The club’s focus groups research was done with members of the club to record their views and opinions about the club and how it can be improved. The information that the club’s focus groups collected are primary data that is categorized as qualitative information. Qualitative information cannot be expressed in numerical terms. Quality facilities--courts, gym, showers.
They also found out what were their greatest gaps between the customers and the club. they found out that communication was the very important thing that has made a distance between the club and its members.
Questionnaire is a type of market research that the focus groups in WRFC used to find out the customer’s opinions and views. The questionnaire is a primary data because it is gathering of information directly from customers within the target market. This can be carried out in a number of ways and is carried out through the focus groups in WRFC.
The diagram below concerns on how WRFC improved their sales and profits by applying their marketing strategies. However, first they had to find out if they were keeping up to their standards. As I mentioned before, they used focus groups to find out what their members needs were. In order to do so, the club ran a survey. The market research enabled WRFC to find out what was important for their customers and sure that it was their priority to improve these facilities, if needed.
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The members interviewed suggested how the club could improve and fulfil their expectations and needs. This helped WRFC to improve the quality of their services and to accommodate their customers needs. The focus groups found out what facilities were most important to their members, which included:
The survey also helped WRFC to recognise their priorities. The marketing activities had to be effective and full proof. They had to recruit new and younger staff in order to promote fitness. They started using computers for storing information about the club and its members. This helped the club to be more organised, thus becoming a new member became easier and quicker.
The surveys carried out by the focus group are mostly non-numerical market research. They are using questionnaires and also interviewing people to get direct statements from their members. They are also interviewing lapsed members to figure out why they left WRFC. Continuation of these surveys makes the members feel that they are being looked after and the club will adapt in preference of their customers.
One of their aims is to maximise sales and make profit. In order to achieve this aim, the club had to research on, how did their existing and prospective members find out about WRFC.
This pie chart shows how new members hear about the Club. 40% of the prospective members find out from their friends therefore, this shows that WRFC must keep on must provide the facilities that meets the standard of their customer, which will help them to promote their club through members. This also indicates that they are not advertising enough, as you will notice that “Other” section has only 7%. This percentage has to increase through more public relations work and advertisement. The increase in this section will mean that the club is attracting more varieties of customers instead of having just one type of customers, which only use specific facilities.
The club also had to find out what type of customers they were targeting. They found out that their priority still lied with the racquets section of the club, however there are growing number of people who liked to use the gym especially prospective members. People also like to use both facilities. This shows that promoting all aspects of the club will attract different types of customers. By doing so the club will be able to maximise sales and make profit in order to achieve the aims and objectives of the club.
Both of the charts are a form of numerical market research carried out by the club. Numerical research helps WRFC to make near to exact targets and plan on the financial aspect of their improvements. It also enables them to make exact aims. It also enables them to find out what majority of the member wants and compromises for the minority members who want something else.
Promoting the club is an essential part in marketing and there are various ways of doing it. A newsletter, which is produced by WRFC, comes in issue, every month. The newsletter is a way in which the club can communicate with its members, as the club wants to increase communication in the club. This will satisfy their customer’s needs as they provide information that they need about the club in a monthly basis and keep them up to date with the recent news about the club. The newsletter is a primary for of data as the information is collected by WRFC.
Similarly to that the club also introduced ‘Club News’ as another marketing activity. The ‘Club News’ informs members about the issues that affect the club. It also informs other issues that the club’s members need to know.
Another marketing activity that is carried out by WRFC in order to satisfy their customers’ needs is the club diary. The club diary shows the activities and events that will happen in the club for that month, which includes the date, day and address of where the event will take place.
With these examples of marketing activities, the club has been successful at informing the members about current activities and events taking place, which made them, achieve the aims and objectives of the club. If they continue with these forms of marketing activities, they will be able to form a good relationship with their customers. Thus, they are achieving their aim, which is to have clear communication with their customers.
Another marketing activity that is used is promotion letters. The letters are given to members depending on the issue or event that is happening throughout the year or the month. The letter below is for the members, in which the club is letting them know about the membership promotion that is running in the club. Usually, the promotion letters offer the free 7-day trial membership pass. This is a successful marketing activity because it gives the prospective member a chance to see how the club is providing their services and if it is efficient or not. The prospective members also get a reference from the friend or a family member who has already joined the club and had given the free pass to the prospective member.
