This Review defines some of the areas of the leisure and recreation market.

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Task 1 Unit 1

Introduction

The universally recognised definition of leisure and recreation is: Leisure - is a period of time and Recreation - an activity that you participate in during leisure time. This Review defines some of the areas of the leisure and recreation market.

Media consumption and reading; listening to music at home

Gardening and do-it-yourself (DIY)

Sports and keeping fit

Catering (eating and drinking outside the home) and gambling

Cinema, theatre, museums and 'the arts'

Tourist attractions and short breaks (although long holidays or any trips abroad have been excluded).

There are many more which could be added to this list. Shown below are things, which are pivotal factors within the leisure and recreation industry. They can either generate large sums of money or cause the industry to lose money, depending on what changes occur in these subsections. For example if there is an increase in disposable income and leisure time the recreation industry will benefit from this as people will want to do something in their spare time and with more of a disposable income they will be able to spend more.

There are many defining factors, which influence trends in the leisure and recreation business, many of which are mentioned below in detail.

Increase in leisure time

The amount of leisure time available to the majority of people in the UK increased steadily up to the early 1970s, but has levelled off since then. It is estimated that by the early 1970s 19% of the year was spent at leisure by the UK population. The main reasons were increasing amounts of paid annual holiday entitlement, and a gradual reduction in the working hours for the majority of workers. Since the 1970s other factors have had a greater influence on the availability of time for leisure pursuits, such as:

· Flexible work patterns and/or shift work for many workers

· Wide spread use of labour-saving devices

· Increasing numbers of unemployed and retired in the population

42% of all free time is now in the hands of adults who spend none of their time in paid employment, these people are either unemployed, part-time workers, retired or children.

There has been a major increase in the time available for leisure for people in full time work since 1971, and it is not predicted to change much between 1996-2001, which it has not the trend has continued. However the percentage of part-time workers inside the UK workforce will have doubled by 2001, this is prediction has occurred as the amount of part time workers within the UK has risen by over 50%. The people in part time work consists of students, people who have to look after children and people with other commitments etc... The trend towards more flexible, part-time employment since the 1970's meant that increasing numbers of the workforce have had more free time in which to pursue leisure activities.

Leisure Time Spent by Activity (1981-2001)

(Hours and minutes per day, weekly average)

981

986

991

996

2001

Leisure Time Spent

5.24

5.47

5.56

6.09

6.26

Sleep

7.57

7.47

7.42

7.44

7.42

Rest and Relaxation

.19

.21

.21

.15

.19

Watching TV, Listening to Radio, ReadingNewspaper or Magazines

2.13

2.18

2.23

2.34

2.34

Hobbies and Amusement

0.33

0.31

0.36

0.35

0.42

Sports

0.10

0.10

0.11

0.11

0.11

(Internet Reference)

These three graphs show the predicted and actual amount of leisure time spent doing certain activities over the years also the amount of time spent doing certain leisure activities during certain hours of the day, and comparing them to different years.

Increase in Disposable income

People now days have a higher standard of living and higher paid jobs. Because of this people have more disposable income, so because they have more spare money they use it on leisure time. Increasingly people are getting higher paid jobs so therefore with a higher standard of living they have more money disposable to them, often spent on leisure.

The amount of money people have to spend on leisure activities is referred to personal disposable income or household disposable income. Disposable income is the money left over after all bills have been paid of immediate necessity e.g. food, house holds bills and mortgage. The trend in the UKis that household and disposable income rise and the trend is set to continue. Although for the unemployed it has fallen. This trend has lead to a huge increase in consumer spending on leisure activities. The average leisure spending per person increased by 89% between 1971 and 1996. Between 1971 and 1997 disposable income almost doubled per person in real terms.
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The figure below shows that the average household spends £51.60 per week on leisure services and goods and a total expenditure of £313.70 on average. This is around 16% of their weekly budget. This only slightly trails behind the food budget, which is 18% and is on par with housing and motoring fares.

This graph shows the percentage of household income spent in different areas, by an average household of two parents and two children.

The levels of disposable income and spending on leisure items vary from household to household and region to region within the ...

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