Introduction

As Cory Matheson, co-founder of Exposure Travel, peered across the inlet at his family's cabin located on the southern tip of Galiano Island in British Columbia, he was once again reminded of the province’s stunning natural beauty. It was this beauty, along with a landscape conducive to numerous outdoor sports and adventures, which spurred Matheson, along with his business partner and long time friend, Nick Gudewill, to create a travel company that specialized in outdoor excursions in BC.

Besides meeting with a representative from a resort owner on nearby Saltspring Island, Matheson and Gudewill had traveled to Galiano to ponder a very serious and immediate decision: Should the company invest roughly 10% of its previous year’s revenue into new Content Management System (CMS) for their website? Such a system would make it more economical to update components of the company’s website, enabling it to become very responsive. A heightened level of website responsiveness was required if Exposure was to pursue a new customer recruitment strategy.

This new strategy, which would utilize travel agents and hotels, was an intriguing possibility, but would be inadequately supported by their current IT system. Exposure had traditionally hired an outside party to manage and update their website. However, assuming the company decided to pursue this new opportunity, could this money be better spent elsewhere? Given the company’s embryonic state, would it be better to allocate this money toward sales, marketing and branding initiatives? Was the timing right to make such a move? These were all questions that needed to be examined in a thorough, yet timely, fashion.

Tourism in British Columbia

The tourism industry plays a major role in the provincial economy of British Columbia. In 2008, tourism in BC generated over $6.6 billion or 4% of the entire province's gross domestic product and employed over 131,000 workers (BCStats, 2009). Following a recovery period, after the September 11th terrorist attacks in 2001, tourism has been a strong point in BC's economy. Between 2003 and 2008 the tourism sector outperformed the overall provincial economy, while growing at an average annual rate of 5.5% between 2004 and 2007 (BCStat, 2009). More recently, the weakening economy worldwide, and particularly in the United States, slowed the industry growth to 1.7% in 2008. The majority of tourists in BC visit from other regions within Canada or come from the United States, forming a strong link between the American economy and the tourism in BC. With that said, there is growing potential for target markets outside of North America, especially in the Asian market. Considering that traditionally the tourism sector in BC recovers slower than the rest of the economy, the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games are expected to give the sector a welcome shot in the arm. Accommodation and food services make up the largest portion of the tourism sector's GDP at 37%, followed by transportation and related services at 35%. A miscellaneous category including travel agents, among other smaller industries, makes up 17% of the sector's GDP (BCStat, 2009).

The natural landscape of British Columbia makes the region a unique and ideal location for adventure travel or tourism. Adventure travel activities can be divided into 7 subsectors, which comprise activities with the highest demand among adventure tourists. These subsectors include fishing, wildlife viewing (land and marine), snowmobiling, downhill skiing and snowboarding, hiking (including cycling and mountain biking), and touring. Various regions across the province afford opportunities for tourists to participate in these activities, enabling many companies to enter the industry, either focusing on a single activity, such as wildlife viewing, or providing services involving many adventure activities.

Competitors

There are many companies offering services which focus on a single activity within a single city or region within BC, but aside from Exposure Travel, there are two major players in the BC luxury and adventure travel market. Both are large international companies operating from outside of BC. These companies are Abercrombie & Kent and Butterfield & Robinson.

Abercrombie & Kent is a large multinational company and is considered one of the world's premiere luxury travel companies. They offer customized vacation packages, combining comfort and authenticity in the world's greatest destinations. The company was founded by Geoffrey Kent and his parents, Valerie and Colonel John Kent, in 1962. Their beginnings were modest. In 1967, Geoffrey Kent (by now Managing Director, following his parents' retirement) decided to expand A&K's signature style of travel. By 1969, he began opening additional companies in Africa. In 1971, he met Jorie Ford Butler of Oak Brook, Illinois. She became a partner in the business and together they expanded A&K into a worldwide group of companies, with offices in London, Oak Brook and Melbourne, Australia. Today, A&K runs 62 full-time offices worldwide, staffed by more than 2,300 people; it also operates its own safari camps and Nile cruise ships, while maintaining a fleet of customized safari vehicles. The company's more recent innovations include Extreme Adventures that bring travelers face to face with nature at its most uncompromising, and Abercrombie & Kent Residence Club, the largest equity-based destination club in the industry.