One of the club’s aims was to increase the amount of members, which were about 1400 members and increase it to 1800 members. Through carrying out these marketing activities, the club has increased from 1400 members to over 2000 members in five years. Below is the chart of how many members joining the club each year. The chart records the number of members joined the club from December.
The pie chart below shows the visual of how many members that joined in each of the categories. In year 2001, the full time members are covering two thirds of the pie, which means there are more full time members in the club. The second majority is junior members. The off-peak members’ section is still low. At this point there are more full time members than off/junior member therefore in the year 2001 their aim of having 50% fulltime and 50% off-peak/ junior members was not achieved. However, they did increase members from 1400 members to 1620 members.
For December 2005, the increase in members exceeds the 1800 members target. For the year 2005 the club had 2008 members joined. This means the club has achieved their aims and objectives. This shows that WRFC continued to use the marketing activities. However, they still need to come up with different marketing activities that will help achieve the aim to have 50% off-peak/ junior members and 50% fulltime members. Off-peak and junior members also include the social and young adult members as well. Compared to 2001 when altogether the section had 34% of the members, in 2005 it increased to 41%, which is 9% closer to 50% target. This indicates that the marketing activity that is covering the off-peak/ junior and other section, is not showing enough impact.
Overall, the marketing activities that WRFC have used and have kept on using are helping the club to achieve its aims and objectives. The increase in members indicates that the club is providing the services according to their customers’ needs. They are maximising sales and profit and they are internally expanding.
Analysing Enterprise Skills of Wimbledon Racquets and Fitness Club
Enterprise means the skills and knowledge gained by entrepreneurs or owners of the business. For someone who owns a business, he or she needs to acquire and coordinate a range of resources, which include physical, financial and human. WRFC is an enterprise because it is an organisation of people formed to deliver services to their members. The club has the qualities that distinguish them from their competitors. By being an enterprise they are willing to try new ideas and approaches to certain markets. The key enterprise skills that a business will need are self-confidence and motivation, risk taking, identifying and exploiting marketing opportunities. They also have to have the ability to innovate and the ability to build teams and inspire.
Self-confidence and motivation
To set the tone of the changes to the club that Jason Beaver the manager has set, to work for changes with in the club. The purpose of this action is to increase membership and provide excellent services in the club. To fulfil this vision, he borrowed £200,000 from the bank in 2001 using the club as equity against the loan. The loan was needed to develop the gym, new gym equipments, sauna, changing rooms and transforming the snooker room into a studio where people can take fitness classes. Alternatively, the club was losing members every month and was suffering from a serious cash flow crisis. To show good faith 30 Gold members contributed by giving £1000 each, for the development of the club. This showed self-confidence and motivation skill the members of the club have. The club would have gone into liquidation if the manager and the owners of WRFC didn’t show these skills.
By taking this step, the manager has contributed to success of the club. If we look back at the pie charts, it tells us that there has been a massive increase in members. This shows that the general manager of the club has self-confidence and motivation skills that he used in an appropriate way therefore the aims and objectives of the club have been achieved successfully. The loan given by the bank and the money given by the members helped the club to carry out their market activities, which also includes the refurbishments of the club.
Risk Taking
Enterprising people aren’t afraid to fail. They recognise that failure is an essential part of future success. Risk- taking was another enterprise skills that are showed by WRFC owners and employees. All the decisions taken by the owners and manager involved risk. For example, WRFC host international and national events. They had to sacrifice all of the clubs resources e.g. car park, courts, staff costs, sponsorship, raise prize money etc. If the tournaments failed it would have been a financial loss to the business. However the tournaments were a huge success. And help the club gain huge publicity. Another example of risk taking is when the loan borrowed from the bank to develop the club proved to be unsuccessful in terms of attracting more members to club, the club will still have to pay back the loan with an interest and might be a situation of going into liquidation.
These risk-taking skills can be positive if it is planned, appropriate and good for WRFC. This helped the club to understand and focus on the business side of the club. The examples, shows that they put their objectives into practice to achieve their aims therefore they became successful.
Ability to identify and exploiting marketing opportunities
This is a difficult skill to develop and is often acquired through working in particular industry for several years. For this reason WRFC appointed Jason Beaver to be the manager because he was the former manager of David Lloyd and did have an experience in identifying the market trends and customer needs. Through market research, they were able to identify that people mostly liked to use gym and go to classes like aerobics or pilates. This was a new market that WRFC needed to get involved because majority of the public were interested in that. The club took advantage of this by;
- Starting pilates mainly for women.
