PASSENGER TRAVEL NEWS.
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The Latest Doings and Developments in the Bus and Coach World.
MORE ABOUT A "SEEING BRITAIN" WEEK.
Why not Plan Now to Boom Motor Coaching in 1924? The L iews of Owners.
" A SPLENDID idea" was the cam...element of a Merseyside coach owner on the suggestion of The Commercial
Motor, that early next season, instead of owners ploughing a lonely furrow and conducting their business as isolated
units' they should join forces and
initiate the 1924 season with a. great " Seeing Britain" week, and afteAvards
by joint endeavour and co-operation use every .means at their command to goster and develop the travel-by-read movement.
One of two coach owners, whilst viewing the proposition with favour,
have been inclined to regard it as somewhat Utopian or to dismiss it as too idealistic to have any practical relation to the condition of the motor coaching industry, as we find it to-day. Others, the sceptics, say : "A Seeing Britain' week is all very fine and large, but how are you going to get coach owners to acquiesce in a general -scheme on such a big scale, when in certain localities coach owners will not work together, and in ethers, where they do, there are always black sheep outside the fold_ whose conduct is a never-ending source of anxiety? "
Criticisms and comments, and a free discussion of our proposition, arei welcomed. It is only by -having as many points of view as possible on the subject that it can be examined in the light of cold facts. •
Coach owners, when confronted with their balance sheets tabulating in terms
of £.s.d, their successes and fannies of a season just concluded, pay small regard to all the little incidents that have pro
daced the result with which they are confronted. The main fact, to them, is
a profit of or a loss of -----.
We start off, therefore, from this one central point :--The coach owner is in business to make a profit. Agreed!
Secondly : He only,. has the opportanity of making a profit when he can get good paying loads of a sufficient number during the ": useful season,", to pay his expenses for a twelvemonth. . Obviously then, to give effect to the major premise, his paramdunt aim should. be to get more people to travel by road.
A few days ago a coach owner told the writer that he was So 'appalled at the prospect of six months' idleness for his coaches and the Weight of "establishment charges that he wished • he could "sell out.' Again the problem 'recurs Ilew to get more traffic?
If. people will not travel for the mere love of being on the move, perhaps they
would be responsive to a propaganda.
effort ;which made road .travelling incidental to ot&r attractions. To.explain:
Thousands of people when they. gij -to Blackpool every year-e-whether by Creech or rail does not, matter—go, not .sa Much
because they want a ride, but because they want to reach • a selected venue. These people travel objectively. Others
go to Bleekiseolby road "just for the run" (as many of themwill teliiieti). R42
These passengers travel subjectively, A " Seeing Britain" week should give expression to both aspirations. But these are details The effeet,so far as the coach owner is concerned is the same-traffic,
"How to get more traffic"that ,is the Problem which a "Seeing Britain" week an endeavour to solve, as an initial effort for the next motor coaching season. The love of travel and of novelty is an almost universal desire. We have the coaches and we have the public. The equation then is to display the service possibilities of the motor coach until they strike a responsive chordin the hearts and minds of the public.
With this object in mind, is it not possible, for one week in the spring of 1924, tol make such an appeal to the public, that every coach owner will be
able to say, "Well, we have started Off in good style. Every seat is booked. True, it is our advertising -week, but we have let the public know we are here, what we can do, and what we will do the season through. That means for the rest of the summer months, having made our &but, we need spend less money on local advertising; 'it has been done far us far more effectively on a national scale, and at a smaller cost to ourselves."
Coach owners need to bear in mind that " Motoring for the million " sheuld be their slogan. Suggestions for tours and outings for men, women and c.hilclen need detailed consideration and attention.
The indoor amusement proprietors are all out in the winter months to do cape, city business. In the summer they are quiet and talk of losing money. If the public withhold their support frorn the theatres and picturedromes in the middle months of the year, why should not the coach owners make a bolder bid for patronage than they have ever done before?