Butterfield & Robinson is also a large multinational company and is considered one of the world's premier active travel companies. They design journeys to the world's most amazing places. Butterfield & Robinson started in 1966, when a trio of college buddies led a European bike tour on a lark. As the owners matured, so did their company. They've long since expanded to the rest of the world, incorporated hiking into their itineraries, and graduated from hostels and pensions to the best inns, villas, chateaus, and wilderness lodges destinations have to offer.

Company Overview and Strategy

Exposure Travel was founded in 2007 by long time friends and outdoor enthusiasts, Cory Matheson and Nick Gudewill. The tandem grew up utilizing BC's extraordinary landscape of mountains, ocean, lakes and forests, conducive to activities such as fishing, hunting, skiing, hiking, boating and camping. The pair decided to turn their passion for such outdoor activities into a business. However, Matheson and Gudewill felt that the outdoor adventure market was quite saturated. Long standing companies, specializing in fishing, skiing, river rafting and hiking, among others, had been in operation for years, thus solidifying a strong position in their market(s). But the pair of former Wall Street analysts concluded that no company offered luxury BC outdoor adventures, catered specifically to a high end customer. The two worked swiftly and diligently to form relationships with numerous resorts, yacht owners, personal chefs, seaplane and helicopter operators and adventure tour guides. Once this task was completed, Exposure had a platform of contacts from which to build upon. The company commenced full time operations in 2008/09. In its first full year of operation, the company performed three trips, which generated roughly $110,000 in revenue. Of these three trips, one accounted for approximately 60% of total revenue.

Exposure employs a differentiation strategy, underpinned by client customization. The company aims to allow customers to experience the rigorous, yet breath-taking, landscape of BC, but in a much more comfortable fashion. As a result, this allows individuals of all ages and skill levels access to outdoor adventures. This allows Exposure to reach its target market of companies interested in corporate retreats, as well as families looking for a holiday.

At the core of Exposure's strategy, customers are encouraged to customize their trips, enabling them to specify travel destinations, types activities and styles of food involved in their adventure. Consequently, adventures commonly consist of yachts, helicopters, sea planes and personal chefs. The company currently offers "Inspired Trips", which are rough outlines of past adventures. These act as a reference point for ideas from which customers can build upon. Through this process, Exposure empowers customers to tailor each trip to their specific interests. Aside from this customization, Exposure seeks to transform common outdoor activities into luxurious experiences. For example, the company coined the phrase "glamping", which refers to a glamorized form of camping. Conventional tents are replaced with large, permanent huts, located in remote areas throughout the province and fine cuisine is substituted for hot dogs.

Opportunities for New Business

Exposure has been receiving inquiries from hotels, agents, and tour groups surrounding their services. These new customers are looking for packaged trips with definite itineraries, destinations and activities. They have been attracted by Exposure's ultra-high-end luxury services, but they are less interested in entirely custom trips. Instead, they want ready-made experiences to offer their clients, and regular schedules to book against.

Servicing this market would represent a strategic shift for Exposure. To date, Exposure has offered no pre-determined packages; all trips have been entierly custom created for each client. To accommodate the new market, Exposure would have to publish a set of generic packages, and regularly update their itineraries.

Systems and Strategy

The current structure of Exposure Travel is aligned with their corporate strategy and supported by an appropriate level of IT. Since their strategy is to design custom vacation packages for customers, few changes to the company webpage are required. Therefore, the small IT budget Exposure Travel has is sufficient for this strategy, deeming additional investment into IT unnecessary.

However, the proposed shift in strategy to accommodate requests for standardized vacation packages would disrupt the current structure. Providing standardized packages requires regular updates of the company's web content, which, with their current level of IT, would involve paying a web developer on a weekly basis to change online content. It is estimated that each set of updates to the website would cost $1,000, and that Exposure expects to update its website six to eight times per quarter. This additional cost significantly disrupts Exposure Travel’s current budget and misaligns the company’s system with the company strategy. If this strategic change is to proceed, a system upgrade may be required.



