ENTERTAINMENT CENTRE - A CONSUMER STUDY

Abstract

The human need for rest, play, and entertainment has fuelled the growth of the leisure industry. In recent years, we witness the advent of the entertainment centre. This is an innovative form of entertainment outlet that houses a variety of facilities under one roof. The conglomeration creates synergy and mass appeal to the consumers. The author foresees the continued growth of such developments in our entertainment scene. The author aims to study the consumers' profile and preferences as it is believed that such information would be extremely valuable to their operators. Based on surveys conducted in Orchard Cineleisure and Jurong Entertainment Centre, the study presents the socio-economic and psychographic profiles of the consumers. In comparing between the consumers' profiles of the two centres, the study shows that consumers from Jurong Entertainment Centre are generally younger than their counterparts from Orchard Cineleisure. Nevertheless, results from the Spearman's Rank Correlation Tests show that variables such as age, sex, and occupation do not significantly affect the manners in which the consumers rank the entertainment facilities. However, the rankings also indicate that certain facilities (e.g. skating rink and amusement arcade) are preferred more by certain segments of consumers than the others. Conjoint Analysis is used to test the consumers' preferences for combinations of various facilities that can be incorporated in the entertainment centre. The analyses show that the consumers derive the greatest part worth utility from the provision of theme restaurant and the least part worth utility from the provision of indoor miniature golf course. These findings would be useful for the formulation of marketing plan to enhance the profitability of the entertainment centre.