Situation Analysis:
Cima Mountaineering, Inc. is a company that manufactures mountaineering and hiking boots for mountaineers and serious hikers. The company mainly manufactures two classic kinds of leather boots- Glacier boots for mountaineering and Summit boots for Hiking. Although the demand for mountaineering and hiking boots has increased in 1994, only serious mountaineers and hikers are interested in their boots and the demand is seasonal, while the foreign competitors target both serious and weekender hikers offering them a line of fashionable boots at lower prices.
Over the years, Cima’s sales and profits have increased. The owners of the company grew up learning and inheriting the boots business and thus have considerable
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The second alternative as proposed by Anthony is to expand the existing product line by introducing two new boots in the Summit line and another women’s boots in the Glacier line. These new boots would have a lower pricing to provide price points at the low end of the line. The new boots will be positioned as boots for serious hikers who want quality hiking boot at a reasonable price and also for casual hikers who are looking to move up to a better boot.
Analysis of alternatives and recommendation:
The advantages of choosing the first alternative is that it would help target the weekender boot market which is 25% of the boot market share, which is more than both the mountaineering and serious hiker market share put together. Also, the weekender boot market has high growth potential as shown by the market research. But, venturing into an all new unfamiliar market can be very risky. The competition in this new “weekender” market is very fierce and Cima doesn’t have any experience working with the new line of boots. It would also be difficult to change the perception that consumers have of Cima from a mountaineering boots company to a casual weekender boots company.
The advantage of choosing Anthony’s proposal is that introducing lower end boots will add on to the advantage that Cima already has and may help in competing with other boot manufacturers who sell lower priced fashionable boots. The
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The first alternative is to enter the "weekend" segment of the hiking boot market. As I plug and chug the number for the first alternative, I found that this alternative would not be beneficial to the company. Even though this alternative will increase demand due to its low price strategy but cost for the WX 450 boot is higher than the price charged to retailers. This alternative will give the company a negative gross margin.
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