...Final Assignment Case Study Aldi store originated in 1913 and is one of Germany’s leading store chains. It was created by the Albriet brothers. Aldi stores corporation has various names such as Aldi, Hofer, and Combi. There are approximately 5400 stores worldwide. The Aldi stores are located in the following countries, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Austria, France, United States, and the United Kingdom. Currently there are 20,000 Aldi employees worldwide. In 1993 the sales for the Aldi Group was 21 billion dollars. Aldi has been known as one of the top competitors in the global retail markets. Product and branding strategies Approximately 90% of Aldi’s products are under their own brand, which means that the can and dry goods are produced by local manufacturers and then re-labeled under a generic name. Aldi takes pride in only supplying 500 – 1000 items at any given time in their store. They take pride in keeping the stores lean and bare minimum selling primarily frozen foods, fresh vegetables and canned goods. Pricing strategies Pricing is very important to Aldi stores, they utilize the Market Penetration Pricing strategy which means that they set the price of a product or service as low as possible to facilitate rapid sales of the goods and services. Market Penetration Pricing strategy is used primarily with new product introductions. Aldi takes pride in having their products 30% cheaper than their competitors. Lean Production Aldi takes pride...
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...* APP update for ALDI * ` * Executive Summary This report involves how information system solves the issues experienced by a leading global supermarket chain and how the proposed plan will be enforced its targets of capturing more market shares and increasing company’s profits. Firstly, our team will describe the main problems to be confronted by ALDI. Then the goals and objectives of the project will be clarified, and the crucial factor for business future development is also listed. The following sector offers a full view of the business case. Specifically, this part contains the reasons and motivations for exploiting the new project, and the business case organizer. Additionally, the relevant environment conditions are described from several aspects in detail. Meanwhile, the current situation and opportunities are analyzed via SWOT model. After that a detailed description of assumption and obstacles about present condition and future projects is shown. Next, we provide two feasible options for ALDI, and we adopts several elements and methods to weigh both options. Then a constructive and enforceable recommendation and opinion is given through previous analysis. Finally, the implementation strategy of project will be identified briefly. * 1. Introduction Nowadays, online shopping in brick-and-mortar stores is a common consumer practice. Mobile devices, especially smart phones, have become a key tool for web shoppers (Turban, Volonino and R. Wood...
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...Industry & Competitor Analysis BUS 630 – Spring 2008 Instructor: Email: Office Hrs: Course page: Russell Coff (www.bus.emory.edu/rcoff/) Russ_Coff@bus.emory.edu by appointment www.bus.emory.edu/rcoff/Bus630.html Phone: (404) 727-0526 FAX: (404) 727-6313 Revised 1/22/08 Course Overview and Objectives This course delves deeper into some strategy topics that you may have only touched upon earlier related to how firms gain a competitive advantage over rivals. In addition, since ICA tends to integrate quantitative and qualitative analysis more than other courses, you will have the opportunity to apply knowledge and skills you've gained across the curriculum (e.g., from finance, ISOM, Marketing, O&M, and Strategy). Building Competitive Advantage The broad focus of the course is on building competitive advantage with special emphasis on how firms can gain access to new resources or capabilities that may grant a competitive edge. We explore strategic investments that are required to compete effectively in uncertain and turbulent environments. Managers often throw up their hands and argue that planning isn’t useful when the landscape is shifting rapidly. However, with the right set of tools, strategic management can have an even greater impact in this setting. We place special emphasis on competitive advantages that stem from valuable and hard-toimitate resources or capabilities. Accordingly, we will focus much of our energy on the question of how to build, acquire or ally to gain...
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...Wal-Mart Case Study Introduction Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. is the largest retailer in the world and also the world’s largest private employee. One can walk into almost any Wal-Mart Supercenter and get a haircut, buy groceries, cash a check, get an exam with prescription glasses or contact lenses, fill medical prescriptions, or even have your car’s oil changed and tires rotated. Wal-Mart is able to provide all these services to consumers around the globe while offering more choices or varieties, while almost always offering better prices than there competitors. Since Wal-Mart is the world’s largest private employees, they are probably the most scrutinized company in the world. This is probably because of the high amount of part-time employees, or the public’s negative perception that they “squeeze their suppliers”, or because they are “killers of mom and pop stores”. This paper will attempt to discuss threats and challenges that Wal-Mart faces while also discussing the different strategies and initiatives that the Wal-Mart management team used to meet those challenges and neutralize threats. History Wal-Mart was founded by Sam Walton and the first Wal-Mart store opened in 1962 in Rogers, Arkansas. Less than ten years later, Wal-Mart had 38 stores operating with 1,500 employees and sales of $44.2 million. It began trading stock as a publicly held company on October 1, 1970, and was soon listed on the New York Stock Exchange (Wikipedia, 2012). Wal-Mart now has stores all over the...
