The Marketing Environment Case Study

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CHAPTER 02: THE MARKETING ENVIRONMENT CONSUMERS CONFOUND MARKETERS Household spending by all UK households amounted to over £500 billion in 1997, or 63% of gross domestic product. This level of expenditure is very closely related to conditions in the country's macro-economic environment. For marketers, it is crucial to be able to read the macro-economic environment and to predict the effects of change in demand for their goods and services. Identifying turning points in the economic cycle has become a work of art as well as science, as consumers frequently confound experts by changing their expenditure levels in a way which could not have been predicted on the basis of past experience. During the Autumn of 1998, mortgage rates in the UK were falling; unemployment was close to its lowest level for two decades; pay rises were keeping ahead of inflation; and share prices were recovering from their recent falls. Yet expenditure by British households was falling sharply. For three consecutive months retail sales fell in value, with retailers such as Marks and Spencers and Storehouse reporting below expected levels of sales. Retailers have traditionally found excuses to justify poor sales to their shareholders, including weather which is too cold/too hot. Even the death of Diana Princess of Wales was widely blamed for keeping people out of the shops.…show more content…
Economic theory would have suggested that lower prices would have resulted in higher sales, especially considering the other favourable elements of the macro-environment. However, this did not appear to be

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