Executive Summary

This report is about my internship program in Sun Touriism International PVT.LTD. in

this comprehensive report, I have discussed about every major aspect of the tour which I
have observed and perceived during my internship program. This research report will
help customer to get the information about the tour.

Tourism is an irresistible word when it comes tour packages, we offer tour and travel
services including ticket booking, hotel reservations, rental car services, holiday tour
packages, domestic tour packages. We provide the most suitably designed as well as the
customized travel packages. To the customers. We offer everything related to travelling
services under one roof.

Today’s extremely exhausting work environment dictates that individuals required some
joyful holidays. We provide stress-free joyful refreshing holidays with cost competitive
and customized packages according to their requirement. We provide services in almost
each and every city of India and also international tours also. We want to serve our
customers with the best possible services and provide them the kind of comfort they want.
We also want to customize our tours as per our customers requirement without reducing
joy or quality to tour. People of all ages and backgrounds will come to enjoy the unique,
upscales, joyful and refreshing environment that our Sun Tourism provides. We provide
the all facilities like Wi-Fi, hotel rooms, guesthouses, rental cars. And transportation
through its airways, railways and busses. According to the tour packages. We offers new
product and concepts from time to time, keeping the effect of change of season on the
human mind and body, we revise our it ineraries regularly. This is because the comfort
and satisfaction of our customers are paramount to us.

1
 Objective of project:

➢ To study the marketing process of Sun Tourism.

➢ To study the promotion activities in Pune and PCMC areas.

➢ To study of customers towards after feedback tour packages.

2
 Organization of Profile

Sun Touriism:
Sun Touriism International Pvt. Ltd. was established in 2007 by Mrs. Nishita Ghatge
(mentioned as Mrs. Nishita) and Mr. Ashok Malik (mentioned as Mr. Ashok). Sun Touriism is
a travel and destination management company located in Pune, Maharashtra. Mr. Shashikant
Ghatge looks after the finances and marketing operations of the Sun Touriism.

Quality is the main focus point of founders. They have not left any stone unturned to bring
quality on all the tours. Mrs. Nishita and Mr. Ashok individually lead tours along with other
team members. Mrs. Nishita leads tours in Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. Mr. Ashok takes
care of times in South Africa, Australia, and Europe. Other team members are highly qualified
members trained under Mrs. Nishita and Mr. Ashok. They handle tours in UK, Dubai, Singapore,
Egypt, Thailand, domestic destinations, and adventure tours. 2014 onwards, they started
offering tours in more than 40 countries and all over India.

The vision of Sun Touriism is “loved by customers as delightful travel partners.” All efforts in
the direction of quality and customer satisfaction have made Sun Touriism famous in Pune
city. The company has many awards on its shelves. Few notable achievements are 1. Most
Trusted Travel Agency in Pune (2019). 2. Pride of Maharashtra (2019) 3. My value partner
mega award. The company's vision has made them successful.

Mrs. Nishita is one of a kind of an entrepreneur. Her street smartness and kindness make her
the most favorite boss of all employees and a favorite travel partner of customers. Her
aggressive business ideas and strategic decisions made her a successful entrepreneur. She has
won Nari Shakti Award (2019), Lokmat professional icon (2017, 2018) Entrepreneur of the
year (2017, 2018) by PCMC. Mrs. Nishita is one of the strong pillars keeping Sun Touriism
growing.

Ghar se Ghar tak Champaign:

During the initial years, the response was not so overwhelming. The founders used this period
to study customers and their requirements. They understood that a lot of people, mostly old
travelers, have the tendency to forget or lose wallets and other valuable things. People do not
hand over such valuables to tourist guide as well. Hotel and air travelling expenses, which are
relatively high, are already included in a tour package. So, the customer has to pay for food,
tips and other transportation tickets which are not costly. A tour operator carried visa and
passport copies. In other words, wallets can be an unnecessary burden.

3
To tackle this problem, they came up with All-inclusive tours. Here, they decided that every
expense will be managed by tour guide including travelling, food, or any other activities except
personal shopping. They gave a guarantee that customers can travel without a wallet during the
entire tour. They suggested that customers do not need to bring it with them. Mostly old
customers were happy with the policy. It attracted a lot of customers from the age group 50 and
above.

Another problem they found was that of travelling from home to airport2. Travelling from Pune
to Mumbai can be hectic. It affects the motivation of customers. Many clients do not travel
frequently, so they are always under the pressure of reaching the airport on time. This fear
PCMC: Pimpri and Chinchwad Municipal Corporation. Pune and PCMC are related areas.
The first branch of Sun Tourism is located in the vicinity of PCMC.

International airport nearest to Pune city is Mumbai which is ~160 km away.

drives them to reach airport six to eight hours before the flight. Before reaching the destination,
tourists get tired and may not have enjoyed their journey. Another point of view is customers
travel for relaxation and leisure. Sun Touriism wants to make sure it starts right from their
home. Thus, they created "Ghar Se Ghar Tak" campaign. They made a contract with a cab
agency. The cab agency had the responsibility to pick up customers from their home, help pick
up baggage and drop at the airport. This campaign received an overwhelming response. Rate
of repetitive customers rose since 2012. One of the customers made a statement that now we
do not care about tourist destination; Sun Touriism does that for us. All we say is "yes, on
which date?" Customers have relied on Sun Touriism. Generally, repetitive customers make
one to two tours per year with Sun Touriism.

4
 Mrs. Nishita and Mr. Ashok always focused on
quality. So, they lead the majority of the group
tours to assure quality. Tours became a routine
job of the founders. They started arranging a pre-
departure meeting to explain customers the entire
itinerary and make them familiar with the fellow
travelers. These meets were arranged in hotels or
conference halls along with a meal. Mrs. Nishita
said that pre-departure sessions have strategic
importance. It's where we come to know about the
difference between competitors and us.
Newly joined members always compare tours offered by different competitors. If a competitor
is doing something more, then people tell us that competitor is offering some XYZ feature
which is missing in Sun Touriism. In a way, pre-departure get-together plays an essential role
for founders as well as for customers.