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...Wal-Mart Case Study Elijah Anthony, Jr MNGT 5650 Feb. 11, 2012 Introduction Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. is the largest retailer in the world and also the world’s largest private employee. One can walk into almost any Wal-Mart Supercenter and get a haircut, buy groceries, cash a check, get an exam with prescription glasses or contact lenses, fill medical prescriptions, or even have your car’s oil changed and tires rotated. Wal-Mart is able to provide all these services to consumers around the globe while offering more choices or varieties, while almost always offering better prices than there competitors. Since Wal-Mart is the world’s largest private employees, they are probably the most scrutinized company in the world. This is probably because of the high amount of part-time employees, or the public’s negative perception that they “squeeze their suppliers”, or because they are “killers of mom and pop stores”. This paper will attempt to discuss threats and challenges that Wal-Mart faces while also discussing the different strategies and initiatives that the Wal-Mart management team used to meet those challenges and neutralize threats. History Wal-Mart was founded by Sam Walton and the first Wal-Mart store opened in 1962 in Rogers, Arkansas. Less than ten years later, Wal-Mart had 38 stores operating with 1,500 employees and sales of $44.2 million. It began trading stock as a publicly held company on October 1, 1970, and was soon...
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...challenge of too many competitors, partly originated by the globalisation, all competing for same objective of making highest profit. So, increasingly companies are not merely asking themselves the management question of ‘Are we doing the right?’ but are having to regularly ask ‘Are we still doing it right?’ They have been seeking a more holistic means of doing this than traditional means of delivering products and services to the customers. In a volatile world, decision makers need options on the future and the ability to change direction as strategic opportunities. Although, business as usual (BAU) performance change is providing a short term success but they are typically faced with a less than perfect processes to make investments. In this case analysis, we are trying to summarise the current situation facing the firm by analysing the general environment, industry, competitor, swot analysis with the recommendation and conclusion. 2.0 External Environmental Analysis Wal-Mart is a household name in the retailing industry. It is one of the few companies that have managed to...
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...IntMk-CStud-4.qxd 26/05/2005 14:05 Page 563 section 4 case studies cases 4.1 Wal-Mart’s German Misadventure 4.2 Handl Tyrol: Market Selection and Coverage Decisions of a Medium-sized Austrian Enterprise 4.3 Blair Water Purifiers to India 4.4 A Tale of Two Tipples 4.5 Kellogg’s Indian Experience 4.6 Strategic Alliances in the Global Airline Industry: from Bilateral Agreements to Integrated Networks 4.7 GN Netcom in China 4.8 IKEA: Entering Russia 4.9 The ‘David Beckham’ Brand 563 571 574 583 586 590 594 599 604 case 4.1 Wal-Mart’s German Misadventure I don’t think that Wal-Mart did their homework as well as they should have. Germany is Europe’s most pricesensitive market. Wal-Mart underestimated the competition, the culture, the legislative environment. — Steve Gotham, retail analyst, Verdict Retail Consulting, October 20021 We screwed up in Germany. Our biggest mistake was putting our name up before we had the service and low prices. People were disappointed. — John Menzer, head of Wal-Mart International December 20012 ‘Don’t look now:’ low prices all year round! With thanks to Walmart 563 IntMk-CStud-4.qxd 26/05/2005 14:06 Page 564 section 6 case studies section 4 German blues For the world’s largest retailing company, Wal-Mart, Inc., the German market was proving difficult to crack. By 2003, even after five years of having entered Germany, Wal-Mart was making losses. Though Wal-Mart did not reveal these figures, analysts estimated...
