Swans Ice Arena Case Analysis

Mkt 521
Dr. Leslie Toombs
Texas A&M University- Commerce
June- 2014
Submitted by

Muktha B Ramesh

1. Strength
Swan Ice Skating Arena is the only indoor ice rink in a northern U.S city
The Arena runs successful hockey programs which makes the arena
well known among sports enthusiasts

 The Arena is a Hockey rink which can allow around 700 people in a
public ice-skating session
Also the receipts a single session of public skating can yield is more
than ten times that of a single hockey session
The most successful sessions are the Saturday and the Sunday
afternoons, with an average of 200 people during winter sessions
The kids and families seem to enjoy and are fairly loyal groups
There is less competition in the locality as there are few outdoor arenas
operated by city's recreation department and the operation of these arenas
depends on the weather conditions whereas Swan's is a indoor arena
Weaknesses
Failure to market and advertise lead to the failure expected turnouts in
14 public skating sessions.
More staff people are needed to handle a public skating session
guards, a ticket seller, skate rental, and more concession help.
The net revenue from either use is about the same due to low turn outs
and staff salary
There seems to be conflicts in how different age groups enjoy it as kids
tend to race around and older patrons and dating couple find this disturbing

Opportunity
David takes notice of different public skating sessions attracting
different kind of people, like weekend noon sessions attracting kinds and
evening sessions attracting loyal customers etc. Based on observation on the
turn outs, he can design the ice skating sessions.
Also more than a quarter of the patrons being young children dropped
off by parents, there can be various social activities designed for children
instead of trying to attract dating couples or adult crowd
Also ice-skating lessons can be conducted during weekends which
may improve turnouts

Threats
Only a few prime time sessions will attract crowd like Friday and
Saturday evenings and Sunday afternoon.
The weather conditions affect the crowd turn-outs in spring and fall
The Friday and Saturday evening public sessions are a big
disappointment which was targeted to attract teenage and adult couple crowd
but it failed to do so.
Marketing Strategy
Looking at the S.W.O.T analysis shows that though there is good potential making a
profit with public skating sessions the factors that need to be worked on are as
follows
The target market must be decided on- As we see this arena is attracting more of
kids and under 14 crowd. This should be the market for which they plan and design
activities.Marketing and advertising can be done for this set of under 14 age group
by having advertise special sessions with other brands that are popular among kids
like a local eatery business, kids clothes brand etc.
They can make dedicated sessions for kind on Saturday and Sundays and sessions
for adults on Friday evenings.
The Ice Arena must have limited public sessions only during primetime hours and
rest of the week it should be open for hockey sessions with a minimal but profitable
reduction in price compared to current price of $200

2.

Swans iceland is mostly using combined target market approach. As they

open the place for public sessions and do not try to segment it further by age,
skating proficiency etc. This approach may fail due to customer satisfaction issues.
The older crowd might want to have a relaxed time with soft music events while the

younger and teen crowd would want more fun events. Also people with ice skating
proficiency who may become loyal customers may want to practice without
disturbances from the beginners or set of people who are first timers. Instead, Swan
iceland must use segmented target market approach where there are dedicated
strategies can be used for different segments based on their behavior and
expectation. A survey can be conducted to study the behavior and expectation of
different segments with questioners in local stores around arena. Also Swans son
used Social media as a marketing strategy which is a powerful tool but needs right
execution. He can request loyal customers share their experience. Also there can be
a system to collect information such as email address at the ticketing counter, which
can be later used to send out invites to join these social groups. Also there can be
weekly e-newsletters sent to customers with the weeks activity specials like theme
activities during holidays, special skating lessons etc. May be they can also start a
blog where initially they start sharing the manager and employees experience about
ice arena.
The teens
Expectation Mostly teen expectations involve a reasonable price, fun sessions with
interactive activities like dance sessions while keeping the music and the ambiance
live and new.
Behavior Time with friends and date over weekend evenings.
The older patrons
Expectation Mostly is a rich experience which comes with a price. This age group
are ready to pay a fairly higher price for a good experience as they are people with
routine job schedules throughout the week and do not mind to spend a little more to
have a good time with family or friends.