Values of Sun Touriism includes "Committed on paper, execution in service." It means to be

always faithful to the commitments made to customers. Sun Touriism makes commitments
about tour plans, food items like meals, the snacks clients will get enroute, surprise parties and
special occasions, travel necessities and goodies. These things are committed on paper, and
tour operators are bound to fulfil it. In many tours, 100% commitment became an additional
cost burden to the company because of the last-minute mismanagement by the third party such
as hotels, restaurants, airlines and other unavoidable instances. Customer’s happiness lies in
small gifts and memories. Sun Touriism takes care of customer happiness.

5
Ghar Se Ghar Tak campaign has redefined soul of Sun Touriism. Affection towards customers
helped break the jinx of the tourism industry. Sun Touriism brought many new practises in the
tourism market. For Sun Touriism, service industry turned to a customer-centric enterprise. All
employees were trained to serve the customer first. As a result, customer retention has increased
drastically. References became potential customers. Revenues kept on growing and so did the
employee strength.

6
 Financials
Mrs. Nishita and Mr. Ashok started Sun Touriism with a capital of Rs. 10 lakhs only. Their
approach always became conservative. Sun Touriism has never built debts. It is a debt-free
company in today's date as well. Despite the financial leverage, the company has grown steadily
since 2008.

Employee’s job is to do administrative job, clerical work and work as a tour operator. Sun
Touriism employees' number was relatively stable for the first five years. After successful
implementation of Ghar Se Ghar Tak, customer inflow increased, and they started hiring more
employees. In the meantime, they opened another office in the heart of the city in 2015-16.
Therefore, there is a jump from 16 employees in 2015 to 22 employees in 2016. Numbers grew
steadily since then. They have employed 28 people in 2019.

Cr: Crore. 1 Cr = 10,000,000/- (10 million)

We can see that employee strength is proportional to the growth in revenue with a delayed
response by one year. For example, in 2015 revenue jumped from Rs. 5.5 Cr to Rs. 8.6 Cr but
employee's number rose in by 5 in 2016 as compared to the growth of 3 employees in 2015. In
the last couple of years, employees' development is comparatively higher than the revenue.

Looking into their financial statements, Sun Touriism is a debt-free company. Founders
approach is conservative when it comes to finances. Sun Touriism owned both the offices. (i.e.
they are not using the option of a lease or rent a place.)

7
 Research Methodology

Customer:
Customer is the primary focal point of the service industry. Pune city is the targeted area by
Sun Touriism. They have two branches located in prime locations of the town. The first branch
is in Akurdi and second is in Kothrud. The total available market (TAM) is an entire Pune city
and its residents who are willing to travel for leisure. Pune city is densely populated, having a
median age of 24 years. Young people are enthusiastic about leisure travelling. It makes the
city a right place for travelling business. The city is also famous as a retirement hub. People who
take early retirement choose Pune city because it's peaceful. The serviceable available market
(SAM) would be upper-middle-class population who are seeking international exposure for
leisure, youngsters interested in exploring India and a newly married couples who want to have
a memorable honeymoon. The serviceable obtainable market (SOM) of Sun Touriism is
classified with a parameter of age and income. For international tours, they target people,
mostly families, of age 50 and above which have an annual income of 12 lakhs plus. For
domestic tours, their target segment is families of age between 30 years to 40 years and have a
yearly income up to 6 lakhs.

Customer preferences
Sun Touriism product is classified into two parts and further classified into two sub-products

1. Group Tours
a. Domestic
b. International
2. Family Inbound Tours (FIT)
a. Domestic
b. International
Competitors
Sun Touriism believes in brick-and-mortar stores. Founders believe in owning properties. They
also do not have any leverage in terms of liabilities. Sun Touriism has bought second property
to open its second branch in 2014.

Sun Touriism has steep competition in Pune city. Most of the competitors have a franchise-
based business model. They have high debts, and a number of franchises are present across
town.
Veena World

It is one of the largest tour operators in Maharashtra.

Operating revenue is above Rs. 500 Crs. The
company started in 2013. It has a franchisee-based
business model. Veena world has near about 160
franchisees all over Maharashtra. Most of the offices
are in Mumbai and Pune. Their specialty is
international group tours and honeymoon packages.
They have approx.1000 employees working across
8
Maharashtra. In six years, they have served more than
400,000 customers.
In terms of finances, Veena world is high debt company. Veena world has expanded in a concise
time frame of seven years. Its debt-to-equity ratio is -19.6. The risk involved is too high. They have
a diversified business. Veena world gives forex services, cultural activities for foreigners and NRIs
in selected locations.

Kesari Tours
Kesari tours is a Mumbai based tourism
company. It is one of the oldest and well known
for tourism activities in Pune. Established in
1984, they have branches all over India and have
an international presence. They have one office
in Muscat and second in is New Zealand. In
India, Kesari has over 30 offices and 150 +
franchisee and sales offices. More than half of
the franchisee is in Maharashtra.

In 2019, Kesari’s operating revenue was over Rs.

500 Crs. Kesari is also a high debt company.
Debt to equity ratio is above 4. Kesari has over
1000 employees out of which 500 are tour
operators, and remaining are office staff. Strength of Kesari is a wide range of products. They
offer tours in more than 70 countries and more than 100 destinations across India. Tours
provided by Kesari are economical. They offer Forex services to diversify from core business.