An alternative is to shift from Exposure's current custom built website to the use of a more standardized website that would be easier to update. This new system, known as a Content Management System (CMS), would cost $15,000 to install, but would allow the company's founders to make changes to the website themselves.

Content Management Systems

A content management system (CMS) manages the lifecycle of a website by separating the tasks of content creation, content management, and content presentation. It is typically set up by experts for non-technical users so that they can easily change, maintain, and administer web content.



The heart of a CMS is its content management database. This database acts as a repository for documents, images, and all of the other content of the website. It can manage security concerns (such as access control), revision histories, integration with outside systems, and it imposes structure onto the website. A CMS can be purchased off-the-shelf through closed-source proprietary vendors, or downloaded from an open-source community.

Business users create content for the website through the CMS’s authoring tools. These may be web-based editors, or more complex word-processer like applications. The goal (and purpose) of the authoring interface is to allow users to administer content on the website without having any knowledge of web programming or systems. Users should be able to use the authoring tool with as little technical knowledge as possible. This permits them to focus on the content that they are creating, rather than on the underlying technologies.

The CMS publishes the business users’ content to the website through its presentation interface by applying a template to the content to create a webpage. Using a template automatically gives the webpage a consistent appearance and layout. Templates are created by web-designers to be visually appealing, functional, and to address concerns of browser compatibility, accessibility, search engine optimization (SEO), and content syndication (through technologies such as RSS). Templates specify the look-and-feel of a website, such as colour schemes, common headers and footers, as well as the placement of content and navigational elements.



CMSes vary in complexity and focus from the blog-publishing platforms such as WordPress, Blogger, and TypePad, to collaborative authoring tools such as wikis, to more general publishing tools such as MovableType, Drupal, and Joomla.

Issues

Exposure is faced with dual decisions. The first issue is should Exposure make a strategic shift in its business model to reach new customers, or should it retain its focus on its previous vision. The second issue is should Exposure change its web systems to use a CMS to support this new model. The issues are linked since the cost undertaken for changing web platforms must be diverted from other areas such as promotion.

At the present time Exposure Travel is mostly focused on custom travel arrangements. Being limited on how often its web content can be refreshed, Exposure Travel does not currently have any pre-packaged vacations advertised on its website. According to Mr. Cory Matheson, co-founder of Exposure Travel, "it is clear that there is a strong demand for pre-packaged travel." However, due to IT limitations his firm is not able to offer any such products on their website.

Future

According to Cory Matheson, the future looks bright for high margin luxury/adventure tour firms like Exposure Travel. The temperate climate of British Columbia and its extensive outdoor sporting options combined with the recent Olympic attraction means that the tourist influx is going to be at its peak for some time to come. The management with its clear short-term and long-term road-map however has no plans to expand their trip destination outside of BC, mainly because of their belief that there is lot more to explore in BC itself.

"Canada's rugged West Coast creates an opportunity for customized adventures and experiences you can’t find anywhere else," said Nick Gudewill, co-founder of Exposure Travel.

Exposure Travel, expects the publicity will help jumpstart an already busy season with U.S. tourists.

"We definitely expect to see a surge in business, particularly from the U.S.," says Cory Matheson. "When people see what stunning backdrops and natural landscapes exist just north of the border, how can they help but want to take advantage of it? Celebrities enjoy coming here because of the privacy and because we offer some of the world’s most captivating vacation spots."

With the economy deterring many U.S. travelers from flying overseas, Matheson believes Canada has become a popular tourist destination. He expects the interest from south of the border to continue into summer as tourists seek out luxury and adventure travel destinations closer to home.

The 2010 Winter Olympic Games embedded countless fresh images of Canada in minds around the world. Apart from the pure emotion and delight it brought millions, people saw the myriad different experiences this country has to offer. This is an important factor that positively contributes to Exposure Travel's future development prospects.