Chapter 4 - Experience Economy
Chapter 4 - Experience Economy
Chapter 4 - Experience Economy
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
The student must be able to:
Economic development normally carries with its cultural development. Economic and
scientific advancement transforms the culture of the nation. The First Wave civilization has the
agricultural feudal culture; the Second Wave civilization has the industrial modern culture, while
the Third Wave civilization has the postindustrial postmodern culture. The Philippines right now
is basically a First Wave (agricultural) country that experiences elements of a Third Wave
civilization. That is why it appears logical for this country to shift or “pole-vault” from the First
Wave to the Third Wave civilization.
4.1 Experience
as Product
Increasing competition in the market means that “goods and services are no longer
enough” and that producers must differentiate their products by transforming them into
“experiences” which engage the consumer. An experience can be considered a product since it
must be produced or staged to be made available. Experiences represent an existing but
previously unarticulated genre of economic output that have the potential to distinguish business
offerings. Elements that make up an experience including those elements that render an
experience meaningful.
Experiences are even more immaterial and intangible than services since the users must
be more engaged than in services because the experience takes place in their minds, being the
customer a co-producer. The aim of services is to solve the customers’ problems, the
experience industry seeks to give the customers what can be defined as a mental journey
(people may experience the same performance in different ways).
Pine and Gilmore (1999) take “the experience” beyond the provision of goods and
services to the recognition of experience as a distinct economic offering. As an economic
offering, experiences can add value to a business’s goods and services and are distinct from
both. Economic actors gain an advantage in the market by staging and selling memorable
experiences that are enjoyable and personally engaging the customer.
The customer who buys a service buys a set of intangible activities carried out on his/her
behalf. The purchase of an experience, on the other hand, buys time enjoying a series of
memorable events that engage the consumer in a personal way. Examples of experience are
sport, art, and culture (the theatre, film, music, TV, etc.), museums, tourism, gastronomy, design
and architecture, computer games, entertainment on mobile phones, and advertising.
The “cultural sector” is non-reproducible and aimed at being consumed on the spot (a
concert, an art fair, an exhibition) and mass-dissemination and export (a book, a film, a sound
recording). The “creative sector” may also enter into the production process of other economic
sectors and become a “creative” input in the production of non-cultural goods.
Bille and Lorenzen (2008) reached a tentative demarcation of the experience economy
by defining 3 areas:
1. Creative experience areas (areas that have experience as the primary goal
and where artistic creativity is essential to its production). For example, theatre, music,
visual arts, literature, film, computer games.
2. Experience areas (areas that have experience as the primary goal, but where
artistic creativity is not essential). For example, museums, libraries, cultural heritage
sites, natural and green areas, restaurants, the pornography industry, spectator sports.
3. Creative areas (areas where artistic creativity is essential but which do not
have experience as a primary goal: they are not intended directly for the consumer
market but instead provide services to business (B2B), which are built into or around
mixed products). For example, design, architecture, advertising.
Culture Experiences
From the merger between culture and business, a new kind of economy is growing. An
economy that is based on an increasing demand for experiences and that builds upon the
added value that creativity lends to both new and traditional products and services (Danish
government report, 2003). At the same time, it expresses a general expectation that the
experience economy will grow: that the culture and experience economy has come into focus,
both at home and abroad, correlates closely with the fact that it is a field that is increasingly
expanding within the economy. (Government, 2003).
KEYWORDS
REFERENCES:
Bill, Trine (2010). The Nordic approach to the Experience Economy – does it make sense?.
Copenhagen Business School. Retrieved from
<https://research.cbs.dk/files/58952160/44_TB_The_Nordic_Approach_to_Experience_Ec
onomy_Does_it_make_Sense_Final.pdf>
Pine, B.J. and J.H. Gilmore (1999). The Experience Economy – Work is Theatre & Every
Business a Stage, Harvard Business School Press, Boston Mass.
Ramos, Luis Moura (n.d.). The Experience Economy and Local Development. University of
Coimbra. Retrieved from
<http://www.creative-heritage.eu/creative-heritage.eu/Luis_Moura_Ramos_The_experienc
e_economy_and_local_developmentf38e.pdf?eID=tx_nawsecuredl&u=0&file=uploads/
secure/mit_download/
Luis_Moura_Ramos_The_experience_economy_and_local_development.pdf&t=1438425
615&hash=89b76a07c7ebf1feee68f381b6d634eb>