Strategy analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Strategy analysis - Essay Example The two giant American companies haven't stopped although their basic cola markets have leveled off in the world and now in the current year they still stand to battle against each other. Thus, Cola wars still continue and the market can still expect some new products from the companies in the beverage market. The cola wars began in the 1950's when Alfred Steele the former Coke marketing executive was made the executive at Pepsi. Steele came up with the strategy "Beat Coke" that focused on take-home sales through supermarkets. Pepsi focused on family consumption so they came up with a 26-oz bottle. Thus after the 2nd world war, Pepsi's growth took a straight shot ahead as supermarkets began to increase in the country. CEO of Pepsi Donald Kendall launched a marketing campaign "Pepsi Generation" that targeted the youth of the nation or people young at heart. This helped Pepsi to squeeze Cokes lead to a 2-to-1 margin. Pepsi also worked with its bottlers to improve plants and store facilities. Thus, Pepsi's bottlers were greater than Cokes during 1970. Plus Pepsi sold concentrate to its bottlers at a price that was 20% lower than that of Coke. In 1960's the two companies decided to experiment with new cola and non-cola brands and also new packaging ideas. Thus Coke launched Fanta, Sprite and low calorie cola Tab. Pepsi launched Teem, Mountain Dew and Diet Pepsi. The companies introduced non-returnable glass bottles simultaneously and also 12-oz metal cans that were a huge hit since they are convenient, light and trendier. The companies also plunged into the non-CSD market that included juices, coffee, tea, hot chocolate and water. The flooded the beverage market. Coke bought Minute Maid (fruit juice), Duncan foods (coffee, tea, hot chocolate) and Belmont Springs Water. Whereas, in 1965 Pepsi merged with snack-food giant Frito-Lay in order to form Pepsi Co. Coca Cola's advertising strategy focused on showing that its product is better than the competitors. Coke focused on the overseas market during this period with the assumption that the domestic market has saturated and Pepsi competed with Coke in the domestic market and managed to double its share in the United States between 1950 and 1970. In 1974 Pepsi launched the "Pepsi Challenge" in Dallas, Texas where Coke was l argest selling brand. They began differentiate with Coke with blind taste tests to ensure that people liked the taste of Pepsi more than any other cola. This strategy worked and sales shot up in Dallas. Then Pepsi launched thin campaign nationwide. Coke retaliated with retail price cuts, rebates, and advertisements that questioned the blind tests validity. But Pepsi challenge managed to win Coke's market share. In 1979, Pepsi sales increased more than Coke sales for the first time through retail outlets with a 1.4 share point lead. Coke then renegotiated its franchise bottling contract in order to achieve flexibility in pricing the concentrate and syrups. Its bottlers approved the contract on a condition that was fulfilled and Coke came side by side with Pepsi in the market. Then Coke announced a price increase in concentrate and

Three basic concepts Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Three basic concepts - Research Paper Example Here comes the option of outsourcing either the whole manufacturing unit or certain major business activities while would help BlueJay in increasing its output. Now in this context there are two things that need to be considered; first, what portions of the manufacturing unit should be outsourced, and second is the amount of capital investment that BlueJay has to make for this new outsourcing plan. This study aim at discussing the basic concepts of the cost of ownership understanding single or multiple options of outsourcing business operational activities of the company. A relationship between cost estimation and financial statements would be explained to validate the basic concepts. For understanding the nuances of the supply chain management in the company, cost of ownership plays an important role. The different elements associated with the cost of ownership involve purchasing price, salvage value or resale value and other expenses which lead to acquisition, disposal and conversi on. These further includes the cost associated with purchase of orders, delivery charges, search costs, handling and storage cost, maintenance cost, repair, etc, and disposal. Cost of ownership when incorporated for analysis of the financial benefit presents cost base for the determination of the economic value of investments. For example internal rate of return, return on investment. The cost of ownership analysis includes operating cost and total cost for acquisition. It is also used to measure the viability of the capital investment. Enterprise may utilize it to as a comparison tool (Zachariassen, & Arlbjorn, 2009, p. 5-8). The three concepts which closely align the cost of ownership are the life-cycle costing, zero based costing and cost-based evaluation of supplier’s performance. All of these concepts are developed to monitor the performance of the suppliers based on the expectations of the firm. The objective is to focus more on the maintenance of long-term relationship with the suppliers, but at the same time calculate the cost associated with supply chain management and manufacturing. In this case the outsourcing cost can be estimated. In order to calculate the cost of ownership BlueJay has to follow an eight step process: a) Analyze the present scenario of the company, b) Map the activities and the processes in the company, c) Identification of the cost drivers, d) Collect the data on activity usage, e) Identification of the potential solution/solutions, f) Estimation of the cost drivers associated with the improvements, g) Calculation of the cost of ownership for different scenarios (before and after), and f) Presenting the results (Woodside, Gibbert, & Golfetto, 2008, p. 207-209). Cost estimates are nothing but approximation of the project cost, which is important for avoiding the problems associated with cost overrun. In case of BlueJay the manufacturing cost would have to be estimated, which can be segregated into three categories; manufact uring overhead, labor cost, and direct material costs. The cost estimates are utilized to conduct a cost-volume-profit analysis to project a revenue figure of the company with respect to its volume of production and the cost incurred by the company for it. Another reason for evaluating the cost-volume profit is to identify the breakeven point of the company’s revenue generation. The estimation of the cost of the manufacturing unit is documented in the cost sheet of a company, which in turn is