For those who work in the coach trade, it’s the $64,000 question. Everyone who takes visitors to towns, cities and resorts throughout the UK knows their passengers will spend something when they’re visiting a destination. Even if they only buy a cup of tea or an ice cream, most passengers will put their hands in their pockets during their visit. Many strongly suspect that the average spend is a lot higher than the price of a cuppa. Who hasn’t seen happy passengers returning to their coach laden with shopping bags, delighted with their purchases?
If Napoleon was alive today, he probably wouldn’t say we were just a nation of shopkeepers: it would be more accurate for him to say that we are also a nation of shoppers, and shopaholics at that. Indeed, many operators have delighted their happy breeds with a bit of retail therapy, but how much do coach passengers actually spend? It’s an important question and one that could bring significant benefits for the coach trade. It’s one thing to know that passengers spend money, but when the industry is trying to persuade cash strapped local authorities that providing better, but expensive, facilities for coaches will bring financial benefits to their community, you are going to need some hard facts to win the argument.[wlm_nonmember][…]
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Teignbridge District
Council’s survey
In order to answer this question, one local authority in South Devon decided to find out what sort of money coach parties were bringing to their town. Teignbridge District Council (TDC) will not be that well-known to those outside South Devon, but included on its patch are places that many in the coach trade will be familiar with. Teignmouth and Dawlish are two such places within the boundaries of TDC, with Newton Abbot being equally well-known for the town’s market which is owned and managed by the local authority. The indoor Pannier Market and food hall is open Monday to Saturday with an outdoor market on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
The big day for the coach trade has traditionally been Wednesday because as well as the variety of the indoor and outdoor markets, there is the added attraction of the livestock market a short moo away from the other two markets. As the market is right in the heart of the town, coach passengers are also delighted to find a branch of the shopping Mecca of their generation, Marks and Spencer, close by. Adding to the choice on offer is one of the few surviving department stores in the UK, Austins, with four branches on the nearby high street. For visiting coach passengers, it’s a heady, intoxicating mix. For coach operators staying in nearby Torquay and Paignton, it’s a convenient port of call. Being only a 15 minute drive away won’t cause operators to lose much sleep about the cost of the diesel or the wear and tear on their vehicles. It’s therefore ideal for a half day outing or as the first stop on a full day when heading out towards Dartmoor, say.
With so much coach traffic going into the town, TDC were interested to know what the financial benefits to their traders actually were. There are probably a number of ways you could find out how much coach visitors are spending, but by far the best is to actually ask them. This is exactly what they decided to do via a questionnaire aimed at a random selection of coach visitors. The council’s survey took place every Wednesday for seven weeks from April 19 to May 31 in the market’s Western Service Yard where coach parties arrive and at Highweek Way where visiting coach drivers park up. When passengers were returning to their coaches at the end of their visit, members of the council’s economic development team were waiting to meet them. Survey forms were handed out – complete with a pen – which were then collected prior to departure. Passengers got to keep the pen as a souvenir of their visit. In total, the council collected responses from some 229 visitors.
The results
The results make for interesting reading. One of the results of the survey will not come as much of a surprise to those who work in the coach trade. That is, the finding that out of the 229 coach passengers who responded, 210 were aged 65+. You may be tempted to say; ‘Well, I could have told them that.’ I wouldn’t argue with that view, but this survey was carried out by people who know somewhere between nothing and very little about this sector of our industry. That’s why they carried it out: not only to find out more but to do so by getting accurate information about this market. In that sense, the fact that any of their results coincides with what passes for common knowledge amongst those who work in the coach trade only serves to validate the findings, given the lack of prior knowledge of those who carried out the survey.
