Kimbaly Franzer Kuddler Fine Foods MKT 421 February 1, 2012 Introduction Through a variety of sales and marketing strategies, Kudler Fine Foods plans to increase customer loyalty and profitability. The customer focused programs, frequent shopper program, direct mailing program, cost cutting initiatives and customer relationship management tactics are designed to achieve quality results (Kudler Fine Foods). Making sure the company is improving the customer’s value chain while instilling loyalty is hoped to increase higher margins in product sales the next step for this company. There are many ways that Kudler can increase profits and provide the customers the needs and wants. Some ways to do that is the catering side of the company,
With a solid financial plan, the organization can tackle initiatives without the organization finding itself in so many debits they cannot recover. Initiatives can also affect a company’s financial planning, just as it affected Starbucks initiatives. Howard Shultz, the CEO of Starbucks stated, Starbucks has initiatives and plans that include increased stores, operating efficiencies, decreases in cost, and even more long time growth for Starbucks (Starbucks, 2011). In order for Starbucks to increase stores, decrease cost and increase operating efficiencies, they had to create a financial plan for this initiative. When a company, such as Starbucks, starts financial planning, it begins with a firm’s working capital to achieve the company’s goals and initiatives.
Food cost managers will generate sales forecasts to reduce the carrying costs of inventory. Perpetual inventory management will track all in store inventory transactions. This includes ordering, receiving, selling, cycle counts, and inventory adjustments. An automated inventory system would allow Kudler fine foods to meet current and future customer demands. This would also save money on hiring and training employees to order products for the stores.
Kudler Fine Foods Frequent Shopper Program Concerns Kudler Fine Foods wants to implement a frequent shopping program to monitor the shopping habits of its customers, and increase customer satisfaction with a projected revenue increase of 4.75% over the first year. As Kudler Fine Foods is a high end grocer, the goal of the frequent shopping program will not be centered around cost savings, but as a point system offering exclusive awards similar to credit card point systems. Kudler Fine Foods can increase customer satisfaction by tailoring their inventories around customer’s shopping habits, but some concerns need to be addressed concerning the tracking of individual customer purchases. The management needs to understand how the frequent shopper
This allows them to allocate resources, like inventory and marketing dollars, to optimize the portfolio. Further, during the economic downturn they have effectively managed payroll while maintaining the service levels customers expect in the stores. To further improve staffing efficiency” Lowe’s is implementing a new staffing software tool, which provides detailed scheduling forecasts based on each store’s customer traffic patterns, incorporates each store’s penetration of specialty business into that forecast and provides managers with improved visibility to daily staffing needs by department. Lowe’s will continue to refine their supply chain”.
Week 2 Individual Service Request Paper BSA/310 Business System Professor: Jennifer Streker Due: July 29, 2013 Kudler Fine foods is in the process of creating a frequent shopper program where their customer’s purchases will be tracked in which they will start to receive “loyalty” points that can be redeemable for high value items. Such a program can possible include legal, ethical, and information security concerns, and if implemented improperly can result in possible fines and or other costs. Further enhancement and modifications can be made on a needed basis. This type of implementation can happen as the company grows, allowing for progression that can be much easier to monitor and maintain. All employees will be carefully trained in
Other key factors are to maintain a record of the inventory that is being sold so the store can better equip products in all three locales and provide for better product placement within all Kudler stores. The design trade-off approach for the project is as follows. A trade-off for the company to increase revenue will be the expenditures for the frequent buyer program, because essentially the company will not see a return profit for an allotted time. The implemented program will allow the company to see a small profit after the first year of the program being implemented. Another trade-off for the company will be the stores performance.
This is so any extra funds that are accumulated can go towards a new marketing strategy so that customers may be rewarded for being loyal to Kudler Fine Foods. A second action plan that may be needed to increase revenue is to increase the efficiency program. Here is where Yvonne Reynolds along with the inventory manger will have to find out how to decrease the amount of food that is being kept therefore; the company can save funds to create better and improved marketing strategies Lateral Collaboration and Vertical Collaboration Kudler’s management team has worked to develop a plan for transforming the stores and its employees to align with the mission and vision statements. The purpose of this strategic direction is to clearly state the major areas of focus for the organization. In order to achieve its objectives it is of utmost importance that Kudler have reliable lateral and vertical collaboration.
These ideas need to improve to increase consumer satisfaction. Kudler addresses the product section of the marketing plan to increase sales. For example, Kudler plans to use a frequent purchasing program to notice which items sell most frequently. Kudler will also bring in useful information if the company later contacts the consumers who purchase these items to see if the product is satisfactory or what improvements need to occur to make the product more useful. Kudler may also discover what selections of items consumers want to see on the shelves through the use of this information.
If a business is operating correctly then it should generate cash surplus. The faster this company expands the more cash it will need for working capital. There are two elements in the business cycle that absorb cash. Receivables and inventory. One specific method of increasing working capital is related to improving internal controls such as optimizing the systems used for maintaining accounts receivables.