Girikand Holidays
Girikand holiday, operating
under the name of Girikand
travels, was founded in Pune in
1977. They are well know in
leisure tours. Girikand has
offices across Maharashtra.
They have eight offices and 15
franchisee-based sales offices.
They offer tours at 40
international locations and
more than 100 domestic places.
Girikand operates with a staff
size of 120+.

Girikand is a well-diversified business. They offer logistics and travel services apart from tourism.
They own a fleet of cars and buses. They provide travel services including airport pickup, limousines,
and coaches for interested customers. In 2019, the revenue of Girikand was near about Rs. 100 Crs.
9
Guru Nath Travels:
Guru Nath travels started with a motive to give
travelling services to pilgrims. It is a Pune based
organization founded in 1970. They have in present
only one location. Currently, they offer tours across
India and 11 international destinations. The core
strength of Guru Nath is pilgrim tourism. 55+
employees are associated with Guru Nath travels.

Guru Nath travels is currently in the phase of

reinventing. They now offer more products like group
tours, honeymoon packages and international tours.

If we look at this whole as an industry, it is not employee intensive industry. Products offered
are somewhat similar across all competitors. Companies use liabilities as financial leverage.
Big players have high debts under their belt. Business expansion model is franchisee based.
Brands formed have heritage value. They are operating from the last three to four decades
except for Veena world. Usually, tourism companies offer forex services along with tourism.
That is industry practice. Diversification into other businesses is, perhaps, not a standard.

Collaborators and Context

Sun Touriism’s another strength is international collaborators. European countries are the forte
of Sun Touriism. They have a couple of local collaborators from every European country which
is in their portfolio. These collaborators work as local guide, scout to find out new places,
hotels, and adventure activities. Sun Touriism has made contracts with many hotels. Services
offered by their hotels are consistently under observation. If Sun Touriism receives negative
feedback about hotel services, they swiftly act upon it. As per severity of feedback, either they
discuss it with hotel owners to make things right or cancel the contract with the hotel. Further,
Sun Touriism have deals with travelling service provides. They have collaboration with travel
service providers which provide cabs and coaches for domestic travel.

Every year, employees go to Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Egypt, and Asian countries for a
longer duration (four to six months). These employees handle groups and FITs in the respective
countries. It boosts employee morale. They feel promoted.

Sun Touriism has collaboration with an agency for hiring employees. These agencies find
suitable candidate and send it to the founders. Since a couple of years, they have started
receiving resumes of interested candidates on their website. So, collaboration with this agency
may be terminated.

10
 4Ps of Sun Touriism

• Pricing
Sun Touriism’s approach to pricing is very conservative. They offer prices keeping competitors
in focus. The pricing model is variable pricing. They offer it according to customer and
premiere services of the product. For example, if the FIT customer is looking for a tour, then
Sun Touriism will keep the premium product in front of the customer. Premium work consists
of good hotels/stay options, excellent food services, various tourist activities and travel
arrangements. Cost of the product is 5% to 10% more than the competition. If a customer is
price-conscious, then they identify what customers priority is, like is the customer willing to
compromise on stay. They offer a cheaper stay option to reduce the cost of the product.

As per discussion with Mr. Shashikant, pricing is product-based classified into two
components. Group tour pricing is, usually, inclusive of all. It includes Visa fees, airfare,
travelling, stay, food and extra activities (differ destination to destination). Family inbound tour
pricing is component-wise pricing. Package includes everything that was offered in a group
tour, but if the customer wants to remove components from it, then it is possible. For example,
if clients wish to book a flight, then Sun Touriism will suggest flights and clients can book
accordingly. Another factor affecting FIT pricing is the date. If tour dates match with a group
tour, then Sun Touriism offers a significant discount to FIT customers. It dramatically reduces
staff hour involved in managing tours for Sun Touriism. Sun Touriism captures customer
premium through variable pricing.

Promotion
Promotional activities of Sun Touriism are classified into two parts and further subdivided into
few categories.

1. Indirect promotions

➢ Advertising
➢ Digital
➢ Prints
➢ Telephonic calling

2. Direct Promotions

➢ Exhibitions

These activities have their own costs. Advertising costs 5% of the generated revenues. It
comprises of digital advertising that has only 0.5% cost to total revenue whereas prints are a
costly affair, contributes 4.5% of the total revenue. Telephonic calling is another part of an
indirect method that has cost 3% of the revenue.

11
 Direct promotional activities, including stalls at an exhibition or travel fair, can attract large
masses of the customer. This platform allows Sun Touriism to communicate face to face with
customers. Frequency of such events varies per month; therefore, the cost associated with
indirect promotional activities ranges from 2-3% of total revenue. Cumulatively, cost involves
in promotional activities is 10-11% of total revenue.

Promotional activities are carried out separately for group tours and Family Inbound Tours
(FIT). The motive behind promotional activities is brand building, brand awareness, and
product awareness. Sun Touriism, primarily, uses the following seven channels.

1.Exhibitions:
Exhibitions exclusively for the tourism industry is held in the city, mainly before the beginning of
the tourism period. Exhibitions attract travel enthusiasts from all over town. Sun Tourism looks
at the exhibitions as an opportunity. In exhibitions, Sun Tourism focuses on product detailing. As
per customers’ interest, they distribute booklets having all the details about comparable products.
For example, if a customer is willing to travel to Thailand, then booklet contains details of
Thailand plus Phuket, Krabi, Pattaya and other Asian counties. Once a customer is interested, Sun
Touriism offers an upfront discount if a customer makes a booking. They take a minimal amount
for booking and full payment a week prior to the tour.

