1. Introduction. True Religion was born in 2002 year as a premium denim brand, which reached second position on the U.S. premium denim market by 2010. However based on the case 1 – 4 (Barney and Hesterly 2012) the company was facing high fluctuation of stock during last year’s due to the uncertainty of fashion market trends. In addition economic recession, which resulted in market decline, rough material price increase and market saturation led to fiercely competition between premium denim sector players.
They began to investigate the marketing program for the new product, and recognized that there were not only valuable possibilities, but also problems they would have to solve before launching the product. Objectives: To improve the gross margins of Chipman union to above 20% by introducing branded socks, for this introduction they have planned a market research. Situation Analysis The Hosiery Industry In 1979 the hosiery shipments totaled 289 million dozen pairs of which 25% were men’s socks. In the men’ socks dress contributed 34.9 % of sales and casual contributed 21.9% of sales. The revenue split was in similar ratio as of sales across different types of hosiery .Per capita consumption of men’s socks was stable at around 10 pairs annually.
However, that market is high competitive and almost commodity-like. Company A would need to consider reducing its labor force or even moving its operation to low cost-region in order to be competitive in the iPod/iPhone headphone market. Another new customer group is the people who use noise-cancellation headphones. There are limited players in this market. Also, the quality of noise cancellation headphones vary a lot and the customers are willing to pay higher price for good product.
Toy stores were more interested in the low price products than a high quality products which made A.C. Gilbert company to lose their competitive advantage. 3. Discuss how the societal environment in the US culture was changing. How did the changes affect the toy industry and Gilbert? A.C. Gilbert company has suffered a big loss in sales and profit.
Due to the fact that Asian and other foreign textile manufacturers have been exported aggressively and consumer preferences are requiring higher-quality products with minimum defects, like other firms, Aurora tends to produce small amount of yarns produced with minimal period and provide to customized markets. Consequently, Aurora had decreased significantly its costs by reducing $3.9 million of SG&A expenses since 2000 and it was one reason of increasing operating profit and net earnings in 2002. Unfortunately, Aurora’s returned amount from retailers had been increased and the proportion of sales return of Aurora’s one plant named the Hunter reached 1.5% in 2002; thus, the firm’s income has not risen well. Figure 1 illustrates Aurora’s financial ratios by calculating given financial information through Exhibits 1, 2, and 6. The first, the company’s liquidity ratios-current ratio and quick ratio-had been increased smoothly for these four years.
Explain your answer. Wal-Mart and Sears are unable to sell merchandise identical to Urban Outfitters because they mass produce there items and the clothes are often poorly made with low end quality material. They focus more on quantity instead of quality to meet the highest profitability. Urban Outfitters sell their merchandise for a higher price and sell a smaller amount of items to turn a profit; Sears and Wal-Mart must sell a significant amount more to make the same profitability. Also, Urban Outfitters makes sure they have the current trends, Sears and Wal-Mart stores are just behind the curve when it comes to fashion.
Bloomingdales is a higher end store that sells high quality products at a high price. They are currently losing many customers because the economy will not move out of the stagnation period. Right now the customers need to be saving their money in case they need it later to pay bills rather than spending it on clothing. Many consumers are starting to shop at stores like Macy’s or Kohl’s where they are offered almost the same quality products at lower prices. Some of Bloomingdales biggest competitors are Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue, Bergdorf Goodman, Barneys New York, Lord & Taylor and Nordstrom.
However, it is important to recognise that the competition in luxury fashion is not based on price but rather on image perception and brand value and quality. It could be argued that competitive rivalry is slightly lower in emerging markets because of their recent development and the slower entrance of key players in this industry. Potentially, this can be offset by the competition of local fashion retailer. Bargaining Power of Buyers Luxury brands have all individual consumers to sell to globally but also in a given country. However, due to the higher prices, there is a certain segment to which these brands can appeal to – this strengthens the power of the buyers.
It has created a culture where it is difficult for both parties to work. The next problem was the discrepancies over the choice of territories. While the territories are meant to be divided by the Sales and Market Analysis Record System, the veterans were taking the better and more convenient territories. This put the younger sales people at a disadvantage. The veterans were taking the better clients giving themselves a better commission.
Porters five force model is “a framework for industry analysis and business strategy development.” (Porter, 2008, p68-104) The loss of the patent broke the barrier of entry into the market hence there was a high threat of new entrants. Buyer power was low because of the high premium price for a cup of Dippin Dots ice cream, the most common buyers were people who grew up on it. The threat of substitutes was high as there were many alternatives customers could opt for in the frozen food section. Competition in Dippin Dots industry was stiff, there were two large companies that dominated the industry, 500 small businesses and other family owned businesses that all produced ice cream. Question 2 A value chain is “a chain of activities for a firm operating in a specific industry.” ( Porter 1996, p61-78) Dipping Dots ice cream was produced from super freezing of chemicals and liquid cream by process called flash freezing