Business Studies Oral: The Foschini Group

The company’s product mix is simple. They offer a wide variety of junior, plus, men’s, boy’s and infant apparel and low prices. The company also offers accessories, shoes, handbags, and home décor to differentiate itself in the market.

Because of this rapid growth several challenges can present themselves. A primary challenge that can present itself is the lost of the boutique feel because of the hundreds of locations. Even though each boutique is different and personalized, opening too many locations may cause the retailer to lose its niche in the market. Another challenge is the many changes the company has gone through in upper level management. Because of the changes investors have been discouraged, as mentioned before, and shares were down 16% after the changes.

In this report I will analyse Country Road Clothing Company (CR) and the CR customer. Specifically, I will be analysing the marketing environment and Country Road’s approach to this environment and how CR market to their customers. I will look it why the marketing in Australia is so successful but how this same success was not translated in overseas markets. I will also discuss the different macro and micro environmental influences to this failure in the U.S. markets and make recommendations on how CR might have learnt from previous marketing mistakes and show how they are striving for success in the future.

One threat to SHLD is its competition with many retailers because it is not very differentiated from its competitors and lacks brand loyalty, thus nothing is stopping the customer from overlooking Sears and visiting a rival retailer. Another threat is a downturn in the economy which could wreck havoc on SHLD’s financial position.

Threat of new entrants: Retail industry has a higher barrier to entry. First, it is difficult to work out a good value chain as it involves a complex process. Second, it is difficult for new entrants to gain competitive advantage and earn above-average returns in such a highly competitive market. Besides,

The overall threat of new entrants in the retail market is a high level threat as it is relatively easy and inexpensive to enter

V.F. Corporation (VF) designs, manufactures, distributes and markets lifestyle apparel, footwear, and accessories. The company offers jeanswear, outdoor and action sports clothing, imagewear, sportswear and contemporary brands. The company markets its products under famous brands namely, the North Face, Wrangler, Timberland, Vans, Lee, and Nautica, among others. It sells its products to specialty stores, department stores, national chains and mass merchants, as well as through direct-to-consumer channel consisting of VF operated stores and internet sites.

Rana Chowdury is the current the manager of I.T store systems and store support for a company that has 4 different brands. The 4 brands are Hot Topic, which specializes in music and pop culture inspired fashion including body jewelry, accessories, and music T-shirts. Torrid is all about the fashion for Plus-Size style and trendy clothes for women. Box Lunch has apparel, gifts, gadgets, & more that also helps provide a meal to a person in need with every purchase and finally Lovesick is young, trendy, affordable fashion & accessories for curvy girl’s sizes 10-26.

Helen’s is an upmarket fashion boutique store in Sydney’s east. Falling sales have been reflected by surveys that reveal consumers view the business as outdated and no longer relevant to consumers’ needs. Strong competition in the area has placed considerable pressure on pricing. The business’s target market, 50-65 year old females, no longer dominated the now younger demographic character of the area.

The industry does not possess major threat from new entrants due to strong barriers to entry and strong competition for retail space. There is also a strong rivalry between competitors as limited space is being contested by major players alongside

There are five categories of risks in Ralph Lauren clothing sector, including: geopolitical, environmental, social and cultural, financial, and technological (“Managing risk in the clothing sector - Anthesis,” 2015).Pure risk such as natural hazards, climate change, food, energy and water security, demographic shifts, concentration of production, commodity prices and laws and regulation can pose risks to productivity, efficiency and supply chain resilience (“Managing risk in the clothing sector - Anthesis,” 2015).

success factors. However, the company has a few weaknesses and threats they need to address in

Based in Framingham, Massachusetts, The TJX Companies, Inc. (TJX or “the company”) is the leading retailer of off-priced fashion and home goods merchandise in the United States and worldwide. The company’s brand

Mr Price Group is considered to be of the fastest growing retailers in South Africa. The group conducts its retails sales through 937 outlets in South Africa and an additional 24 franchised stores throughout Africa. The group also employs over 17800 people and pledges a focus on employee well being as part of its corporate ethos (Fastmoving, 2016).

There are different methods to analyse the micro environment of the company but two only three of them are used in this report to analysis the micro element which affect the strategy of the company. The three analysis techniques used to study micro elements affecting the strategy of Mercedes Benz include