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...Journal of Economic Geography 7 (2007) pp. 451–469 Advance Access Published on 14 May 2007 doi:10.1093/jeg/lbm010 Barriers to ‘US style’ lean retailing: the case of Wal-Mart’s failure in Germany Susan Christophersonà Abstract Wal-Mart’s exit from the German market in 2006 after 10 years of attempting to achieve sustainable competitive advantage contributes an interesting case to the small but expanding literature on ‘failure’ in international investment. The work on the disinvest decision in all its forms has been critical to a re-conceptualization of the international investment process as dynamic rather than static, linear and inexorable. An important segment of the work on investment and disinvestment as dynamic processes focuses on the environment in which investment and disinvestment decisions evolve. While the environment of the host country market has begun to be examined, the market environment of the country in which the retail transnational corporation (TNC) originates also affects the international disinvestment process. To explore this ‘home country effect’, I examine the resources Wal-Mart brought into the German market and their ability to use those resources in the German context. WalMart’s resources were shaped by the market governance regime in which the firm evolved, and not insignificantly, over which it had and has influence. Within this theoretical frame, Wal-Mart’s reliance on the resources of network dominance and autonomous action that made for...
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...britain ’s bruisin g banana wars Why ch threat eap bananas Policy en farmers’ report future s A Fairtrade Foundation Report February 2014 When I sell a box of bananas it’s a product with quality, with incredible taste, so it should be fair that you pay a fair price for it. Horatio Hernandez Coobafrio Co-operative, Magdalena, Colombia January 2014 contents 1 Introduction 4 2 6 Executive Summary Britain’s Bruising Banana Wars 16 16 20 21 4 The banana value chain 4.1 The UK banana market 4.2 The retail price of bananas in Britain 4.3 UK banana imports 2002 – 2013 4.4 Changes in banana supply chain operations 4.5 The impact of supermarket price wars on producers 4.6 Producer prices vs costs of sustainable production 22 22 23 5 The market environment for bananas 5.1 Evolution of the global banana trade 5.2 Consolidation of retailer power and UK price wars 5.3 The impact of competition law on banana prices 38 6 Fairtrade’s alternative approach 6.1 General background to the Fairtrade system 6.2 Fairtrade bananas – scope and scale 6.3 airtrade: the benefits and F constraints for farmers and workers 2 3 About this report 3.1 Fairtrade’s involvement in bananas 3.2 Research objectives and approach 3.3 Methodological note 7 Achieving a sustainable banana industry 7.1 inclusive market An ...
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...Week 1 Question 1 Welcome to our Week 1 Discussions! To get us started, let's consider the following questions. 1) Would a traditional income statement differ depending on whether the business is a service organization, merchandiser, or manufacturer? 2) Could we use managerial accounting tools to assess the profitability of an organization other than a manufacturing business, or are the topics that we are learning only related to manufacturing? 3) If we could use these concepts in service and/or merchandising businesses, how would we go about doing so? Let's start with the first question. According to Casteele (2013), income statements are important to most business. It allows owners, managers, and shareholders to see how money is flowing into the company. This article also stated that service and manufacturing companies have several differences between their statements since the businesses have different types of expenses and different income sources. The article further explains, businesses adapt their income statements to their needs based upon the industry the business is in. A business in the service industry could not use the same income statement template as manufacturing industry businesses, because of the significant differences in how the businesses operate and earn money. Casteele, J. (2013). The Difference Between Service and Manufacturing Income Statements. Retrieved from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/difference-between-service-manufacturing-income-statements-34551...
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...Best Retail Brands Founded in 1974, Interbrand is one of the world’s largest branding consultancies. With nearly 40 offices in 26 countries, Interbrand’s combination of rigorous strategy, analytics and world-class design enables it to assist clients in creating and managing brand value effectively across all touchpoints in all market dynamics. Interbrand is widely recognized for its Best Global Brands report, the definitive guide to the world’s most valuable brands, as well as its Best Global Green Brands report which identifies the gap between customer perception and a brand’s performance relative to sustainability. It is also known for having created www.Brandchannel.com, an international online exchange and resource about brand marketing and branding. For more information on Interbrand, visit www.Interbrand.com. For more than 30 years we have been creating retail brand experiences for companies around the world. Interbrand Design Forum’s talent for game-changing innovation spurred us to create a business model that integrates analytics-based strategy into what began as a design and architecture group — the first and only company with such a comprehensive offering. Our broad range of services includes: retail design, brand strategy, shopper sciences, packaging, digital, documentation and rollout. This unique ability to address retail’s growing complexity has led many of the world’s top companies to our doorstep and propelled Interbrand Design Forum to the forefront of...