2.References:
References are Sun Tourism’s most vital promotional channel. References or referrals are those
people who were referred by current customers. After every tour, Sun Touriism asks a customer
to fill up the feedback form and ask for five references who are willing to experience what
customers have experienced. According to Mrs. Nishita, joy and happiness are contagious. If
someone has experienced it, then relatives and friends want to have that experience too.
Moreover, if customers feedback is right, then relatives and friends cannot hold back. References
are a channel through which Sun Touriism gets connected to those friends and relatives who are
mutually motivated to travel. Conversion rate from potential customer to an existing customer is
whopping 70%.

3.Newspaper advertisement:
Sun Touriism uses newspaper advertisements for brand building purpose. It is a specific area
champaign. Local newspapers have a stronghold in any area. Readers are relatively higher than
any national newspaper. (9) Sun Touriism is a company located in only one city. So, it makes
sense to advertise through local newspapers rather than a national newspaper.

12
4.SMS:
Phone number and email ids of people connected to travel or related activities are available on
social media sites and advertising agencies. Sun Touriism purchases contact details from
various sources and sends them SMS regularly. After 2-3 SMS's, they remove old contacts and
replace them with new connections. The aim of this activity is general brand awareness. They
want to create awareness in the travelling enthusiast community.

5.Radio:
Radio is the most preferred medium of advertisement, especially for local businesses. Sun
Touriism also uses this platform because it is directed towards a targeted audience.
Advertisement is aired during peak hours that is from 8 am to 11 am and 5.30 pm to 8.30 pm.
Working people are mostly travelling during this period. Radio is still the most famous medium
of entertainment while driving a car. Purpose of radio advertisement is to gain higher reach.
Sun Touriism reaches all over district via radio. Another advantage is that mostly people
earning above 25 lakhs use a car as a transport medium. Sun Touriism airs advertisement
targeting these people.

6.Pamphlets:
Pamphlet distribution is used when specific tour campaign requires targeting a particular area.
For example, if campaign for pilgrim tour is going on, then the targeted area of residents living
in the vicinity of a big temples get pamphlets. If campaigning for ladies' special tour, then Sun
Touriism distributes pamphlets in relevant ladies’ clubs.

7.Billboards:
Sun Touriism uses billboard advertisements for traffic awareness and brand building. They target
billboards in a radius of 5 km from both the offices. They also use billboards near IT parks. Hinjewadi,
Pune's IT hub has over 150 IT companies. Around 1.5 lakh commuters travel daily to Hinjewadi IT
Park. (10) Such intense traffic area is targeted by Sun Touriism where they put advertisements on the
billboard. It helps brand building and brand penetration

Product
• Sun Touriism has put a lot of efforts to offer unique travel destinations. These
destinations are not included officially on any channel. As per Mr. Ashok, these are
secret recipes provided on the spot. With the consent of the customers, they tweak the
schedule of the tours for one day and take customers to the selected sites which may
not be famous but deliver beautiful experience.

• They have 3% budget allotted for R&D. In R&D, scouts explore famous travelling
places. They spend a lot of time with locals, discover about festivals and food, find out
areas where customers can enjoy these festivals and food. Scouts generally spend 15 to
45 days in a country.

• In the majority of the cases, customers want to visit as many places as they can. It is
because customers are spending a lot of money, they would like to take benefit of
visiting maximum sites. But it makes trips hectic and tiring. Sun Touriism explains both
sides to the customers and tweaks products as per customers’ requirement.
13
 Product Portfolios are classified as

1) Continent based:
a) Asia
i) India (Domestic Tours)
ii) Western Asia (Middle East)
iii) South-East Asia
iv) East Asia (Japan)
v) South Asia (near India)

b) Europe
c) Africa
d) North America
e) Australia & New Zealand

2) Customer-based:
a) Group Tours
b) Family Inbound Tours
c) Ladies Special
d) Honeymoon
i) Group Tours
ii) Individual Tours
e) Customize Tours

• Placement
• The key for Sun Touriism is placing the right product to the right customer and hence
two offices are placed at the correct position for customer service. Several employees
offer door to door services. Products are displayed directly to the customer in
offices and exhibitions.
• Advertisements and promotional discounts are offered to attract more customers.
Founders are interested in providing what customer wants. They do not press customer
to upgrade their product. They say that once a customer takes a tour with Sun Touriism
then most likely he/she will back because of superior service quality. Every destination
gets equal treatment, so every customer is valuable. Product placement solely depends
on customers’ interest.

14
 Sales and Distribution Management
Process of Sales
Sales operations are completed in 9 steps
I. Tele calling: It is a process of finding interested and enthusiastic customers through
telephone calls, SMS, and email. Sun Touriism get these numbers primarily from
existing customers as references and from advertising agencies.

II. Confirmation of needs: When a customer shows interest, Sun Touriism asks for
travelling needs. This step may involve multiple calls. It is a time-consuming step
because customers are not sure about their preferences. Once a customer agrees then
the conversation goes more in-depth.
III. Understanding interest: They listen to customer care. Understand why and where clients
want to travel like international/domestic, group/FIT, leisure/adventure/shopping,
duration etc. Accordingly, they offer a product.
IV. Pricing: When a product is finalized, Sun Touriism offers them a price. It provides a
complete itinerary of the tour. The itinerary is either package or customized list as per
customers’ requirement. Sometimes booking amount is collected in this step.
V. Office Visit: Most of the customers visit first time after finalization of the itinerary.
Then they make a payment from 50% - 75% depending upon the product. The office
collects necessary documents required for flight booking and Visa.
VI. Bookings: After the first payment, Sun Touriism books flights, stay and other
transportation arrangements. They start visa processing. These activities are completed
two to three months before the tour.
VII. Pre-Tour Get together: In case of group tours, the pre-tour gathering takes place 15 days
before the tour. Here, the founders discuss the itinerary with the group and make last-
minute changes. People joining group come to know each other. Complete payment is
collected before pre-tour gatherings.
VIII. Tour: Sun Touriism offers services and makes tours enjoyable and memorable.
IX. Feedback: After completion of the tour, Sun Touriism collects feedback verbally and
through written forms. Founders randomly talk to five to ten peoples from the group
and collect critical feedback. As per feedback, they make changes in hotel selection,
destinations, and other offerings.
Sun Touriism also collects five references from each customer. They call each of them
after 15 days of tour completion. 70% of them get converted into new customers.

