would have to wait 9.09 minutes for the lift to arrive again at the bottom. This calculation is made without considering the unloading time of the people at the top. Thus in reality it would take the lift more than 9.09 minutes to reach the end of the slope to load in the second lot. For the third lot which would have increased in number due to skiers completing their skiing runs and reaching the lift, the wait would be a minimum of 18.18 minutes without considering the loading and unloading time of the first two lots (DePaul 16).
Considering increased sales, during peak hours if there are a large number of people in the skiing arena the lift would prove to be insufficient for handling the pressure. This would lead to customer dissatisfaction and would prove to be detrimental for the business. Secondly, this option does not meet the target of carrying guests from the bottom of the slope to the top in less than four minutes. Although it would be the cheapest alternative the wait time for the lift would be a considerable duration and would be deficient in coping with increased sales. Thus option one would not be recommended and is not likely to be implemented. (Ritchie 87)
In the second option, with the chair capacity increased to 4 people per chair the maximum capacity is increased to 648. But in this the speed of the chair lift remains the same, i.e., it takes 9.09 minutes to complete a one-way trip. Thus it would be able to make only 6.06 one-way trips and 3.03 trips carrying people from the bottom of the slope. A skier requires 20 minutes to come down the slope and a further 3 minutes to reach the lift. Again considering the example of 1000 people, the second lot would have to wait a minimum of 18.18 minutes before they could board the lift without considering the loading and unloading time of the first lot. Another thing to consider would be the situation at the top (Glaesser 112).
Even if there are only 52 people at the top, which in reality would be more, the total number of people at the top of the slope would reach 750 when the first lot is unloaded. This would be way above the comfort zone of the guests. Thus it would lead to a crowded scenario and a chaotic situation at the top at the peak hour if the lift operates at its full capacity. Also to consider in this case is the fact that there would always be more people at the top than the bottom.
If the lift has to operate at its full capacity on its second trip, 296 more skiers will have to join the second lot. This situation becomes highly unreal with just 52 at the top, 1000 at the bottom, and more than 296 people in transition (Litvin 188-197).
Moreover, after the lift completes its third trip, there would be complete chaos at the peak. This option is highly discouraged as it would lead to a high wait time for people waiting at the bottom to reach the top, and might even lead to a chaotic situation with an increased number of people at the skiing arena as they will not be properly distributed over the top, bottom and in the transition phase. Moreover, it does not come near to the target of carrying skiers from the bottom to the top in less than four minutes. This option is highly unlikely to be implemented.
Option three with 44 chairs, a chair capacity of 6, and a high speed of 3.636 minutes with an increase in skiing area by 15% would be a profitable option to cope with increased sales. It would be able to make 16.5 one-way trips in an hour i.e., 8.25 trips upwards. This indicates that a second lot would have to wait for a little over 7.2 minutes to board the lift after the first lot has been loaded. This is considerably lower than the wait time in the other two cases.
This also means that the crowding at the top of the slope can be avoided as the maximum capacity of the lift would be lesser than the other cases and would mean lower loading and unloading time. Thus the distribution of the skiers would also be optimized. A 15% increase in the skiing area would mean more than 750 skiers at the top of the slope could enjoy the experience simultaneously. Initially, the lift could have only 44 chairs for cost-effectiveness and later can be extended to 52 depending upon the growth of the business (Ritchie 21).
Installation of this high-speed lift would be able to increase the quality of service and enhance customer satisfaction as skiers could spend more time in actual skiing than waiting for the lift. This would attract new and more customers and thus would increase the profitability of the business. Customer satisfaction along with proper advertisement of this enhancement of service quality could also boost the repute of the business. The budget for enhancement includes the extension of the skiing area by 15 %. Thus available resources should be efficiently managed. It would be suggested that the lift should start its operation with 44 chairs and only a fraction of the 15% of the skiing area must be increased initially. The sales figures should then be studied carefully to analyze the growth in sales and profits (Litvin 188-197).
Result
Based upon these results future growth must be predicted and the budget utilization should be optimized by deciding how many more chairs is to be added which can be extended to a limit of 52 chairs and how much more of the skiing area is to be extended which could go up to 15% of the current skiing area (Ritchie 24).
Proper cost planning and budget utilization would make the implementation of this plan proficient and would thus be sustainable. If the plan is executed successfully, it would give the business an edge above its competitors. The holiday season during the winter is the time when the peak of sales is reached. The projected number of clients shoots up during this season. It should be ensured that the guests receive an enthralling experience during their stay. To do so, the lift should be effective by that time as this option is capable of handling the increase in sales and a large number of people during the peak hours of the holiday season (Siomkos 101-108).
Risks involved in adventure sports are high. With the execution of this plan risks also increase. Any minuscule mechanical error may lead to serious injuries or even fatalities. Also increase in the number of skiers means more chances of skiing accidents occurring.
Conclusion
Thus it is imperative to structure a risk management strategy in the event of a crisis that may involve accidents or a calamity. Regular mechanical surveys must be carried out and medical help should be kept on standby and also crisis management teams must be properly trained and should be ready to face crisis situations.
Work Cited
DePaul, Charles. Snow Canyon Resort: Paradise Ski Lift. Virginia: Darden Business Publishing, 2006.
Glaesser, Dennis. Crisis Management in the Tourism Industry. Oxford: Butterworth – Heinemann, 2007.
Litvin, Steve. How Charleston Got Her Groove Back: A Convention Bureau’s Response to 9/11. Journal of Vacation Marketing, 9.2, (2005):188-197.
Ritchie, James. The Competitive Destination: a Sustainable Tourism Perspective. Oxford: Butterworth – Heinemann, 2006.
Siomkos, Gregory. Managing Tourism Disasters. Journal of Transport Management, 6.12, (2007):101-108.