Dealing with the midweek and off-season blues
November 2009
Many smaller tourism oriented cities are able to attract relatively large crowds on weekends and holidays and at festival times. They face economic challenges, however, during off-seasons such as midweek periods and holidays. To add to the weekday challenge, many tourism communities are also weather dependent. For example, if you are a beach (sand and sun) based community and it rains on two or three summer weekends, an entire tourism season may be lost. Ski resorts face similar problems if there is a lack of cold weather and/or snow.
This economic loss pertains not only to hotels, restaurants and shop owners but also to city governments which may be losing a great deal of tax revenue due. Attracting weekday and off-season visitors may make the difference between a successful year and a failed year, between tourism expansion and in the worse case potential business bankruptcy. While there is no one magic formula to deal with what many weekend communities call the “midweek blues or off-season blues.” Here are several ideas that may be of help to ease the midweek/off-season blues.
- Remember that Sunday night is often a midweek or off-season night. Most people have to be back at work on Monday morning and it is for this reason that hotels often have their lowest occupancy rates on Sunday nights. This is the night to create special events, offer deep discounts not only at hotels but also at restaurants and cultural opportunities.
- Know your community. It is essential that you not oversell your community. Be realistic about what you have and have not. All too often communities believe that they have a product that everyone wants. For example, a golf course is a nice addition to a community but rarely will visitors make a long trip to play at a local golf course. Of course the exception to this is a world famous golf course, but few communities have this amenity
- Half a loaf is better than none. Work with hotels, restaurants and businesses to give “off-week” discounts. While no one likes to lower his/her prices, some profit is better than no profit. Be creative in pricing and remember breaking even is better than going bankrupt.
- Learn to be creative on the web. The web is a way to sell your products in any season. In today’s world websites can jump over geographical and seasonal problems. Different types of businesses need different types of websites. Remember that if you want to sell a product on the web, then remember the rule of KISS. Keep It Simple Stupid. The more complicated a website is the less chance there is that people will use it.
- Think through who might be a weekday target audience. Off-season, mid-week is the time to think through who your midweek market is and if this is the same market that you want to use during a high season. For example, you may wish to change your focus to visitors who come from a range of about 250 miles (4 hours drive) from your location. This is about the maximum distance that you can expect for visitors coming for a two-day visit. If it is a day trip set your sights on a 100-mile radius (160 kilometers) at best. Basic rule of thumb is that most people will not travel for a time that is longer than the stay.
- Connect educational or spiritual tourism to your business community. For example, it has become popular to visit cemeteries. The problem is that no one seems to know what to do after a cemetery visit. Provide lists of restaurants and hotels that will cater to these people. Have stores place historical merchandise or practical merchandise at their place of business.
- Develop a slow season/midweek business plan. For example, many businesses open with the expectation of a constant flow of traffic. The reality is the opposite. Often businesses run into trouble due to cash flow problems in slow seasons. Teach businesses to set aside some high season money to tide them over during the off-season.
- Use the midweek or off-season to promote weekends and high season business. While strategy will not fill stores during the lower customer activity periods, it will increase businesses enough to allow storeowners to survive the low seasons or midweek blues.
- Market, market, and then market some more!! Here are a few ways to recapture high season visitors in the off-seasons. Develop mailing lists from your high-season customers and stay in touch year ’round. Collect emails and send them once a month a list of midweek specials. Provide special offers to your best weekend customers and encourage them to come for special midweek sales and promotions. Send these customers “Midweek Welcome” discount coupons. Offer free drinks or desserts for midweek visitors.
- Create special one-day conferences, poetry readings, art shows and other cultural events. These are especially popular with people in their late 50s and early 60s and these are the people who are often the best customers and have the most disposable income.
- Develop local tourism. Remind your own citizens that low season can be the fun season. This is the time that they can go to restaurants and avoid the crowds, they can shop at local stores and receive personal attention and visit local cultural centers. Offer local discounts along with twofers, where two can eat or see a movie for the price of one. Encourage local residents to invite out-of-town friends for a midweek fling and reward the local population with special awards or even special certificates. Publicize people in your community who have helped to find ways to attract off-season visitors.
- Work with the local school to create off-season demand. Often schools can be great sources of creativity. For example during an off-season or midweek period put school children’s work on display. These displays not only build young people’s self-esteem but also encourage parents and grandparents to go into the local shops to see their children’s or grandchildren’s artwork.
