Creating a built facility, consumer product or service, with unique attributes is a means of assuring maximum investment return and asset value. Where those unique attributes can be managed and enhanced over time, provides a "sustaining competitive advantage" in the spirit as first described by Peter Drucker.
In a competitive environment where many are focused on ROI and financial performance, the concept of sustaining competitive advantage is a distinct marketing viewpoint that can be helpful to long-term success.
Consumers today have a wide array of places at which they may enjoy their leisure time including retail centers, restaurants, nightclubs, museums, family entertainment centers, theaters, sport facilities, theme parks, themed attractions, themed entertainment, musems & science centers, among many others. We have also seen a return to urban entertainment districts, historic districts, and the "great streets" of vibrant urban locations. To a varying extent, all these places compete with each other as alternative experiences for a consumer?s time and attention.
In general, today's consumer, from child to retiree, has experienced high quality live performances, movies, theme parks, restaurants, and especially, recreation experiences. This is increasingly true even on a worldwide basis. Each person, each "end user" in this vast "theme park generation" is a sophisticated master of his or her own lifestyle and increasingly technology-savvy.
Despite such sophistication, as strategic marketing consultants we believe it is straightforward to figure out what consumers are after: During each person?s leisure time, enjoyment of their personal time with children, parents, extended family, spouse (or girlfriend/boyfriend), and friends and associates, is the whole point. We all want to seek or feel satisfaction with the quality of our relationships and the quality of our leisure-time experiences. We're quite literally in the "shared" experience business, a part of the Experience Economy.
