Welch – BUS SERVICES PUBLICITY INCREASES REVENUE 1983

Description

Northamptonshire County Council and United Counties Omnibus Co. tested a high-quality publicity leaflet for Kettering to improve awareness and ridership. Noting many people lack timetables and information on services beyond their local stops, the leaflet combined inter-urban maps, estate maps with stops, town-service timetables, journey times, fares and long-distance links. Color-coding distinguished AM/PM times and a map-based layout was used for local routes. Twenty thousand copies were distributed; follow-up surveys of 330 passengers showed high retention and usability—78% found the inter-urban timetable easy to use and 63% preferred it to conventional timetables. Passenger feedback was largely positive. Revenue monitoring comparing pre- and post-distribution periods found town-service fares up 4% (≈£520 per eight weeks) and inter-urban up 0.8% (≈£1,250 per eight weeks); publicity cost £1,350. While not replacing detailed timetables, the experiment showed that well-designed publicity can increase ridership and is cost-effective, with lessons being applied elsewhere.