Executive Summary
A two-question survey was run to explore interest in a “self-bagging” option (i.e., travelers tag and check their bags in without agent assistance) among U.S. airport travelers. The survey ran in U.S. airports and hotels from June 7-8, 2012 and generated 3,884 total responses.
Questions
The two survey questions were positioned on a single, unbranded page, above the fold. Each respondent saw both questions. Layout was specific to each device (mobile, laptop, tablet, etc), and all device types were included in the survey group.
The questions were:
1) Are you traveling for work or pleasure?
- Work
- Pleasure
2) How would you feel about airports making a change to a "self-bagging" system, where you would print out and attach your luggage tags to your suitcases and then drop them off on a conveyor belt (no interaction with any agents) before going through security?
- Very positive
- Somewhat positive
- Neutral
- Somewhat negative
- Very negative
Results
Responses were gathered from 3,884 participants at 180+ hotels across the United States and Cloud Nine partner hotels and airports in Charlotte (CLT), Oakland (OAK), and West Palm Beach (PBI), from June 7-8, 2012.
Travelers were almost evenly split in terms of whether they were out for business-related (49.5%) or recreational (50.5%) purposes.
Responses to the proposed “self-bagging” option for checking in bags at the airport were predominantly “Neutral” (35.7%) to positive, with “Somewhat positive” garnering 22.8% of the votes and “Very positive,” 20.6. “Somewhat negative” received 11.6% of the votes and “Very negative,” 9.3%.
Comparative results from the two questions showed a common trend. In both cases, Neutral received the largest share of responses, followed by Somewhat positive and then Very positive.
Comparative results to Questions 1 and 2 – Opinions on self-bagging, Work vs. Pleasure
|
Very positive |
Somewhat positive |
Neutral |
Somewhat negative |
Very negative |
|
|
Work |
21.7% |
22.2% |
34.9% |
11.5% |
9.7% |
|
Pleasure |
19.5% |
23.4% |
36.6% |
11.7% |
8.8% |
Responses to the self-bagging question, separated out by work/pleasure. Trend is common
between the two groups – neutral received the largest percentage of responses in both
categories, followed by somewhat positive and very positive.
Consideration of the results by property type (Economy, Midscale, Upscale) and device type (Laptop, iPhone, Android, etc.) evidenced the same trends as the data above. In other words, there was no significant difference in the likelihood of people at one versus another type of property, or using one versus another type of device, in terms of their feelings about a self-bagging option at the airport.
Another breakdown of responses was done for only airport travelers – that is, people who took the survey while actually at the airport. These 1,391 people, clearly, would have the airport bag check-in process very fresh in their minds. Here there was an increase in the percentage of Somewhat positive and Very positive responses, at 23.2% and 26.5%, respectively.
Conclusion
Overall, results show that people have neutral to positive feelings about the implementation of a “self-bagging” baggage check-in system at the airport. The proportion of travelers rating the idea Neutral, Somewhat positive, or Very positive was slightly larger among travelers at the airport at the time of taking the survey versus those at airports/hotels combined. No appreciable differences were seen between people traveling for Work versus Pleasure, or based on property tier or device type used to connect to WiFi at the time of taking the survey.
About the survey provider:
Cloud Nine Media lets advertisers trade free WiFi access for 30 seconds of positive, brand-safe engagement with tens of millions of tech-savvy travelers each year in thousands of premium airport, hospitality and retail locations worldwide; http://www.cloudnine.com/.
