TEM403 Understanding the Tourism and Event Sectors Assignment Sample

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Introduction: TEM403 Understanding the Tourism and Event Sectors

Tourism industry is termed to the activities based on the people’s movement from one place to the other for the business or personal purpose. It is considered as one of the largest industry in world and has a massive contribution in the development and growth of the GDP of the UK. The industry of tourism is closely connected with the accommodation and transportation industry and tourism destinations along with the suppliers and tourism facilitators for the generation of high economies of scale. It has a vital impact on the economy through the creation of jobs and by way of development of infrastructure to enhance the number of tourist with an aim to generate high revenue. This sector covers domestic, outbound and inbound travel and includes approximate 230,000 businesses among which mostly are small and medium sized businesses.

On the other hand, event industry refers to all the activities of events to accomplish the business or personal purpose of meeting and enjoyment. It encompasses with the broad spectrum of meetings, exhibitions, conferences, entertainment events, gatherings and trade shows. The event industry of UK is a leading event industry by staging events all over the world. It has a crucial contribution in the UK’s GDP with the generation of revenue turnover along with the creation of jobs.

Main Body

It also examines the impact of COVID-19 on these sectors, including the decline in visitors, revenue losses, and business closures. The analysis provides valuable insights into post-pandemic recovery and industry resilience. Get expert academic support and detailed guidance with Assignment Help to enhance your understanding of the tourism and event sectors.

Scale and Size of event and tourism industry

The industry of tourism has a significant contribution in the development and growth of the economy within the United Kingdom. The current size of the UK’s tourism industry is measured at a revenue turnover of US$41.29bn in 2024, with a significant annual growth rate of 2.48% within a CAGR 2024-2029 (Statista, 2024). In addition, it was expected that the project market volume of the UK’s tourism industry will be measured at US$46.68bn by 2029 as per the current trends within the industry. The tourism market along with the hotel market plays a vital role towards the economic contribution both the nation’s GDP. Besides that, the current scale of the UK’s tourism industry is measured at 42.94 million users with an increased penetration by 71.2% in the year 2024. In addition, it was expected that the tourism industry will be projected to reach with an increase of 82.5% by the year 2029.

TEM403 Understanding the Tourism and Event Sectors Assignment Sample

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The current trends of tourism industry includes culinary and eco-friendly tourism, wellness retreats and cultural and heritage tourism. This leads to reshape the tourism landscape, results in increased contribution of tourism industry to the nation’s GDP has risen by estimated 237.1 billion British pounds in 2024 with a share of 8.6% in the nation’s total GDP. Apart from that, the tourism industry of the UK has a vital contribution in the creation of job opportunities as the size of the tourism sector is increasing day by day. In the year 2022, it has massively contribution to the nation’s GDP with the creation of approximate 3.64 million jobs in the nation (Statista, 2024).

On the other hand, the event industry transitions from the mode of survivals to growth with the expansion and recovery of industry in unexpected and new directions. In 2024, the UK’s industry of events is emerging as a testament to innovation and resilience, results in robust growth of the sector and financial growth. It is underpinned by the pivotal influence of digital transformation, results in expansion of market scale and size by meeting the needs and preferences of the customers. The market size of the Event industry is measured at £34.3 billion in 2023 (Mintal Limited, 2024). However, due to the arrival of COVID-19 pandemic, the market size of the event industry has been reduced as compare to the post pandemic era. Currently, the UK event market comprises of estimated 25000 businesses of venues, event organizers, companies and organizations of destination marketing, event production and exhibition contractors.

The UK’s event industry has a remarkable contribution in the economic development by offering estimated 775000 jobs to the residents in the year 2023. Besides that, it was reported that the event industry of the nation will be expected to reach at worth £27.6 billion by 2026 (Jenkins, 2023). There are approx. 85 million people that attend events organized in the UK, results in increasing the contribution of Industry by 35% in the nation’s GDP. Moreover, the event industry has contributed with over £1 billion for the investment in the infrastructure to enhance the attraction of people towards destination venue, results in the CAGR value of 11.2% in 2023.

Impact of Covid on event and tourism sector in terms of scale and size

The industry of event and tourism has adversely impacted by the emergence of COVID-19 pandemic, results in a severe shortfall in number of tourists and users due to the imposition of lockdown and closure by the UK’s government (Bhatia et al, 2022). In addition, the productivity and efficiency of these sectors were drastically reduced, results in arising the risk of survival of business. The following points reveal the negative impact of pandemic on the sector of event and tourism within the context of their scale and size.

Decline in Number of visitors and customers

Arrival of Covid leads in significant decline in the number of tourist as a result of travel and movement restrictions imposed by the nation’s governance (Mohanty and Choudhury, 2022). Businesses of tourism and event industry were stopped due to lack of customers and tourists, results in facing complexities in running business operations and even to sustain their business. as a result, majority number of people who are depend on the business of tourism and event for their livelihood closes their business due to lack of customers and tourist, leads to reduce the market size of these industries. It was reported that the number of tourist arrival has been reduced by 98.3% during the pandemic, results in the closure of more than 80% business within tourism industry in 2020 (Office for National Statistics, 2021). on the other hand, the event industry of UK has lost estimated £57 billion of business value as per the comparison of pre-pandemic era due to lack of customers for the organization of events and meetings, results in reduction of market size and scale of the event industry (Harvey, 2021).

Decline in profitability of business

There is a drastic decline in the efficiency and profitability of the event and tourism industry due to shortfall in number of tourists. It has been reported that the inbound tourism within the UK was declined by 73% visits and reduced their spending by 78% towards the activities of tourism and leisure. This result in decline in demand of tourism activities, leads to loss of scale in terms of revenue of UK’s economy by £22.2 billion in 2021 (UK Parliament, 2022). On the contrary, the event industry of UK has adversely impacted by the pandemic results in reducing scale due to non-organization of events, leads to permanent ceased of 17% event businesses.

Figure 1: GDP of the UK's tourism sector

(Source: Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, 2021)

It was reported by the oxford economics that COVID-19 has massively impacted the GDP of tourism sector, results in falling of economy by 64% within 2019 and 2020 from £75 billion to £27.2 billion (Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, 2021). Besides that, the economic output of the tourism sector leads to 1.5% decline in the GDP of nation.

Complexity in survival and growth of business

Emergence of Covid-19 results in increased recession, leads to unprecedented loss in nation’s GDP. Due to the imposition of lockdown, the activities of tourism and event sector was stopped completely, leads to loss of income (Meeprom and Silanoi, 2020). This has negatively impacted the scale and size of these sectors as the businesses are faced challenges related to the sustainability and survival in the pandemic era (Mainolfi and Marino, 2020). As a result of closure during pandemic era, there is a massive loss of 126000 jobs in the event sector with a loss of over a third of event business and organizations. This arises the complexity for the industry in terms of reduction in scale and size of the event industry (Chatterjee and Mandal, 2020). On the other hand, business within the tourism industry of the UK faces a loss of revenue turnover by 73.6%, emerges as a sharpest decline in the scale of the tourism industry.

Current issue 1: Changing Customer preferences

In the dynamic business landscape, changing preferences of consumers emerges as a current issues faced by the sector of events and tourism (Kim et al, 2020). It comprises of changed opinions and preferences about the services and products offered by the event and tourism sector based on the criteria of convenience, quality, individual preferences and price. Consumer behaviour within event and tourism sector is undergone with massive shift due to cultural changes, global events such as COVID-19 pandemic and technological advancements. For instance, Rise in the eco-friendly and experimental tourism activities reflects the changing preferences of customers towards immersive and sustainable experience (Sun et al, 2021). Evolving tourists demand for the sustainable and eco-friendly practises and for the experimental activities and adventure of tourism emerges as an issue for the tourism sector.

Moreover, customers want increased personalized experience and quality services results in the creation of pressure on the tourism industry. For example: Jet2holidays faced the issue of changing demand and preferences of customers due to lack of personalized experience and lack of digital integration within organization, results in decline in efficiency and profitability of the organization (Endacott, 2024). In addition to that, the arrival of global pandemic results in changing preference of customers towards the tourism sector as they are more concerned towards safety protocols. They are looking for hygiene and eco-friendly tourism emerges as a current issue for the tourism sector as they are unable to meet the changing preference of customers (Choe et al, 2023). Unlike that, the event sector of the UK is also facing the challenge of changing customer needs and preferences. Societal and cultural transitions of the customers force the event industry to be more responsible and ethical.