Behavior would not want to be disturbed by a younger crowd or by rock or new

generation music. They would expect a more pleasing ambiance like soft lighting and
light music.
The Beginners
Expectation This class will have first basic expectation of ice skating lessons.
Again there can be sessions for different age groups.
Behavior They are people who are interested to learn but have little knowledge
about Ice-Skating.
The Proficient crowd
Expectation This crowd would want to have relaxed practice sessions from time to
time and all they care about is the maintenance of the arena
Behavior They would again not want to have disturbances from teen crowd or
learners.
With these expectations and behaviors different sessions can be planned for
different segments. I would chose the segment marketing that I explained above with
a customer behavior study. A customer focused business makes the process of
choosing the target market and planning the marketing strategy more scientific giving
an option of tracing the approach in terms of any errors( not meeting the expected
success target) and check for improvement or corrective measures.

3.

A competitor analysis is analysis about similar businesses in the market and

to device a marketing strategy which will be different and unique from the
competitors to ensure stable market and profit. In case of Swan ice arena one
important factor noticed by David is that by swan's ice arena is that there are few
outdoor skating arenas in the city operating depending on the weather conditions.

Swan being an indoor arena has an advantage of ease of operation with the weather
not affecting.
But there are many other factors to be considered :
The type of skiing sessions offered by other arenas like the competitor
target market, if they are targeting the adults, it is a good option to keep
swans target market as kinds below the age of 14.
The promotion- since other arenas are controlled by city's recreation
department they would have promotions on local tv channels and radio
station. It is a good strategy to have ads of swan on the local media as well as
social media.
Initial advertising is a strong factor. Also it is important to study the
location of the competitor locations being in parts of city which are easily
accessible or are they located far from the heart of the city.
The location of swan plays a major role as winter weather conditions
must be favorable to expect a good crowd. This is one factor that can be used
to decide pricing.

Considering all the above factors it is important to make sure the new idea
does not make customers feel that it is an arena similar to any other in the city,
Swans must offer something the others are not and that which can not be easily
copied. One idea is to make the arena temperature controlled with the advantage of
it being an indoor arena and opening the arena for a limited period in spring and
summer to give the public a feel of winter in the summer.

4.

Swans ice-skating has advantages and a potential market but only with a

better planning. The advantages are it being the only indoor ski arena and it is big
enough to have ski sessions with 700 people per session. It is also a known hockey
rink in the locality.
There is less competition in the locality as there are few outdoor arenas
operated by city's recreation department and the operation of these arenas depends
on the weather conditions whereas Swan's is a indoor arena. The most successful
sessions are the Saturday and the Sunday afternoons, with an average of 200
people during winter sessions. Also more than a quarter of the patrons are children
who are below 13.
Although Swan has potentials the downside is that the current revenue
earned by public sessions is not as high as expected, it is more or less the same as
what swan used to make earlier. Also there is more staff requirement and staff
salaries. To increase the profit David tried different strategies but in vain. Trying to
attract adults and couples and restricting children in a few sessions may not yield a
good profit. Also trying to install good lighting and music to attract the adult crowd is
costing a lot.
Instead of trying to attract a different segment of people it is a good
opportunity to design the business for the existing segment which is children and
families. There can be few dedicated sessions for couple based on the turn out
observation. The activities can be designed for children under the age of 14 as they
are a big portion of the patrons at swan. Also a marketing strategy based on the
competitor analysis and market segmentation is to be implemented.

References

Peteraf, M. A. Competitor Identification And Competitor Analysis: A Broad-based Managerial

Approach. Managerial and Decision Economics, Vol. 23, 157-169.
Ghoshal, S., & Westney,D.(1991). ORGANIZING COMPETITOR ANALYSIS SYSTEMS.
Strategic Management Journal, 12(1), 17-31
Ronen, B., & Coman, A. Focused SWOT: Diagnosing Critical Strengths And
Weaknesses.International Journal of Production Research, 5677-5689.
mind of marketing. (n.d.). : What is customer segmentation?. Retrieved June 23, 2014, from
http://www.mindofmarketing.net/2007/05/customer-segmentation-why-exactlydoes.html#.U6f_wfldVyU
McCarthy, E. J., Perreault, W. D., & McCarthy, J. P. (2011). Basic marketing: a globalmanagerial approach (18th ed.). Homewood, IL: Irwin.