Old tourist couple, Cascais, Portugal — Used under Creative Commons licence CC BY 2.0 by Pedro Ribeiro Simões

Keeping on adventuring

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Age and disability need not hold back those who want to keep or start travelling.

Ability Adventures is an accessible holiday travel company, providing a range of holiday packages for mature travellers and people with disabilities, including those with physical, sensory or learning impairments and those with special medical needs. Options are available for individuals, couples, families and groups. Applied Management student Ursulla Honey Mohan worked with Ability Adventures' principal Marina Hanger to identify how the company could better promote its services to senior and disabled travellers in New Zealand.

Ursulla surveyed Ability Adventures' past customers to better understand their preferences and priorities, then undertook competitor analysis. Tailored self-guided packages were the preferred tour option. Ursulla's recommendations for Ability Adventures included:

  • improving promotion of some of the options on the website
  • using photographs on Facebook and Instagram for promotion
  • building strong relationships with disability and older people's organisations 
  • using an online tool to survey customers

Marina Hanger found that working with Ursulla was a learning experience for her as well as for Ursulla; Marina gained greater clarity through explaining her business to Ursulla, and the process also challenged Marina's thinking about the business. Ursulla's recommendations usefully reinforced Marina's ideas about marketing the business.

Find out more about working with our Business students here.

Image credit: Pedro Ribeiro Simões,  used under Creative Commons licence CC BY 2.0.