Using value equity drivers to understand parents’ perspectives of youth summer Hockey camps: an importance-performance analysis

ABSTRACT Like many sports, ice hockey has become subject to year-round participation; here, many summer hockey camp operators compete against each other for consumers (players). Using Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA) and Customer Equity (CE) theory, where customer acquisition and retention are the foundational concepts, the purpose of the research was twofold. First, the aim was to understand what Value Equity (VE) drivers are most important to parents when deciding to register their child for a summer hockey camp. A second goal was to ascertain if summer hockey camp operators are performing to the level of importance ascribed to those factors, as determined by parents of camp attendees. Surveys with 148 parents, who registered their child in a summer hockey camp in the Niagara Region of Ontario, Canada, were used in order to complete the IPA. The findings indicate that parents deem ‘quality’ factors, versus elements of convenience and/or price, as both ‘most important’ and ‘most in need of managerial attention’.