In addition, due to the increased digital engagement within customers, they require attractive and best event services with effective time management to gain more personalized experience, results in increased pressure on the event sector. For example: Zentive Event Industry faced the issues of change in the preference of its customer due to non-compliance with the environmental policy and sustainability trends (Zentive Events, 2024). This leads to reduce the engagement of customers and further declines their numbers, leads to shortfall in the revenuer turnover of the event organization. In the rapid paced landscape, customers are more concerned about the sustainability and environmental issues. Besides that, cultural and demographic factors also played a vital role in changing the demand and preference of the customers towards the adoption of tourism and event activities.

As a result of global pandemic of COVID-19, the average spending of the tourist and customers on the event and tourism activities has been reduced. This leads to reduce the scale and market size of these sectors and has an adverse impact on the productivity, competitiveness and profitability of these sectors (Marques Santos et al, 2020). Apart from that, it negatively influences the preference of the customers as they preferred to be in their homes as compare to engage in the tourism activity or towards organization of events.

Current issue 2: Financial issues

The event and tourism industry of the UK faced the financial issues which results in adverse impact on their business operations and revenue turnover. In the competitive landscape of business, tourism industry aims to serve best and effective services to their customers and aims to organize eco-friendly and sustainable tourism activities to increase the attraction of diverse range of tourists (Orden-Mejía et al, 2022). Furthermore, industry has also adopted the sustainable practices to attract and retain tourists to maintain its competitiveness and profitability. However, this emerges as an issue as the maintenance of quality services results in incurring huge costs, results in arising financial issues. Besides that, it requires trained qualified staff to provide best tourism services, leads to incur expenses and emerges as a financial challenge (Mainolfi and Marino, 2020).

On the other hand, event industry of UK faced the issue of lack of personnel or trained and skilled workforce. Due to lack of skilled staff, the event organizations are required to provide them training for the development of skills among staff, results in additional expenses in training and development of employees (Noba, 2024). This adversely affects the profitability of the organization, emerges as a financial issue for the UK’s event sector. In addition to that, emergence of digitalization after pandemic also becomes a cause of financial issue for the event and tourism sector. Organizations of events and tourism sector are required to leverage the advanced technology within their business for the smooth management of business operations and for the delivery of best and effective services to their customers as per their preferences and demands (Škare et al, 2021). The event and tourism sector has recently adopted the technologies of Artificial intelligence, Machine learning, VR and AR and techniques of Automation within the organization.

The primary focus behind the adoption of advance technology is to streamline the business operations, for better time management and to remove the repetition task and reduction of human errors. To achieve the objectives of business, the events and tourism sector are required to integrate the advanced technologies with the business operations, results in arising of huge cost of investment and maintenance of advanced technology. This emerges as a financial issue for the organizations of tourism and event sector as it reduces its profitability and incurred expenses. In reference to that, change in the interest rates and government policies are the key reason behind the incurring of financial issues (Bhatia et al, 2022). Apart from that, in the post pandemic era, the average spending of the consumer’s towards leisure and tourism activities has been drastically reduced; result in decreased profitability of the tourism organizations. Due of job loss and increased rate of unemployment, communities and organizations are still not overcome with the adverse financial impact (Mohanty and Choudhury, 2022). As a result, event and tourism sector organizations are still faces complexities in managing their funds and financial resources.

Impact of external forces on current issues

In the Dynamic Business landscape, there are multiple external forces that have impacted the overall performance and efficiency of the organization within event and tourism sector (Meeprom and Silanoi, 2020). External forces have a crucial impact on influencing demand and preferences of customers and further affect the business operations and costs. In context of the first issue of changing preferences of customers, an external force of social factors and technological factor has been identified. The social factor comprises of opinions and attitude, preferences and needs, demographics and employment pattern of the consumers (Chatterjee and Mandal, 2020). Furthermore, it includes the cultural patterns and ethical trends prevailing in the society along with the reference to living standards. This factor has a vital impact on the issue of changing customer preference as a slight change in the employment pattern and preference has an adverse impact on the efficiency of the organizations within these sectors (Kim et al, 2020).

