Demand on the tourism has grown worldwide during the past two decades. Increasing competition on the travel industry has been recognized. Travel industry and travel organizations in Finland have faced big changes and challenges recently. (Vainikka, 2016) According to Furseth & Cuthbetson (2016:1), it has been noticed that amount of technology use in bookings has increased. According to Weiermair (2004), trends in traveling have changed and people want different things from their holidays than before. Experience is now in a leading role of the decision making. According to Vainikka (2016) travelers have also became more informed and they want a good quality for a lower price than before. Weiermair, Walder & Perez (2006) says that tourism industry has changed from sellers’ market to buyers’ market as customer is in the main role and attention needs to be on customers’ need.
According to Page, Yeoman, Connell & Greenwood (2010) there are many influencers on the tourism industry, every part of the influence needs to be taken into account while planning the future and strategies. This research concentrates on the future from the comprehensive point of view and finding the answer what are main driving forces of the change and how these driving forces will influence on the future of the tourism of outgoing trip packages from Finland in 2022.
According to Dwyer, Edwards, Mistilis, Roman & Scott (2007) Tourism is integrated with external sectors like economic, political, environmental, technological, social and demographic.
All changes which are going on are influencing on travel industry worldwide. Preparing for the future in the critical situation is important. It starts with gaining a better knowledge on trends on every external sector of the industry. Strategies can be formulated based on scenarios of the future.
1.2. The purpose of the study
This study concentrates on travel industry in Finland. Specifically on travels out of Finland to other countries, concentrating on travel packages as a product. The aim is to create a scenario of
the future of the travel industry on outgoing trips from Finland for five years from year 2017.
The main question of the research is:
“How will the future of the package tours from Finland abroad look like in 2022?”
Answer for this question is a scenario of the future of the travel packages (five years from 2017).
The side question is “How to prepare for the future being as a part of the tourism industry in Finland?” This question will be answered shortly in the end on the study.
The aim of the research is to find out how the current situation will develop in five years. Which driving forces will influence on the travel packages purchasing. The method of scenario planning has been chosen because according to Chermack, Lynham & Ruona (2001) it provides better understanding about the direction on the industry than qualitative or quantitative research methods. The authors say that scenario building is a methodology of forecasting and gives a chance to understand the whole range of possibilities that are important in the industry. By creating scenarios and developing them, organizations and companies can take actual steps for the future and adapt the fast changing environment.
The contribution of this study is important from two point of view: business and academic.
According to Dwyer et al. (2007) travel industry is changing fast and updated view of the future on the industry is urgently needed. Companies are trying to understand the change and win the increasing competition situation by creating new strategies. The challenge of the organizations is to identify driving forces of the change. The main question which the stakeholders on the travel industry should ask themselves is “What will the future of the industry be like”.
I think that on the academic point of view the importance is based on the amount of studies done on the future of the tourism. According to Dwyer et al. here is a need to find out what is the future of the travel industry and be prepared for the future. Most of the travel industry future concentrated researches has been done during 2000-2010, there is an urge for the new information on the field.
According to Dwyer et al. (2007) a key factor of a successful future of the tourism industry is to be informed and to prepare for the change. It is important to analyze the factors, create the picture of the future and be prepared for it. According to Honkanen and Räikkönen (2014) tourism innovation is connected to future research. It is aiming to predict the future and create the “innovative way” to prepare for it. It is important to understand that tourism innovation is not created alone by tourism organizations. They can create a package of trip different parts included in it, however the outcome depends on the customer’s reaction. Customer’s reaction is depending on Political, Economic, Social, Environmental and Legal issues. This is why Pestel analysis is important part of the research, as it takes into account all the parts of the industry. “Pestel” is used in this research to get a data base for scenario creating.
This research will give a suggestion how the possible future will be for out bounding package tours from Finland. Furthermore the scenario (result of the study) will create a base for further strategy planning for travel industry companies and organizations.
1.3. Key concepts and structure of the study Key concepts of the study are:
Travel industry and how it has been studied by use of future research tools. Travel industry and travel industry in Finland are the main concepts of the study.
Scenario creating method is one of the key concepts as it is the methodology which is used in this study.
Pestel- analysis and use of it is described as well. Pestel analysis is the main data collection method of the study.
Use of this concept will give the best picture of the travel industry in Finland in the past and present. It will give a strong base for creating scenarios for the future. Structure of the thesis will follow this order: theory, research method, Pestel- analysis, Scenario creating, Scenario ranking, Scenario analyzing and Conclusions.
First in theory part is introduction of the key concepts I presented previously. After it, the methodology section is about how the study is done with the use of Pestel analysis for data collection and scenario planning. Study is continuing to empirical part where the data collected with Pestel analysis is carefully analyzed with the use of Impact/Uncertainty analysis and after it scenarios are created. In the end the most certain and important scenario for the future is chosen by use of the Matrix analysis.
The time frame for this research is five years because this time frame is ideal for the Master’s thesis. Longer time period like ten years would be possibly too long for the thesis, as the time for writing the thesis is limited.
2. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND