Nonetheless, Nordstrom is offering self-service at their store. When customers are not satisfy with the item they purchased from Nordstrom, they can bring it back and return the item. Unlike other department stores, Nordstrom has a generous return policy for their customers. Destination stores or convenience stores like Wal-Mart or 7-11 does not offer the same service as Nordstrom. They normally have a strict 7-day return policy and you cannot return it once the deadline is passed or without the receipt.
Assignment 1 – Competitive Analysis of the Grocery Industry Rebecca Lenz Alice Richmond BUS 490 – Business Policy October 27, 2011 Competitive Analysis of the Grocery Industry Porters Five-Forces Model of competitive analysis is a widely used approach for developing strategies in many industries (David, 2009). Everyday millions of Americans and citizens of other countries nourish their bodies with food that is purchased at one store or another. By using Porters Five-Forces Model, a clear and concise competitive analysis can be done for an industry that is sure to be around forever. The grocery industry consists of many different competitors like Publix, Winn Dixie, Wal-Mart, Costco, and BJ’s just to name a few. When a consumer sets out to fill their cabinets with their everyday necessities the owner and operator of these grocery stores needs to take into consideration the wants, needs and desires of their shoppers, how to pull them in and how to keep them.
Walmart sells many items at ridiculously low prices. They are able to offer low prices on their items due to an incredible mark-up on imported products. Especially in today's economy, the buck is the big winner. Everyone wants to save money, and they can do that by shopping at Walmart, where many items are the lowest price in town, even if it's only by a few pennies. But consumers aren't helping their fellow countryman earn his own living by buying these imported items.
Pricing is what really brings the bulk of customers to purchase the product. There are times that a client is interested in a particular product, but because is to high they do not purchase. Now there are other occasions that even though the price is high, the service is fantastic, so customers preferred to pay extra just for that good service. Kudler Fine Foods is that case, they offer valued services instead of discount and so far that program works for the
They believe in providing quality products to customer rather than cheap products. • Target Stores are more attractive then Wal-Mart. • Target Corporation is environment friendly they don’t sell firearms, tobacco and toy guns. • The top seller of Gift Cards in US. • It donates huge amount of profits.
This external pressure incentivized Newell to optimize their supply chain and maximize supply efficiency, which led to systems like cross-docking. The threat of new competition and the threat of other products/services went hand in hand with how Newell was perceived by their customer. If a Wal-Mart, say, were displeased with an aspect of Newell’s performance they would pressure Newell by threatening to allow a competitor into the supply chain to stock some stores. Given the relatively un-differentiated nature of Newell products substitute suppliers were not hard to find. In essence, any market player that was operationally similar with a comparable, or superior, portfolio of products was a threat for Newell.
Wal-Mart’s divisional structure, according to the text, “as organizations grow and become increasingly diversified, they find that functional departments have difficulty managing a wide variety of products, customers, and geographic regions. In this case, organizations many restructure to group all functions into a single division and duplicate each of the functions across all the divisions” (Bates, 2011). Wal-Mart is sectioned into three product divisional structures. The three include Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, and some global stores. Wal-Mart was wise to use the divisional plans, as each division is open to center their attention on specific goals, customer services, and product knowledge.
This is why Places like Costa Coffee may choose to open here as a lot of people like to have a drink with friends when they catch-up. Town centres these days also have a lot of charity shops in the area this is because the goods they sell are normally cheaper than other stores. Out of Town Centres, Out of Town Sites and Factory outlets this would be one of the cheapest places to open a new store. 2 Supermarkets: These are large stores that sell a variety of goods mostly food and drink the everyday items but they sell them in one big self-service shop. For example Tesco or ASDA.
Buy one shoe at regular price, and get the other shoe at equal or lesser value free. The original plans for the operation of the stores were to keep down cost for the owners. The displays for the shoes were made of plain wood, and set up by the managers. Most of the maintenance performed by the managers, and only one or two employees per store, this assisted the stores with keeping down cost. An average price for a pair of shoes were about $3.00, the stores also kept down cost by purchasing shoes from more than one supplier.
These allow IKEA to reduce space requirements in logistic operations such as trucks and warehouses and they also lowered costs, creating a core competency for IKEA. - Furniture showroom/open warehouse. This unique store concept allows customers to come see the IKEA products so they can see for themselves the quality of the products before they decide to buy them. IKEA’s end products are low-priced and high-quality furniture and in-house products. These products have low prices as a result of IKEA’s core competencies.