15
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
The tourism industry is a service-based industry primarily driven by customers. Every customer
is different because of his/her unique requirements. Customer relationship management
(CRM) is a crucial component of the tourism industry. CRM is a tool to manage interactions
with existing and potential customers. Gather data from these interactions and analyze to
enhance the business of a firm.

Online Vs Brick and Mortar business.

Mr. Shashikant is not in favor of going online. It does not mean he is an old generation guy and
does not understand technology. Sun Touriism’s office looks very modern. Every essential
person has a laptop. CRM gives all update to all important persons daily. Every employee has
a smartphone with CRM software. They are well trained. CRM allows employees to connect
from anywhere. That enables them to offer door to door service without difficulty. According
to Mr. Shashikant, tourism has to be felt. Relations make experiences memorable. So, he
presses more on face-to-face meetings and relationship building.
He explained further on differences between online tourism model vs brick and mortar model.
he said online business is app-based or website-based business model: Sun Touriism target
customers aged 40 and above. Majority of the ageing population is not comfortable with online
business model, maybe because they find it difficult to access websites or they avoid it thinking
it may be a fraud. Feedback and grievances systems are less effective in the online business
model. Trust building is difficult in the app-based system. “Whereas when we meet face to
face, customers feel that confidence in us. That trust and confidence are vital for sustainable
business growth” says Mr. Shashikant.

Online businesses are run on investor funding and they spend a lot of money on promotional
activities. It is not new to know that online companies are negative margin businesses. Hitting
breakeven may take years. Sun Touriism is a cash positive business since the beginning.
Promotional activities have a limited budget, and they are targeted to the right customer.

16
 Data analysis
The tourism and hospitality industry has played a significant role in the growth of India. Its contribution
to India's GDP (2018) is 9.2% which is quite noteworthy. Tourism has created more than 4.2 crore jobs,
which is approximately 8.1% of the total employment in India. It grew from $ 172 billion to $ 247.37
billion from 2013 to 2018 at CAGR of 7.3%. The sector is predicted to grow at 7.02%, i.e., from the
size of $ 247.37 billion in 2018 to $ 512 billion in 2029. A direct contribution of travel and tourism to
GDP was $ 87.17 billion in 2016. It has increased to $ 98.17 billion and is further expected to touch
$195 billion in 2028 at CAGR of 7.23%. This figure places India in the world's eighth-ranked country
by the total contribution of travel and tourism.
TOTAL CONTRIBUTION IN BILLION

247.37
185.63
U.S. DOLLARS

268.29
219.72
172.91

232.01
201.43

512
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2029

Figure 1 Total contribution of travel and tourism to GDP in India 2013-2029

DIRECT CONTRIBUTION OF TRAVEL AND TOURISM TO GDP

US $ Billion
194.69
87.17

98.17
91.27

2016 2017 2018 2028F

Figure 2 Direct contribution of Travel and Tourism to GDP at Real 2017 prices (US $ billion)

Tourism is a crucial source of foreign exchange. Foreign exchange earning in India stood at the
US $ 27.7 billion in 2018-19

17
 Tourist's activities economic

Travel agents, Tour

Direct Impact
operators, Hotels

Airline, Train, Other

Indirect Impact Transport, Hotel

Arts, F&B, Healthcare,

induced Impact
MICE, Retail, Others

Figure 3 Classification of the impact of Tourist economic activities

How the tourist is based on the above?

1. Direct impact
2. Indirect impact
3. Individual impact
4. All of the above

18
 Sun Tourism - Revenue and Employee Strength
140 30

120 25

100
20
80
15
60
Revenue - million Rs.

Employees Number
10
40

0 0
2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019

Financial years
Employee Revenue - Million Rs.

Mrs. Nishita and Mr. Ashok started Sun Touriism with a capital of Rs. 10 lakhs only. Mr.
Shashikant joined in 2016 as chief financial and marketing head. Before joining Sun Touriism, he
worked with Mondelez International as regional head of the western Indian region of sales and
marketing department.

How many workers were there in Sun Touriism when the company was established?

1. 5
2. 6
3. 9
4. 10

“Ghar Se Ghar Tak” campaign has made an impact on growth. Before 2012, growth was
relatively low, with a CAGR of 11.5%. Revenue grew from Rs. 1.5 Cr in 2008 to Rs. 2.2 Cr in
2012. Till 2015, revenue increased exponentially to Rs.8.6 Cr with a y-o-y growth of 72%. Growth
of Sun Touriism slowed from 2016 onwards. Revenue rose to Rs. 12.5 Cr in 2019. The company has
grown by CAGR of 11.5% from 2015 to 2019.

19
 TAM
Population of Pune City

SAM
Upper Middle Class

SOM
International Tours: age 50+,
families

Domestic Tours: Age 30 to 40.,

families

Figure 5 Target customers of Sun Touriism

As per records of Sun Touriism, nature of clients is as follow.

Sr. Age (Range) Income group (Rs. Destination %

No. Lakhs per annum)
1 50+ 12 + International 65%
2 40-50 18+ International 15%
3 25-40 Up to 6 Domestic 15%
4 20-30 5 to 10 International/ 5%
Honeymoon

Table 1 Sun Touriism's customer

segmentation

20
 Age wise classification of Destination wise
customers classification of
Customers
5%

15% 15%

15%

65%

85%

50+ years 40-50 years 25-40 years 20-30 years International Domestic

Figure 6 Classification of Customers

As targeted by Sun Touriism, 65% of total customers are above 50 years of age. 15% are between
40 years to 50 years, and remaining 20% are below 40 years of age.
After taking 200 customers feedback I got to know Most of the customers above 185 choose an
international destination. It is fair to say that Sun Touriism strength lies in international tours.

