On 31/03/2012 08:36, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at
18:14:49 on Fri, 30 Mar 2012, Arthur Figgis
remarked:
On 30/03/2012 17:16, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 15:32:47 on Fri, 30
Mar 2012, Graeme Wall remarked:
The figures I saw were 20%, it wasn't clear whether that was absolute
or another 20% over and above those who would normally go abroad at
that time.

ABTA's report said:

"Escaping the crowds

Clearly we are not all sports lovers, 12% of Brits say they are
intending to go abroad specifically to avoid the Games and 9% are
looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free from Olympics fever.
The older generation appears to be the least keen on staying in the UK;
with 22% of the over 65s intending to head overseas to avoid the Games
and 18% of 55-64 year olds.

Londoners most likely to change plans

Perhaps unsurprisingly, over a quarter (28%) of Londoners are
considering changing their holiday plans due to the Olympics. Nearly 50%
say they will take time off throughout the games and 77% say they will
be staying in the Capital during the two weeks.

Do such figures have any credibility whatsoever?

Have you ever been involved in market research?

Depends what you mean by... I get to see an awful lot of it, and have
discussions with marketing types about whether any useful info can be
extracted from their data.

I was market researched last night. I was asked which things I would
associate with a particular politician. The options were something like
"a) making the trains run on time b) abolishing all crime c) magic beans
for every hard-working British family d) not being an evil newt-loving
terrorist-hugger who wants to squish women and children with nasty
bendybuses". I'm not sure that whatever results they will get from this
would have been accepted as entirely valid for the A-level maths course
I did.

A while back I was surveyed about drinking habits (I had to ask for more
paper). Real ale wasn't an option on the list, so the lady said "given
your age, we'll just put you down as a lager drinker".

They don't just pull numbers out of a hat.

Depends who "they" are.

At work I've had market research types be genuinely surprised when I've
mentioned that 84% of statistics are made up.

Nor would they claim that a figure like "22%" is
accurate between 21.9% and 22.1%, but 22% is an awful lot of people
(about 15 million) and needs to be taken seriously.

Depends what the questions were, and who was asked.

I intend to be taking my private jet to my own tropical island, but
I'm having some slight problems with an intermediate stage in this plan.

And even so, "9% are looking to go on holiday somewhere in the UK free
from Olympics fever." That somewhere could include London, which
wouldn't really help the transport situation...

In this context the whole of London is tarred with "Olympic Fever",

In that case the numbers are clearly broken...

as
are several other locations, like Weymouth.


--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK