ABSTRACT
The final chapter in this section focuses on marketing and further develops the theme of leisure travel demand by exploring the marketing strategies which can be adopted by the airline industry to cope with the changing nature of this demand. In general, critics of the science of marketing might suggest that it is essentially a dishonest and amoral activity. At its worst, it can be based on the meeting of frivolous ‘needs’ and the exploitation of gullible and naïve consumers. However, it will be demonstrated that it should be neither of these things. 1 First of all, to apply marketing principles to the leisure air travel market requires a great deal of effort to be expended in obtaining a full understanding of the needs of customers in the main segments of the market. Alongside this, knowledge must be accumulated about the so-called marketing environment – the background against which marketing activities take place.