In sun tourism what ages customers were there?

a) 50 years
b) 40-50 years
c) 25-40 years
d) 20-30 years
e) All of the above

What kind of mostly tour the customer prefer?

a) International
b) Domestic

21
 Year Customer Group Family Domestic International
Numbers Tours Inbound Tours Tours
Tours Group FIT Group FIT
(FIT) Tours Tours
2009 400 6 44 3 30 3 14
2010 432 6 44 3 30 3 14
2011 450 11 50 5 35 6 15
2012 460 11 52 5 37 6 15
2013 520 14 57 5 20 9 37
2014 822 20 73 9 37 11 36
2015 918 25 73 9 37 16 36
2016 987 29 98 13 53 16 45
2017 1025 31 123 14 59 17 64
2018 1198 38 153 18 63 20 90
2019 1208 38 153 18 63 20 90
Table 2 Tour preferences of the
customers

Customer Preferences: Product Comparison

100

90

80

70

60

50 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019

Domestric Group Tours Domestric FITs International Group Tours International FITs

Figure 7 Product Comparison

Several group tours, both for domestic destinations and international destinations, has increased
steadily. Demand for domestic and international is almost the same. International group tours
have slightly higher consumption than domestic group tours. In the case of FITs, international
tours become more and more famous. In 2019, demand for global FITs was 33% more than the
demand for domestic FITs. We can say that Sun Touriism’s strength lies in international tours.
22
Name Employee Strength Speciality
number
Sun Touriism 30 International Tours High customer retention
No debt. The company owns
all properties.

Veena World 1000+ International Tour 160+ franchisee

Honeymoon Tours Extremely high debt

Kesari Tours 1000+ International Tours A vast network of a

franchisee. 150+ franchisee
located strategically across
India.
Domestic Tours International presence. Two
offices outside India
High debt Company
Wide range of products

Girikand 120+ Domestic tours Leisure Tours

Travels Owns a fleet of cars and buses
Offices at 25 locations
Diversified business

Gurunath 55+ Domestic tours Pilgrim tours

Travels

Table 3 Comparison of Tourism players in Pune

Sr. No Season Destination

1 May to September Europe
North India
United States of America
Southeast Asian countries

2 Nov to March Australia & New Zealand

Southeast Asian countries (Nov- Jan)
South India
North-West India
Middle East (mid-October)

3 April-May Japan
South Africa
Middle east
Table 4 Sun Touriism Season Wise Product Portfolio

23
 Company Name Leh-Ladakh Dubai Tour Europe Tour
8 Days 6 days No of days Price
Sun Touriism 62,000/- 73,000/- 18 2,86,000/-
Veena World 42,000/- (+ 1,02,000/- 15 3,25,000/-
airfare)
Kesari Tours 37,900/- (+ 94,000/- 15 2,81,000/-
airfare)
Girikand Travels 44,000/- (+ 1,03,000/- 18 2,24,000/-
airfare) (+ airfare)
Gurunath Travels 39495/- (+ 49,775/- (+ - -
airfare) airfare)

Table 5 Price comparison

Table 5 compares three products (Group tours) offered by Sun Touriism and competitors. First
is the Leh-Ladakh group tour. Leh Ladakh is a famous tourist destination in India located in
North India. Second is Dubai, which is known as starter international tour. It's a famous
destination for shopping, luxury, adventure and sightseeing. The third is a premium product
offered by all companies that is a Europe tour. Europe is considered as the most beautiful place
to travel. Veena world, Kesari tours and Girikand have multiple products having Europe as a
destination, whereas Sun Touriism is limited with the product range.

Pricing offered by Sun Touriism is very competitive, and tours are inclusive of all. Whereas other
competitors charge visa and airfare extra. (Mentioned in chart wherever applicable). In the case
of domestic tours, price-sensitive customers get a choice of the transport medium (flight or train)
with all competitors except Sun Touriism. If we investigate premium product range, pricing of
Veena and Kesari is 15%-25% more than Sun Touriism and Girikand. It shows that pricing gives
an advantage to Sun Touriism in this domain.

If we compare product range with competitors then Veena, Kesari and Girikand have multiple
products targeting the same destination. For example, competitors offer Europe tours starting
from 5 days to 23 days. All tours have different areas covered and are targeted for a diverse
audience. For the Europe tour, Kesari provides more than 15 varieties, Veena offers 10 to 12
products, and Girikand offers about 8 products. Sun Touriism has less variation, 5 Europe tour
types. In my view, product variation depends on the scale of business. Competitors have access
to considerably a greater number of customers than Sun Touriism. So, group tour gets filled
fast and offering product range is more sensible. In the case of Sun Touriism, footfall is a
relatively low and wide range of product may lead to cancellation of more tours. The scale is a
limitation of Sun Touriism as compared with competitors.

