In the fierce market competition, marketing competition is a necessary means to win the market competition. Competition in marketing is essentially a conflict between enterprises in order to obtain more benefits, which is based on products and aims at winning customers. This kind of conflict is often manifested in the price of goods and has become an important means of market competition. In order to gain more market share, enterprises often conduct marketing competition around price. The so-called price reduction competition refers to the competition in which enterprises simply reduce prices and obtain profits in order to improve the trading conditions of products and increase the sales volume of products. I. Price Reduction Competition in Travel Agency Industry In recent years, China's travel agency industry, as a new industry, has begun to take shape since the reform and opening up. Before 1978, there were only two travel agencies in China, namely, international travel agency and China travel agency, which were not enough to form an industry and had no economic nature. 1980, China Youth Travel Service was established, which started the monopoly of China Travel Service. 1984, the national bureau delegated the right of tourism outreach. 1988, the number of travel agencies in China soared to 1573, completely breaking the monopoly of the industry. Since then, the attractive development prospects of the travel agency industry are being recognized by more and more people. Due to the low entry threshold of travel agencies, more importantly, before the new Regulations on the Administration of Travel Agencies 1996 was issued, the number of travel agencies was less than 5,000, which was not particularly large. The market is in short supply, the competition is not too fierce, and the tourism laws and regulations are not perfect. Therefore, the profit rate of travel agencies is relatively high, and it has become a well-known "lucrative" industry. Attracted by its high profits, the upsurge of "all private travel agencies" has been set off all over the country, and travel agencies have become investment hotspots in various industries. In recent years, the number of travel agencies has been increasing, and the competition in the tourism market has become increasingly fierce. In order to compete for market share, price reduction is regarded as the main or even the only means to compete for customers. Some travel agencies attract tourists at low prices and attack competitors, while competitors retaliate at lower prices, resulting in lower and lower prices of travel agency products in the tourism market, which leads to the misunderstanding of price reduction competition and the vicious circle of disorderly competition in the travel agency industry. Whether it is domestic tourism or international tourism, the phenomenon of price reduction competition is very common, and even "zero tour fee" and "negative tour fee" have appeared. In the winter of 2002, there was a strong "Hainan Double Flying" price reduction wind in Shanghai tourism market. Since mid-February, 1600 yuan, 1500 yuan and 1400 yuan have even fallen below the bottom line recognized by the industry 1300 yuan. You know, the one-way ticket to Hainan was 1520, which was later adjusted, but it was also 1360? Hovering between 65438 and 0400 yuan. The reason for this price war is the sharp drop in the number of tourists in the off-season. In order to maintain market share, airlines have increased their marketing efforts. Some powerful travel agencies in Shanghai use the special policy of "charter flight" to win air tickets at the lowest "charter flight price", and at the same time reach agreements with hotels, motorcades, scenic spots and travel agencies in Hainan, which leads to this unprecedented "low price" war and Hainan tourism boom. Since 2006, the phenomenon of price reduction competition still occurs from time to time. At the beginning of May, an international travel agency in Wuhan launched four two-way low-cost tours in one breath, which attracted people to flock to it and left other travel agencies in the cold for a while. In order to regain the lost market, several major domestic airlines quickly formed an "alliance" with other outbound agencies in Wuhan. With the support of several major airlines, many travel agencies in Jiangcheng quickly launched related routes at lower prices, which opened the price war in Wuhan tourism market. At the beginning of June, the travel agency once again issued a price reduction card-the double flight routes in Guilin, Zhangjiajie and East China dropped more than those in 400 yuan, and the double flight routes in Shenyang and Dalian dropped by 1000 yuan. In this regard, other outbound travel agencies in Hubei Province once again lowered the quotations of several tourist routes to less than a dozen yuan to several hundred yuan. The profit margin of travel agencies is getting lower and lower in the whirlpool of price reduction competition. According to statistics, in 2000, the average profit rate of travel agencies in China was less than 3%, but in 2002, the whole industry suffered losses. Until now, the travel agency industry is still a "meager profit" industry.