When we look at the average spend we can feel very confident that this is accurate information, even though it conflicts with views expressed by too many in the coach that, variously; ‘There isn’t any money about’; ‘No one wants to spend any money’ and ‘I’ve got a tight lot on this week.’ In the light of the information collected in Newton Abbot, the less notice anyone takes of such ill-founded views, the better. It’s also worth considering whether this finding is good or bad news for the coach trade. On the one hand, the over 65s are a group with inflation-proof guaranteed incomes, but on the other, it means that operators are reliant on a narrow group of people particularly as only two people surveyed were aged 25-44 and 17 aged 45-64.
Also of no great surprise was the fact that the survey found that apart from 10 visitors who were visiting from Plymouth where they lived, the rest of the respondents were holiday makers staying in Torquay (174) and Paignton (45). The origins of those completing the survey revealed that the coach heartlands of South Wales (63), the West Midlands (29), South Yorkshire (25), Scotland (21), Derbyshire (19), Nottinghamshire (13) were all represented. Twenty-two were from East & West Sussex, the 10 locals from Plymouth and 27 from ‘other’. Hope they got on the right coach when it was time to go home!
The survey found that most visitors (113) stayed for some two hours. The rest stayed for between one and a half hours and three and a quarter hours, with all arriving somewhere between 1000hrs and 1030hrs. A finding that surprised me was the number of people that spent money on food and drink during their visit. We can assume, given where they came from on the day of their visit, that they were staying in hotels and given their arrival time, had not long finished their breakfast in Torbay. 85% said that they had something to eat and drink during their stay in either a cafe, restaurant or a pub. Nineteen used a takeaway while there were five others who found food somewhere or another. Thirty-five didn’t buy any food, so either their hotels were feeding them very well or they were on a diet.
Given the destination, it’s no surprise that 183 people visited the indoor market and food hall while 185 visited the outdoor market. Due to the proximity of the two places, we will have to assume that they were largely one and the same group of people, but 85 wandered off to have a look round the nearby department store, Austins, while 134 well-seasoned shoppers managed to sniff out Marks and Spencer.
Of those who visited the market complex, and of particular interest to the council as it is made up of the owners and managers of the market complex, 57% (130) bought something from the market traders.
Thankfully, no one indicated they made a purchase in the livestock market, even though healthy Jacob rams could be had for the bargain price of only £38 a head.
Money spent
The big question to find out what coach visitors spent while they were in Newton Abbot was revealing. Only 11 people out of the 229 people surveyed said they left without bothering to open their wallets or purses; a measly 5%. Fifty-nine people spent between £1 and £9; 86 spent between £10 and £24; 50 spent between £25 and £49; 16 spent between £50 and £99 while six lucky people spent £100+. The council does counsel some caution here because it was not clear if the figures were for individuals or couples. As a result, they refer thereafter in their report to the average spend as being; ‘per person / couple.’ Even so, who said there was no money about? In any event, the resulting calculation reveals that the average spend is somewhere between £15.65 and £31.70 per person/couple with a global average of £23.68 per person/couple. The total spend for the group surveyed was between £3,569.00 and £7,229.00 or an average total of £5,399.00. That’s some going in a couple of hours.
On the basis of that feedback, the report goes on to try and calculate the global annual spend by coach passengers visiting the town. There are some uncertainties here though. Firstly, the council has to estimate what the average loading per coach amounts to. Their average ‘guestimate’ of 30 passengers sounds reasonable to me but is just that, an estimate. The next problem they have is calculating how many coach parties actually visit Newton Abbot.
The figures they do have are based on the number of drivers that collect the £5 cash incentive and food voucher available from one of the market traders. The problem here is that the council are quite sure that not all drivers collect the incentive and therefore, they don’t have totally accurate figures. This arises because the drivers who park in Highweek Way are required to stay with their vehicles. As a result, if an incentive isn’t collected, the visit of that coach party is not recorded.
