*Due the last day of class
**Your answer should not exceed 8 pages (double spaced, 11 point font.)
Foxwoods is a resort & casino located in Ledyard, Connecticut. Their website is www.foxwoods.com
Mohegan Sun is a resort & casino located in Mohegan Sun, Connecticut. Their website is www.mohegansun.com
Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun are both about 2 hours from Boston. The closest Amtrak stop is New London, Connecticut. A taxi ride from New London to either place costs about $25. Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun are about 8 miles apart from each other. They offer similar (but not identical) experiences, and, obviously, compete with one another for patrons. Both establishments offer bus service from Boston. However, the two services differ in several ways, including ticket price, associated promotions, departure times, return time(s), pickup locations, capacity and type of bus, etc.
Analyze the two services. Are they sufficient, given the demand? Are they excessive, given the demand? Is one superior to the other?
Now suppose you were a marketing consultant for one of these two institutions. What would your recommendation(s) be? Should the bus service be discontinued?, expanded?, tweaked?, fundamentally altered? How many busses (if any) are optimal? What is the optimal pricing scheme? How could their website be improved?
Although there are many relevant considerations for analyzing this problem, you may want to make reference to some subset of the following concepts discussed in class: total demand, potential demand, test-markets, fixed costs, variable costs, break even quantity, competition, price wars, reference prices, fairness, "framing", decision difficulty, joint vs. separate evaluation, customer needs, substitutes, complements, segmentation, targeting, positioning, demand curves, price elasticity, price discrimination, price bundling, price promotions, prospect theory, brand image, customer loyalty, customer satisfaction, customer service, word of mouth, lifetime customer value.
*If you think of things that seem relevant to the problem, but are not quite sure how to formally analyze their effects, list them as a bullet points at the end of your document in a separate section entitled: Points to Ponder. You may use up to 2 pages for this section. Furthermore, although you are expected to make definitive recommendations, feel free to express reservations or concerns about your analyses (key assumptions you are unsure of, etc.). Lastly, please limit your discussion of this problem to other members within your group.