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...Context: 1. Introduction 2 2. Background of Wal-Mart stores Inc. 3 3. Retail organization internatinalization expension 4 4. International Expansion of Wal-Mart in Maxico,china and canada 5 5. Comparison of Entry Modes 6 6. comparison of Opportunities 7 7. Final touch 8 8. Conclusion 9 9.Bibliography 10 1. Introduction: Being present and having to enter foreign markets is for many companies natural, while for other it is a new challenge that they have to face. This challenge, known as market entry, consists of three major decisions: where to enter, when to enter and how to enter different markets. Some companies are forced to internationalize in the early stages of their life due to small saturated home markets, while other companies choose to go abroad because of the great opportunities new markets might bring (Peng, 2006). Once deciding to go abroad and choosing the target market and timing, companies' need to consider the choice of entry modes. Generally, to choose international firm there are six different entry modes: exporting, turnkey projects, licensing, franchising, joint ventures, wholly owned subsidiary (Hill, 2004). Each entry mode its distinctive characteristics (see, e.g., Hill, 2004; Hill, et al, 1990; Hill and kim, 1988; Anderson and Gatignon, 1986; Madhok, 1997; Brouthers and Brouthers, 2000; Bishop 2006. Selecting a suitable entry mode is a difficult decision for firms interested in entering a foreign market (Agarwal and Ramaswami, 1992). Sometimes...
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...Communicating Strategically In the first chapter, we examined the changing environment for business over the last half century. In this chapter, we explore how these changes have affected corporate communication and why it has become imperative for modern companies to communicate strategically. Strategic communication can be defined as “communication aligned with the company’s overall strategy, [intended] to enhance its strategic positioning.”1 An effective strategy should encourage a company to send messages that are “clear and understandable, true and, communicated with passion, strategically repetitive and repeated, [and] consistent (across constituencies).” We begin this chapter with a summary of the basic theory behind all communication, whether individual or organizational in nature. We will also briefly discuss influential models in modern communication theory. Although many communication experts have adapted these theories to help leaders communicate in writing and speaking, few have looked at how these same basic theories apply in the corporate communication context—that is, the way organizations communicate with various groups of people. Communication, more than any other subject in business, has implications for everyone within an organization—from the newest administrative assistant to the CEO. Thanks in part to important strategy work by academics such as Michael Porter, Gary Hamel, and C. K. Prahalad, most managers have learned to think strategically...
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...C H A P T E R T W O Communicating Strategically In the first chapter, we examined the changing environment for business over the last half century. In this chapter, we explore how these changes have affected corporate communication and why it has become imperative for modern companies to communicate strategically. Strategic communication can be defined as “communication aligned with the company’s overall strategy, [intended] to enhance its strategic positioning.”1 An effective strategy should encourage a company to send messages that are “clear and understandable, true and, communicated with passion, strategically repetitive and repeated, [and] consistent (across constituencies).” We begin this chapter with a summary of the basic theory behind all communication, whether individual or organizational in nature. We will also briefly discuss influential models in modern communication theory. Although many communication experts have adapted these theories to help leaders communicate in writing and speaking, few have looked at how these same basic theories apply in the corporate communication context—that is, the way organizations communicate with various groups of people. Communication, more than any other subject in business, has implications for everyone within an organization—from the newest administrative assistant to the CEO. Thanks in part to important strategy work by academics such as Michael Porter, Gary Hamel, and C. K. Prahalad, most managers have...
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...Developing Pricing Strategies and Programs Price is the one element of the marketing mix that produces revenue; the other elements produce costs. Prices are perhaps the easiest element of the marketing program to adjust; product features, channels, and even communications take more time. Price also communicates to the market the company’s intended value positioning of its product or brand. A well-designed and marketed product can command a price premium and reap big profits. But new economic realities have caused many consumers to pinch pennies, and many companies have had to carefully review their pricing strategies as a result. For its entire century-and-a-half history, Tiffany’s name has connoted diamonds and luxury. Tiffany designed a pitcher for Abraham Lincoln’s inaugural, made swords for the Civil War, introduced sterling silver to the United States, and designed the “E Pluribus Unum” insignia that adorns $1 bills as well as the Super Bowl and NASCAR trophies. A cultural icon—its Tiffany Blue color is even trademarked—Tiffany has survived the economy’s numerous ups and downs through the years. With the emergence in the late 1990s of the notion of “affordable luxuries,” Tiffany seized the moment by creating a line of cheaper silver jewelry. Its “Return to Tiffany” silver bracelet became a must-have item for teens of a certain set. Earnings skyrocketed for the next five years, but the affordable jewelry brought both an image and a pricing crisis for the company: What...
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