Nonetheless, on the basis of the records of the drivers who have collected their incentive payment, the report offers up some projections as to the value overall of coach visitors. So, in 2014, applying the estimate of 30 passengers per coach mentioned above, the 181 recorded coach parties visiting the town meant that the 5,430 people on board spending an average of £23.68 per person/couple brought business worth £128,582.40 into the town. By 2016, the figures had reduced to 106 coach party visits. This meant that the estimated 3,180 people on board injected £75,302.40 into the economy of Newton Abbot.
Accuracy and issues
The council is of the view that these are not accurate figures given their view that some coach party visits are not recorded. They feel the real spend is higher, but by how much is anyone’s guess. They speculate that carrying out the survey during the spring rather than during the Turkey & Tinsel season when Christmas is looming means that spending in the autumn could be higher. If there are more people on the coaches than the estimated figure they use, then the fact that almost everyone spends something when they visit the town means that again, the real figures are much higher. However, it must be said that the effort that has been made has provided some very useful information about the value of the coach trade that, not withstanding the uncertainties of the recording of coach visits and estimates used in the report, it leaves one thing very clear: coach passengers are very good business for Newton Abbot.
The document concludes by discussing some of the other issues raised by coach drivers and their passengers. Unsurprisingly, the big issue for drivers was parking. The report discusses the difficulties that have arisen since the coach parking facilities at the nearby racecourse became too expensive for the council who used to cover the cost. This, they recognise, has acted as a deterrent for coach parties to visit the town.
Drivers have been able to either use the facilities at Highweek Way, which are limited, and which local service bus drivers mistakenly think are their sole preserve, or they have had to find somewhere to park on the edge of town on one of the industrial estates. Given the proximity of places like the House of Marbles and Trago Mills that have on-site parking facilities, drivers are possibly voting with their accelerators and their gain is Newton Abbot’s loss. The report does note that the driver incentives offered at both places are higher and given the on-site parking, one must assume that they are being collected with greater regularity.
The views of the passengers are also mentioned. Some reflected on the physical condition of the market square expressing the opinion that it was ‘tired and tatty.’ Well the good news here is that TDC has just voted in a £1.9million plan to refurbish and update the market complex. Given the findings in their own report, that tens of thousands of pounds worth of trade is going unrecorded and that large sums of money could be going elsewhere, for Newton Abbot, the very big question must be; what are decent coach parking facilities worth? Quite a lot.
Response to the results
Recognising that financial fact, TDC has not stood still. In direct and immediate response to their survey, they have provided three coach bays in the Western Service Yard. On the day I went to the market, the visiting drivers had easily squeezed four coaches into the space allocated. This is a very welcome and positive development, as space will still be available in Highweek Way for any overflow. The forthcoming modernisation will improve the market complex dramatically, encouraging overall more coach party visits. And there is a lot to play for. With each coach party being worth up to £674.88 (30 x £23.68, excluding 5% non-spenders) to the town, and with up to 60 to 70 coach parties a week staying in Torbay, better facilities all round must be good news for Newton Abbot and very good news for the coach trade.
The council’s report notes that 99 of the people surveyed had visited Newton Abbot before and overall, when asked if they would recommend the town to their friends, 221 said yes. The coach parties visiting Torbay will still be looking to visit places close by. With a modernised shopping complex and improved coach parking facilities, that is a mix that could encourage coach passengers to spend, spend, spend in Newton Abbot for many years to come.
A lot will depend on the response of the drivers to the changes but the council has at least one convert already. Gavin Brame, tour driver with Lincoln based PC Coaches, had not been to the market before but was impressed with the new parking bays. He said: “It’s my first time here. I think it’s brilliant, both for the parking, for the passengers and the fact that the drivers are looked after. It’s a pleasant change not to be chucked out of the town. I would come again. I would try to squeeze in a visit to the market even if it wasn’t on the itinerary.”
Given that word-of-mouth is a force to be reckoned with in the coach trade, if Newton Abbot keep on top of their game here, there will be a lot more drivers like Gavin taking a lot of business Newton Abbot’s way.[/wlm_ismember]
