16 November 1992 Student Property Marketing Exercise a Success

A student marketing exercise for a subdivision in Christchurch's Mount Pleasant area has been praised by Harcourts Sales Consultant Bill Kridle.

The Lincoln University students of Valuation, Real Estate and Property Management carried out a "real life" marketing exercise as a course assignment. It was marked by the subdivision developers, Mt Pleasant Estates Company, and the real estate firm responsible for the development, Harcourts Grenadier.

Working in teams and to a set budget of $10,000, the students had to prepare full scale marketing plans covering everything from the sale of sections, the provision of street names, and the researching of a socio-economic profile of potential buyers, to the preparation of brochures and the devising of a newspaper and radio advertising campaign.

Mr Kridle praised the work of all the teams and said the exercise was very difficult to judge because of the uniformly high standard. Three or four of the groups had really excelled themselves.

"We got good ideas from almost everyone and we will incorporate a number of the points into our own marketing strategy," he said.

The winning team comprised Mark Taylor, Adam Sadgrove and Koh Harn In. All are second year Bachelor of Commerce and Management students. Miss Koh is from Malaysia.

"What made them stand out was their presentation – it was excellent and likewise the ideas they had in their brochure," said Mr Kridle.

The 75 students taking part had two weeks in which to complete their assignments. The value and success of the "real life" assignment has encouraged Lincoln and Harcourts to carry out another one in the future.

Ian Collins, Journalist, Lincoln University, Canterbury, New Zealand.