24
 Products Number Based On Product Range
Europe Leh-Ladakh Scale
Sun Touriism 5 3 Low
Veena World 8-10 9 Moderate
Kesari Tours 15+ 11 High
Girikand Travels 5-8 6 Moderate
Girikand - 4 Low

Table 6 Product Range Comparison

Process of Sales

Pre Tour Gathering,

Visa, Flight ticket, hotel Full payment before
Tele calling
15-45 days of tour.
booking

Office Visit - document

Confirmation of needs collection and payment Tour
(50%-75%)

Interest - FIT/Group, Post tour feedback and

Pricing & Itinerary
International/domestic references

Figure 8 Sequence of the Sale process

25
 Channel Product Decision Making Speciality

Exhibitions Group and FIT Very fast -Direct product-direct

customer.
-Gets booking amount
upfront

Campaign Group Fast -Relation building – mutual

trust
-Competitive pricing

Tele Calling FIT Slow -Brand seeding

-Discount based selling

Walk-ins FIT Very Slow -Intent and impact selling

-High margin – low
throughput

Table 7 Sales & Distribution Channels of Sun Touriism

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

Figure 1 shows the flow diagram of the CRM of Sun Touriism. Their CRM model is based on
precise planning, execution excellence, rigorous review, and innovation. Sun Touriism has
acquired a smartphone-based app software. They have designed and developed their software
from a software company based in Gujarat. The purpose of obtaining a smartphone-based app
is to reduce inventory cost (laptops / desktop computers), save space because computer/laptop-
based offices need to have sophisticated offices and the overall easy to use. All employees
working with Sun Touriism are young and can operate smartphones efficiently.

26
 1. Planning

5. 2.

Innovation Operation

4. Review 3. Finance

Figure 9 CRM process of Sun Touriism

The first step of CRM software is planning and data collection. They manage the flow from the
inquiry of the tour to the booking of the trip. During the first inquiry, Sun Touriism sends
messages over the phone or WhatsApp. After a response, they call their customers for
requirements, collect data such as customer's interest, age, specific needs such as food choices.

As per collected data, Sun Touriism does sector analysis in terms of an international tour or
domestic tour and further categorizes it in a specific region. Other differentiation criteria' cover
group tour or family inbound tour (FIT). Group tours generally carry 30-40 people. It has a
fixed itinerary and fixed cost. In contrast, FIT is flexible on both itinerary and number of people
and other parameters. They offer suitable tours to the customers.

For the commercial purpose, Sun Touriism use both CRM software as well as Tally to get
verified financial data. CRM is mostly used to collect money from a customer, and the Tally is
used to maintain financial records.

The fourth step of CRM is a review. Reviews are taken after the tour. Customer is questioned
on parameters like satisfaction, what went wrong, what more is expected etc. These reviews
were brainstormed so that Sun Touriism can delight the customer. And Sun Touriism gives a
gift to customers as a token of appreciation.

27
In innovation, Sun Touriism takes input from feedback and make changes in their choices of
hotels, food, and destinations. For example, if a customer is happy with the selection of the
hotel, then Sun Touriism further investigates to find cheaper hotels of the same or higher
standards.

The CRM software is a package that takes care of almost all essential branches of Sun Touriism.

Market Positioning
4 Product 1
Variation
Quadrant Quadrant

Kesari

VEENA

3 2

Quadrant Quadrant
SUN

Figure 11 Market Position Matrix

According to competitors’ study, Sun Touriism’s pricing is very attractive. It may be because
of a few offices and limited staff as compared with big players who have over 100+ staff.
Operation cost is relatively low for Sun Touriism.

More number of branches gives access to more customers. Kesari and Veena have more than
100 outlets, whereas Girikand has 15+ units. As customers increase, companies introduce more
and more products to satisfy different needs of different customers. Along with it, prices go up.
The reason behind rising prices may be operation costs, higher debts, and higher staff. Sun
Touriism is in 3rd quadrant, and the rest of the big players are in the first quadrant. They should
try to move to the second quadrant. In this process, prices will increase. Efficient operations,
cost-effective tours and exact required staff may keep costs under control. They should have
more products to serve a more extensive customer base and relatively low pricing to gain a
competitive advantage.
28
 Findings from data analysis

• As targeted by Sun Touriism, 65% of total customers are above 50 years of age. 15%
are between 40 years to 50 years, and remaining 20% are below 40 years of age. Most
of the customers above 40 choose an international destination. It is fair to say that Sun
Touriism strength lies in international tours.
• Several group tours, both for domestic destinations and international destinations, has
increased steadily. Demand for domestic and international is almost the same.
International group tours have slightly higher consumption than domestic group tours.
In the case of FITs, international tours become more and more famous. In 2019, demand
for global FITs was 33% more than the demand for domestic FITs. We can say that Sun
Tourism’s strength lies in international tours.

29
 Learning of the Project:
My Learning:

Working with the Sun Touriism was a great learning experience for me during my
summer internship with Sun Touriism Pvt. Ltd. I learn how the tourism sector work

➢ I have learned from this work that the tourism sector is really very good.

➢ I have talked to customers from different ages and prepared them for the tour.

➢ I have learned how to prepare for a tour.

➢ I got to know how to get the documents required for the tour like a passport, visa and
more.

➢ Before going on tour, I have learned about the problems faced by the customers and how
to solve them.

➢ I have Learned time management to complete a tour properly.

➢ I have learned the difference between marketing and selling.

30
 Contribution to the host organization:

➢ My role in sun tourism company was as a sales executive. in this work I have to call the
customers and meet them face to face and introduced our national, international tours
information. Then customers will book their tour packages as their budget. After that I was
carefully processing the document so that the customers will not have any problem.
➢ Customers were enjoying the tour without any hassle as the trip was well planned.
➢ The customers himself was doing word of mouth publicity due to good facilites.so the customers
for this company grew a lot.
➢ My respectful work has helped the company to grow its customers base and increase its profit.
➢ The company has benefited from this Ghar se Ghar Tak scheme.

31
 Conclusions of the Project

During my 45 days tenure as intern. I have experienced the wonders of Sun Touriism Pvt. Ltd.
Through this training I have gained useful tips like good communication skills, customers
behavior, time management, tour package selling target.

I have learned many things such like banking money transactions/online transactions process
like RTGS, NEFT, UPI. Even small-scale business can also provide such facilities as similar
to large scale business.