On the other hand, the living standards of the customers have a major influence on their preferences. Most of the people belongs from middle economic class and expects best and effective services of events and tourism at affordable prices (Sun et al, 2021). However, due to increased competition and availability of diverse range of options, the preference of the consumers has been negatively changes as they switched to other tourism or event organizations for best and affordable services (Škare et al, 2021). Apart from that, cultural diversity within the external social factor has an adverse influence on the service quality and international interactions, results in incurring the issue of changing needs and preferences of customers within event and tourism sector (Choe et al, 2023). On the other hand, event and tourism sector faces the financial issue due to the adverse influence of the external forces of technology and economic factors. Technological factors comprises of integration of advanced technology with the business operations to achieve the objectives of event and tourism sector (Charkina et al, 2022).

The advanced technology helps these sectors to understand the preferences of customers by analysing latest trends and patterns, to maintain their trust and loyalty by delivering best and effective services and to ensure the time management of tourism activities and events (Marques Santos et al, 2020). However, this factor plays a crucial role in the arising of issue as it requires huge cost of investment in the implementation of advanced technology, leads to arising complexity for the organizations in managing the funds. Moreover, maintenance of advanced technology incurred additional expenses, emerges as a financial challenge for the event and tourism sector organizations. Besides that, economic factors within the external forces are crucial in shaping the industry of events and tourism (Orden-Mejía et al, 2022). Factors comprises of income, capital investments, quality of infrastructure, income of consumers has a significant influence in the development and growth of the event and tourism sector.

However, the reduction in the income of consumer minimizes their spending towards tourism and event activities, results in arising financial issues by reducing the organizational profitability and revenue turnover (Mainolfi and Marino, 2020). In addition, to attract diverse range of tourists and event customers, organizations within these sectors are required to maintain high quality resources and required huge investment for the development of infrastructure, emerges in arising potential financial issue within the event and tourism sector.

Conclusion

From the above report, it has been concluded that the event and tourism industry played a crucial role in the development and growth of the UK’s GDP. The tourism industry aims to facilitate the services of tourism and travel by linking the traveling of people from destination to other and has revenue turnover of US$41.29bn in 2024. On the other hand, event industry comprises of organization of meetings, conferences, event, exhibitions and corporate and social gathering and has a market size of £34.3 billion in 2023. Furthermore, it has been summarized that there was a negative impact of global pandemic of Covid-19 on these sectors due to the imposition of lockdown and closure. This leads to decline in the number of arrival of tourists and reduced their spending on the tourism activities and event programs.

Therefore, it results in the closure of businesses due to drastic reduction in profitability, results in decline in scale and size of the event and tourism industry. Besides that, changing preferences and demands of the customers and financial issues were highlighted as a current issues for the sector of tourism and events. At last, the social, economic and technological factors were discussed to analyse the impact of external forces on these sectors.

