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424 paid vacation
dation, offered for sale for a period of more than
twenty-four hours �Middleton 1994).
Package tours were originated in the 1850s by
Thomas Cook. The idea evolved rapidly after the
1950s when air transport made travel quicker and
more affordable. Package tours can be independent
for individuals, but frequently are organised for
groups. They are categorised by the main transportation
used, such as coach, train, boat or
airplane �both scheduled and charter). Tour
operators or wholesalers sell their package tours
directly or through a retailer. Travel agencies
retail tour operators' packages and create independent
package tours for individuals. In Europe,
package tours refer mainly to overseas destinations,
travelling on charter flights for a fixed period,
typically one to two weeks.
Package tours offer several benefits to both
consumers and the industry. For the former, tours
maximise security and offer guidance, while
facilitating the information seeking and reservation
processes. The optimisation of operations
reduces costs, often at the expense of quality,
making travel affordable. For the principals,
package tours enhance their distribution and
promotion mix, and reduce operational risk and
seasonality problems. However, they present
several disadvantages, mainly because they encourage
mass tourism. They stimulate large-scale
development and jeopardise the sustainability of
resources of destinations. Intermediaries also
tend to lead consumers to products and destinations
where they can maximise their profit
margins. Tourists' contact with the destination
and hosts becomes artificial or staged. Intermediaries
concentrate bargaining power which they
utilise to reduce principals' prices, resulting in low
profitability and economic benefits at the destination
�Buhalis 1994).
Future trends in this area include the improvement
of quality and the growth of thematic
tours. However there is a trend towards individualisation,
and towards greater satisfaction of
consumers' needs. This is facilitated by information
technology, which enables consumers to
identify and package suitable products themselves
and thus threatens a certain degree of disintermediation
in the distribution channel.
References
Buhalis, D. �1994) `Information and telecommunications
technologies as a strategic tool for small
and medium tourism enterprises in the contemporary
business environment', in A. Seaton et
al. �eds), Tourism:The State of the Art, Chichester:
Wiley, 254±75.
Middleton, V. �1994) Marketing in Travel and Tourism,
2nd edn, London: Butterworth-Heinemann.
Further reading
Cooper, C., Fletcher, J., Gilbert, D., Shepherd, R.
and Wanhill, S. �eds) �1998) Tourism:Principles and
Practice, 2nd edn, London: Addison-Wesley.
Laws, E. �1997) Managing Packaged Tourism, London:
International Thomson Publishing.
Sheldon, P. �1994) `Tour operators', in S. Witt and
L. Moutinho �eds), Tourism Marketing and Management
Handbook, 2nd edn, London: Prentice Hall,
399±403.
paid vacation
DIMITRIOS BUHALIS, UK
The growth, during the twentieth century, of the
practice of employers providing their employees
with vacation with pay has been a key component
in the expansion of tourism in Western societies.
Paid vacations have fuelled the growth in volume of
tourism as well as its democratisation. Until the
early twentieth century, paid vacations of one or
two weeks per year were generally limited to the
professional middle classes. For manual workers,
the practice was limited to a few individual
employers or industrial sectors.
The critical period for the acceptance of the
principle of paid vacations came between the two
world wars. In the United Kingdom, two main
phases can be identified as the years immediately
after 1917, and immediately before and during the
Second World War. These phases coincided
generally with trade cycle booms, but also required
constant pressure from workers' unions. Whereas
in the early 1920s one million manual workers had
paid holiday provision, by 1938 this had risen to
four million and by 1945 ten million workers had