Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
PROFILE
Suzanne now serves as senior advisor to the association related to
its research and strategic initiatives. She continues to author the
monthly e-newsletter U.S. Travel Outlook, which monitors ongoing
travel industry performance; synthesizes relevant economic, social,
and consumer trends that can affect travel; and provides regular
forecasts and qualitative analysis about the future of U.S. travel.
She also serves as general manager of U.S. Travel's Marketing
Outlook Forum, the industry's leading strategic forecasting confer-
ence, is a frequent speaker at industry conferences, and has been
cited frequently in leading national media. Suzanne has also been
appointed senior executive associate with the Consumer Insights
and Brand Strategy Group of the Ypartnership, a leading marketing
service company serving the travel industry. In addition, she has
established her own company, Suzanne Cook Consulting, LLC,
specializing in research, strategic planning, and presentations for
destinations and travel corporations.
Prior to joining the U.S. Travel Association, Suzanne held the
position of senior project director for the Arbitron Company, a
major broadcasting research firm. She is an adjunct faculty member
at The George Washington University, where she received her
doctor of philosophy degree in social psychology, and has taught
graduate level courses in research methods and statistics in
Washington, D.C., abroad, and online. She also served as president
and chairman of the board of the International Travel and Tourism
Research Association (TTRA), and is currently the chairman of the
board of governors for the Alexandria, Virginia, Convention &
Visitors Association. Travel Agent magazine named Suzanne as one
of the most powerful women in the travel industry. She is the
recipient of TTRA's highest and most prestigious award, The
Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as the Access to Freedom
Award given by the Society for Accessible Travel & Hospitality.
SUZANNE COOK
President, Suzanne Cook Consulting,
LLC and Senior Advisor, U.S. Travel
Association
F or more than three decades, Suzanne Cook served as the
senior vice president of research for the U.S. Travel Associa-
tion, the industry's leading ''umbrella'' trade association, pro-
viding economic and marketing research and analysis to benefit
its members and support industry efforts involving promotion
and advocacy. The comprehensive program she developed and
directed includes the Travel Economic Impact Model, the only
national model that provides consistent and comparable esti-
mates of both domestic and international travel's economic
impact at the national, state, and local levels. She was also
instrumental in the creation of several consumer research pro-
grams designed to monitor the size, characteristics, and growth
of existing and emerging travel markets on an ongoing basis,
such as TravelHorizons TM , a quarterly, forward-looking survey
conducted in conjunction with the Ypartnership. She was also
the principle architect of travelgreen.org, the primary source for
information on sustainability efforts within the travel commu-
nity, and some of our industry's best efforts, developed in part-
nership with American Express.
WORDS ABOUT THE FUTURE
The future belongs to those who best understand and serve the current
needs of their customers, while also being attentive to major
demographic, social, economic, political, environmental, technological,
global and other trends that are likely to affect our industry and
customers in the future. This requires a rigorous approach to research,
built on appropriate theoretical underpinnings, familiarity with the
knowledge base of other relevant research, and great attention to the
reliability and validity of the research methods used. It also requires
curiosity and creativity—a focus on developments in the world around
us and the trends as they evolve, as well as the ability to extrapolate
these trends so as to gain new insight into the most likely scenarios for
the future.
for this. First, trend analysis does not ''explain'' demand in any way. In other words, if demand changes
from year to year, we would expect this to be because of changes in the components of demand
(propensity and resistance, as discussed earlier in this chapter). Trend analysis does not acknowledge
the in uence that these variables have on demand levels and, therefore, cannot explain why it
changed. Second, to extrapolate from a linear trend (extending the trend line AB to point C)isto
assume that past growth trends will continue without change. Such an assumption is tentative at best.
Estimates based on a constant growth rate tend to become very unrealistic in rather short periods of
time, due to the nature of compounding.
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