32
Analysis & Suggestions:

Company Details

▪ Name: Sun Touriism Pvt. Ltd, Pune

▪ Director: Mrs. Nishita Ghatge and Mr. Ashok Malik.
▪ Chief Marketing Officer: Mr. Shashikant Ghatge. (Ex. Regional
Customer Development Manager at Mondelēz International, Mumbai)
▪ Website: https://suntourismpune.wordpress.com/ , https://www.suntourismpune.in
▪ Employee strength: 0-50
▪ Turnover: Rs. 12.5 Cr
▪ Customer Base: 24000
▪ Vision: Loved by customers as a delightful travel partner.
▪ Mission: Think of tourism, think of Sun Touriism.
▪ Values:
o Aggressiveness
o Accountability
o Adaptability.
▪ Short term goals: To be in a list of top three travel companies in Pune till 2025. The
target of reaching 100 Crs revenue by 2025.

I would like to make the following recommendations based on my study.

• Expansion: Target of 100 Crs in five years looks very steep. According to my
understanding, Sun Touriism does not have the infrastructure supporting the targeted
revenue. They need to be aggressive in terms of expansion. They need to open more
branches/offices strategically placed in metro cities. If owners do not want to build debt,
then they can think of renting offices instead of purchasing.
To reach targeted revenue, Sun Touriism needs to grow by 50% annually. It will take
Sun Touriism to a revenue of Rs. 95 Crs. Head branch of Sun Touriism is contributing
60% to the revenue whereas second branch’s contribution is 40%. So, Rs. 7.5 Cr
revenue is coming from head office and Rs. 5 Cr contribution is of the second branch.
Every year, Sun Touriism must add two new offices which can add revenue of ~ Rs. 3
Cr. How this Rs. 3 Cr number came into the picture? By looking at records, Sun
Touriism opened the first branch in 2014. Next year revenue jumped to Rs. 8.6 Crs.
Considering 60-40 breakup of the revenue, a new unit added ~Rs. 3.4 Crs in 2014. In
all, Sun Touriism have to add 10+ offices in the next five years to reach near the target.
I would like the founders to consider the option of having debts with Sun Touriism. The
tourism industry, as a whole, is the high debt industry.

• Customer growth: Achieving 50% growth is not an easy task. Sun Touriism has to
increase customer base. Profile of the targeted customer matches with employees
working in the IT industry. Typical software engineer with age 40+ earns Rs. 20 Lakhs

33
 annually. (Industry standard is experience X 1.5 = Annual Salary, in Lakhs) Sun
Touriism can have access to the broader customer base through the IT industry. They
can tie up with software companies such as Infosys, Cognizant, Persistent, TCS etc.
similar model to restaurants. Restaurants offer 5%-10% discount to employees of IT
companies which has tied up with the restaurant. This discount can be availed just by
showing the company's ID card and Govt. ID card. It will help increasing customer base
swiftly.

• Loyalty Program: Sun Touriism should keep revisiting customers in focus. About 70%
of customers are retained. It is a very high standard. In the expansion process, retention
may go down. It is because founder members cannot manage all tours if the scale
increases. It may impact quality. This possibility cannot be ignored. So, Sun Touriism
should start a loyalty program as a preventive measure. In this program, they should
offer some benefits, which may be non-cash benefits, to the customers who have
travelled with Sun Touriism for consecutive years. Criteria can be defined in terms of
cost. For example, a customer who has contributed more than Rs. 1.5 lakh in successive
years and travelled more than once with Sun Touriism can get these benefits. Benefits
include annual gathering followed by dinner or 5% discount for the next tour. It will
boost customer morale and help retain customers in the phase of expansion.
• Brand Penetration: Competitors like Veena World, Girikand and Kesari Tours have
greater brand recognition because of more extensive reach, intensive advertising, and
attractive offices. The expansion will bring networking effect and increase brand
recognition. Sun Touriism also needs to understand that while serving to a premium
customer, offices should be recognized from a distance. They should have big LED
name boards over the shops and modern offices to serve the customers. Ambience and
aesthetics play an essential role in the psychology of people.
• Mini Stalls: Big shopping malls like Phoenix, In orbit, Pavilion attract sophisticated
customers during the festive season. During the festive season, Sun Touriism can opt
to have mini-shops in such malls. Small places for mini-shops in malls are available for
rent daily. It's affordable to place a mini stall for 10-15 days. Indian people, usually, go
on a trip during or after the festive season and in December. Mini stalls will increase
customer flow, brand penetration and awareness. It may play a vital role in the near
future.

34
 References

➢ Research report: Outlook of the tourism industry in India, 2019.

April 2019 By Frost and Sullivan.

➢ Research report: Tourism and Hospitality. June 2020.

By Indian Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF).

➢ Statistics: World Population Review, Pune Population, 2020.

➢ Article-Hindustan times

Websites

➢ https://www.kesari.in/
➢ https://gurunathtravels.co.in/
➢ http://www.girikand.com/
➢ https://www.veenaworld.com/

➢ http://www.suntourismpune.in/

pg. 35
 Annexure:
Questionnaire

1. Whom are you travelling with?

o Friends
o Colleagues
o Family
o Travelling alone

2. Who made your travel schedule?

o Self-made
o Tailored by travel agency
o Adopted an existing schedule from travel agency

3. How long will you stay in destinations?

o 1-3 days
o 4-6 days
o 7-9 days
o 9+ days

4. What is your budget allegation for the trip? (Per person)

o Less than 50,000 ₹
o 1,00,000—2,00,000 ₹
o More than 2,00,000 ₹

5.What food would you prefer while travelling in Maharashtra?

o Veg/non-veg
o Maharashtrian Thali
o Other

pg. 36