Second, the travel agency industry price competition reasons 1. The supply of travel agency products exceeds demand. There are more than 1.3 million travel agencies in China. Although there are not many travel agencies per capita, there is not much consumer demand. Travel agencies are mainly concentrated in economically developed coastal areas, and their regional distribution is extremely uneven. Therefore, compared with the tourism market, the number of travel agencies is still high. This is directly related to the cost of the travel agency industry. The fixed cost of travel agencies is relatively low. It's not expensive to rent a facade with fax and telephone and hire a few employees. As the main cost, variable cost is directly proportional to the business volume. Of course, when the business volume is large, it can make a lot of money, and the business recession can barely support it, which makes many travel agencies with weak strength just maintain bleak operations and the market loses its due power. Because of this, the oversupply of products is the direct cause of price reduction competition. 2. The seasonality and non-storability of travel agency products. Because the sales of travel agency products are obviously divided into off-season and peak season, and because travel agency products mainly meet the needs of customers through services, travel agency products that combine tourism resources, facilities and services can exist only when tourists buy and consume, that is, they cannot be stored, that is, it is now or never. As a result, the opportunity came, and everyone flocked to it. Almost all travel agencies made various price reduction reactions, and this reaction far exceeded the scope of normal seasonal discounts, which was the fuse of price reduction competition. Graduation thesis 3. Repetition and similarity of travel agency products. Many domestic travel agencies do not develop products vigorously enough and lack high-quality products. The vast majority of products are from commodities, and there are only a few well-known tourist routes, and everyone is selling them. This is mainly because travel agency products lack access mechanisms such as trademark rights and patent rights. A travel agency developed a marketable product, which immediately caused many small and medium-sized travel agencies to rush headlong into action and follow suit. This is the fundamental reason for price reduction competition.
4. The quality and level of travel agency managers are low. Some managers of many small and medium-sized travel agencies, especially middle-level management cadres, don't know much about the connotation of marketing competition in the market economy, can't master high-level competition strategies, and can only adopt simple price reduction competition strategies. 5. The scale has begun to take shape and the order is chaotic. After years of efforts, the scale of travel agency industry management has been initially established. However, due to the gap between China and developed countries in macro-control, regulations and penalties, the market order of China travel agencies is still in a chaotic stage. This is the external cause of price reduction competition, and it is also a category beyond the power of travel agencies. Third, the negative impact of price reduction competition on the travel agency industry
In a sense, price reduction competition is conducive to purifying the current situation that the travel agency market is large, small, scattered, chaotic and weak, and creating a number of large enterprises. This kind of price reduction competition can also bring some benefits to tourists. However, as an independent accounting and self-financing economic entity, travel agencies can't really realize "zero tour fee". At the same time, in order to maintain profits, we can only adopt the management mode of "reducing prices first and then reducing services", that is, lowering catering standards, reducing tourist attractions, compressing travel time and increasing shopping times. Or use various kickbacks and headcount fees as profit margins, and even some cooperatives increase their income by deducting travel insurance premiums. Some powerful travel agencies can also make a certain profit in charter flights, while small travel agencies can only focus on shopping. So go to three or four shopping spots a day, or add some scenic spots with high rebates. In order to increase kickbacks, tour guides and drivers spend the best time of the day on shopping spots and only take a look at the scenic spots, which seriously damages the interests of tourists, affects the overall reception quality of the tourism industry and greatly reduces the service. In order to reduce costs, some travel agencies employ temporary tour guides without basic salary, which makes it difficult to guarantee the cultural literacy of tour guides. Some tour guides have low quality and poor service awareness, which seriously affects the quality of service and is easy to cause complaints from guests. Why the complaints peak after the Golden Week has a lot to do with the behavior of travel agencies to cut prices first and then reduce services. The second method is to make a fuss about the price, such as using half-package price and small package price as all-package price to attract consumers. When consumers think that they have chosen a cheap route, they will pay twice and three times, and the final cost is far less "cheap" than originally thought. The disorderly price competition makes travel agencies stay at a low level of service and cannot meet people's high-level demand for holidays, adventures and other tourism. The result of price reduction competition will lead to people's distrust of tourism service enterprises, and profits will make travel agencies stay at the level of ensuring food and clothing forever. It is impossible to invest in training staff, develop new tourism products, improve the quality of tourism services, let alone retain high-quality talents, which will make travel agencies fall into a vicious circle. The disorderly price competition also makes the products of travel agencies unable to locate correctly. The price of some core tourism products is lower than its symbolic value, which will lead to a decline in sales and seriously affect the development of the travel agency industry. So, how can the travel agency industry develop healthily?