Indian consumers’ behaviour during COVID 19: An Exploratory Study

Time and again it is said that Indian consumers behave differently from the western or global customers. Since a pandamic like COVID 19 has force lockdowns restraining the customer all over the world the consumers have exhibited different behaviour other than the normal one. Consumers behaviour is shaped by their wants and hence the importance of understanding it. Many business face the challenge of understanding the consumers and their wants and hence the flounder at the market place. This is more apt in India for the foreign companies that try to market in India. Many big multinationals companies (MNCs) have struggled in India before they got the hold of the market. Further, India being a young country compared to other countries, it has become a attractive market. The success is evasive to those who fail to understand the Indian consumers. Somehow, the ethnocentric behaviour of MNCs have not augured well for them. Even though the consumer behaviour has been studied by researcher and scholars for long now, they mainly focused on the western customers. Only recently the scholars have had occasion to study Indian consumers. Hence, this study was undertaken with the intention of understanding the behaviour of Indian consumers during the pandemic.

Analyzing the Proposals from Leading Operators in the Tourism Market of Kharkiv Region

The article is aimed at analyzing the proposals from leading operators in the tourist market of Ukraine, in particular in the city of Kharkiv. The article analyzes the charter offers of travel operators for the summer season 2020. After the analysis, it can be stated that travel operators plan to significantly increase volumes for Turkey (for example, two flights a week to the Turkish Dalaman are planned (in the season 2019, one flight per week was operated)). It is worth noting that travel operators also plan to significantly increase volumes for European areas, in particular Italy. In addition to the proposed flights to the swimming and beach resorts, the summer navigation will also feature direct flights of the airline Ernest, which will allow to develop interesting excursion routes, focusing on the arrival airports in Rome and Milan. At the same time, the expediency of increasing the volume of flights to Calabria can be questioned, because two flights a week is too much for a place that has not yet become a mass resort, which means that it experiences problems with infrastructure development and sufficient availability of accommodation facilities. The article analyzes the proposals of leading operators in the tourist market of Ukraine, according to the findings it can be noted that almost all travel operators - leaders in the number of tourists served consider the Kharkiv region as an attractive market for expanding travel content. The leaders in the number of tourists served were two travel operators who have their own airlines, namely: Sky Up (Join Up) and Azur Air Ukraine (Anex Tour). The undisputed leader in the number of exclusive destinations represented with a guaranteed flight is Join Up, and there is also a tendency to increase volumes with the travel operator TUI. On the basis of a survey, the best travel operators were identified by the ratings of agent-friendly and tourist-friendly, they were: Tez Tour, Join Up, Pegas Touristik, Coral Travel, and TUI.

Location Determinants of Portuguese FDI in Poland

In recent years, Poland has become one of the most attractive locations for foreign investment and has strengthened its position in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and throughout Europe. The aim of this paper is to analyse what makes Poland an attractive market for foreign investors, to offer a better understanding of reasons why Poland is a more attractive location compared to its neighbours in the CEE. After surveying Portuguese investors in Poland, our results indicate that the most significant factor determining locating a business in Poland is its large domestic market. Poland’s location is also appreciated by Portuguese investors while deciding on FDI. As indicated by Portuguese investors, the most important obstacles to investment in Poland are language barriers, cultural differences and bureaucracy. These results are relevant for companies who wish to invest in Poland and can also assist policymakers in designing policies to attract FDI.

Rich, lavish and trendy

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to research lesbian fashion consumption in order to draw conclusions on the attractiveness of the lesbian target segment for the fashion industry. So far, lesbians’ fashion consumption behaviour has hardly been researched. However, an evinced lesbian stereotype exists which describes doctrinal feminists with an antipathy against consumption in general and fashion shopping in particular. In contrast, gay men have been identified quite contrary as an attractive market segment and marketers have started to particularly target this so-called “dream market”. Design/methodology/approach – First, qualitative semi-structured interviews (n=18) were conducted to gain first insights into fashion consumption behaviour of lesbians. Second, a quantitative online survey (n=879) was carried out to generate more detailed findings. Due to the difficult reachability of the homosexual consumer target group, the segment’s high online media affinity was used and data collection was conducted through popular German homepages targeted to homosexuals (esp. “queer.de” and “lesarion.de”). The research investigated fashion-consciousness, willingness to pay, brand-affinity, and openness to homosexual marketing. In addition, influencing factors – such as the affinity towards the homosexual scene, career orientation, income, age, status of coming out, and number of inhabitants of the city of residence – have been researched. Findings – Results prove that lesbians are an equally attractive and financially interesting market segment for fashion marketers as gays. Lesbians have a similarly high fashion-consciousness and willingness to pay, and an even higher brand-affinity – but a lower openness to homosexual marketing than gays. Especially scene-affine femme lesbians with a high-paid professional career are a highly attractive market segment. The study proves the attractiveness of the lesbian target segment for fashion marketing and debunks the myth of the consumption-averse lesbian stereotype. Practical implications – This paper provides evidence on the attractiveness of the lesbian market segment for the fashion industry. Due to its size and financial attractiveness, the question whether to target lesbians with a specifically adopted marketing mix should be raised. Originality/value – Research on lesbians’ fashion consumption behaviour in general is very scarce and on fashion consumption behaviour in particular is almost non-existent. This study is a first attempt to analyse the major areas of fashion consumption for the German market.

Winter Sport Tourism An Overview

Winter sport tourism falls under the umbrella of sport tourism, one of the fastest growth sectors of the tourism industry. Although sport tourism is a relatively new concept in contemporary vernacular, its scope of activity is far from a recent phenomenon. The notion of people traveling to participate in and watch sport dates back to the ancient Olympic Games, and the practice of stimulating tour- ism through sport has existed for over a century. Within the last few decades however, destinations have begun to recognize the significant potential of sport tourism, and they are now aggressively pursuing this attractive market niche.

Domestic Nature-Based Tourism: A Case Study of Norway

Domestic tourism represents an attractive market for most countries, in particular for high-cost countries such as Norway. based on this market's notable size and financial potential, tourism marketers are aiming to attract residents to experience their country's tourism offerings. by identifying the characteristics of domestic tourists such as their preference for nature-based activities, tourism marketers can segment these tourists and target them accordingly. The present study puts forward preferences as a theoretical construct in order to outline preferred nature-based activities in addition to demographic, geographic, and behavioral characteristics as the basis to study variety within domestic nature-based tourism. A total of 1,201 Norwegian residents who exhibit an interest in nature-based vacations in Norway participated in an online questionnaire and were segmented using two-step cluster analysis. The results revealed four valid domestic nature-based activity clusters that differ based on several profiling characteristics. based on the research findings, several theoretical contributions and recommendations for tourism marketers are provided. Future research opportunities and the limitations of the research are also outlined.