References

Books and Journals

• Bhatia, A., Roy, B. and Kumar, A., 2022. A review of tourism sustainability in the era of Covid-19. Journal of Statistics and Management Systems, 25(8), pp.1871-1888.
• Charkina, T., Pikulina, O., Zadoja, V. and Tsviliy, S., 2022. Improvement of the tourism industry management due to introduction of new trends and types of tourism.
• Chatterjee, S. and Mandal, P., 2020. Traveler preferences from online reviews: Role of travel goals, class and culture. Tourism Management, 80, p.104108.
• Choe, Y., Baek, J. and Kim, H., 2023. Heterogeneity in consumer preference toward mega-sport event travel packages: Implications for smart tourism marketing strategy. Information Processing & Management, 60(3), p.103302.
• Kim, C.S., Kim, P.B., Milne, S. and O'Neill, L., 2020. Key choice factors and preferences of attendees at academic hospitality and tourism conferences. Event Management, 24(2-3), pp.335-346.
• Mainolfi, G. and Marino, V., 2020. Destination beliefs, event satisfaction and post-visit product receptivity in event marketing. Results from a tourism experience. Journal of Business Research, 116, pp.699-710.
• Marques Santos, A., Madrid, C., Haegeman, K. and Rainoldi, A., 2020. Behavioural changes in tourism in times of Covid-19. JRC121262, 22(3), pp.121-147.
• Meeprom, S. and Silanoi, T., 2020. Investigating the perceived quality of a special event and its influence on perceived value and behavioural intentions in a special event in Thailand. International Journal of Event and Festival Management, 11(3), pp.337-355.
• Mohanty, P. and Choudhury, R., 2022. Events tourism in the eye of the COVID-19 storm: Impacts and implications. In Event Tourism in Asian Countries (pp. 97-114). Apple Academic Press.
• Orden-Mejía, M., Carvache-Franco, M., Huertas, A., Carvache-Franco, W., Landeta-Bejarano, N. and Carvache-Franco, O., 2022. Post-COVID-19 tourists’ preferences, attitudes and travel expectations: A study in Guayaquil, Ecuador. International journal of environmental research and public health, 19(8), p.4822.
• Škare, M., Soriano, D.R. and Porada-Rochoń, M., 2021. Impact of COVID-19 on the travel and tourism industry. Technological forecasting and social change, 163, p.120469.
• Sun, Q., Feng, X., Zhao, S., Cao, H., Li, S. and Yao, Y., 2021. Deep learning based customer preferences analysis in Industry 4.0 Environment. Mobile Networks and Applications, pp.1-12.

Online

• Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, (2021). The Tourism Recovery Plan. Online. Available through: <https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/992974/Tourism_Recovery_Plan__Web_Accessible_.pdf>. 
• Endacott, S.,(2024). What next for Jet2holidays? Online. Available through: <https://linkedin.com/pulse/what-next-jet2holidays-steve-endacott-qaole>. 
• Harvey, P., (2021). Value of UK events sector down by £57 billion due to Covid. Online. Available through: <https://mitmagazine.co.uk/News/Value-of-UK-events-sector-down-by-57-billion-due-to-Covid>. 
• Jenkins, A., (2023). The Events Industry Key Statistics. Online. Available through: <https://www.quadrant2design.com/the-events-industry-key-statistics/#:~:text=The%20UK%20event%20industry%20provides,prized%20at%20%C2%A320%20billion>.
• Mintal Limited, (2024). UK Conferencing and Events Market Report 2024. Online. Available through: <https://store.mintel.com/report/uk-conferencing-and-events-market-report#:~:text=Events%20market%20size%3A%20The%20market,2019%3A%20%C2%A338.9bn)>. 
• Noba, (2024). Is the UK event industry heading for a resource shortage this summer and top tips for procurement. Online. Available through: <https://noba.co.uk/blog/uk-event-industry-heading-for-resource-shortage-this-summer/>. 
• Office for National Statistics, (2021). Coronavirus and the impact on the UK travel and tourism industry. Online. Available through: <https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/tourismindustry/articles/coronavirusandtheimpactontheuktravelandtourismindustry/2021-02-15>. 
• Statista, (2024). Travel and tourism in the United Kingdom - statistics & facts. Online. Available through: <https://www.statista.com/outlook/mmo/travel-tourism/united-kingdom#:~:text=The%20United%20Kingdom's%20Travel%20%26%20Tourism,US%2421.40bn%20by%202024>.
• Statista, (2024). Travel and tourism's total contribution to employment in the UK 2019-2022. Online. Available through: <https://www.statista.com/statistics/598098/travel-and-tourism-employment-contribution-united-kingdom-uk/#:~:text=In%202022%2C%20the%20total%20number,in%20the%20country%20in%202022>.
• UK Parliament, (2022). How Covid-19 affect the UK tourism industry. Online. Available through: <https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/42176/html/#:~:text=Covid%2D19%20has%20had%20a,%C2%A322.2%20billion%5B8%5D>.
• Zentive Events, (2024). What are the current challenges to the sustainable events industry? Online. Available through: <https://www.zentiveagency.com/post/what-are-the-current-challenges-to-the-sustainable-events-industry>.