- Fitness classes (state times)
- New Gym
- Circuit training
- Beginners for squash and badminton
- Innovate bar and restaurant
- Change image from an old mans working club to a young trendy club that is family orientated in terms people know each other and socialise. Children are welcome etc. Remember if they go to the bigger clubs, they may have more services but they will not get that same friendly atmosphere.
The club has been successful in having the ability to identify and exploiting marketing opportunities. They have been using every marketing opportunity they can get hold of. This includes advertisements, using PR for local newspapers and radios, giving offers and discounts, refurbishing the club etc. This skill helped WRFC to be more successful because they have more members than the time when the aims were set and prospective members usually end up joining the club permanently.
Ability to innovate
Enterprising people can think ways to improve products. They can look beyond traditional perceptions and ask new questions. This means that they have the ability to introduce new thing to the club. WRFC did this by building bar and catering team. They also have first port of call once members enter the club. All staff members are trained to know the members names in order to create that friendly atmosphere. All staff members have their photos on the wall for easy recognition. This innovation will help club achieve their aim to have a friendlier environment with the club.
The above example, shows that introducing the bar area for the members was a success and it also shows that there is an encouragement to improve the bar according to members’ preference. It also shows that they are making profit while in year 1999 and 2000, the bar area suffered losses. Making it more convenient for the members raised their sales, thus making profit. This shows that WRFC applied the right innovative skills and was successful in achieving their aims and objectives.
Ability to build teams and inspire
WRFC, as an enterprise has the skill to build teams and to inspire employees. It is the ability to organise an organisational structure to suit and meet the needs of WRFC. The change in structure of WRFC enable staff to be multi skilled compared to the old structure that was used. It makes possible for staffs to help out across different departments.
WRFC employed younger and qualified staffs in order to run the club like a business. The old organisational structure did not promote communication and contribution between departments. It also did not have departments for finance and marketing which made it difficult for them to be organised and be successful. However, the new organisational structure, include the finance, marketing and administration departments that focuses on how to maximise and maintain the sales and make profit. The new teams helped the club to successful by being organised and focus directly on the aims.
Analysing Teams and Structure of Wimbledon Racquets and Fitness Club
The club is run by unpaid volunteer members who sit on the board and committees, with the exception of the General Manager and rest of the staffs. This means that they need to work together as a team and cooperate with each other. The flexibility in the work force is the main purpose of this new organisational structure that was introduced in WRFC. The team in WRFC has to follow through the organisational structure, which enables each team member from department to help across different departments in order to achieve their aims and objectives.
The old organisational structure lacked the qualities and features of a team therefore the organisational structure did not fit the purpose of WRFC achieving the aims and objectives. This was the reason why WRFC changed to a new organisational structure, which created flexibility in the work force.
New Organisational Structure
Introducing the new organisational structure has helped the club to be successful because the new structure enables the staff to have flexibility in their work force and team cooperation is increased. The new structure also enables communication and transferable skills within departments; therefore each department can bring forward their ideas, which is a great advantage for WRFC and the aims and objectives of the club is being fulfilled. The structure shows that a person from one department can work in another department. Communication and cooperation within teams of departments was increased in the workforce. For example, the new structure enables the manager to rely on the reception manager and the receptionist to carry out duties like giving the right advice to customers, delivering excellent service and making the club friendlier. The new structure is straightforward and official which gives the customers that the club is serious and will help them and make the best out of the services provided. This shows that the new structure is helping to achieve the aims and objective of WRFC, as there is flexibility within the structure arrangement.
The above data shows how they planned the transition from the old structure to the new structure. It also mentions focus groups interviewing and doing surveys on the staffs about their working environment and how the organisational structure can be improved. This shows that the staffs want a good working environment and also want a good relationship with the members of the club. This also shows that the club authorities and members do not only influence the new structure, but the staffs’ views also matter as it them who will be work according to the new organisational structure. This helps the club to be successful because it is made easier for staffs to share their ideas and contribute.
In conclusion, after analysing all the elements that influence Wimbledon Racquets and Fitness Club, I have found out that the decisions that the club made was effective. They were successful after applying the different strategies and they continue to be successful. They have achieved almost all of their aims and objectives, which have made the club, survive, grow and become a threat to its competitors.
