Claims About Wrong Strategic Direction Summary

Businesses especially those that operate in the same industry always try to emerge the best in the market by adopting different strategies so as to become more competitive. In the retail industry where goods move in volumes, proper management of the inventory can make a big difference by making a company to be more competitive as compared to the others. In most retail business, manipulation of the supply chain functions is one of the strategies that are used to give a retailer a competitive edge over its competitors. This research paper will compare how TJ Maxx and Ross manipulate their supply chain functions to gain a competitive edge over each other. Based on the available facts, the paper will make a determination on which of the companies

For this assignment, the writer commences by exploring “Resource Dependency Theory” as the understanding of this hypothesis is vital. Next, an overview will be undertaken in terms of the selected organisation -that is, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. After, the paper will present a brief description of the relationship between Walmart and its suppliers. It then goes on to highlight the managerial bridging strategies that the company uses in dealing with the organisations it depends on for resources. These strategies are: negotiation, contracts, interlocking directorates, joint ventures, strategic alliances, and mergers and acquisitions.

Supplier chain management (SCM) has been the most imperative management function for attaining long term competitive advantage. As competition is in global markets, firms are facing challenges enhancing their performances, from getting quality right to serving disparate and fluctuating markets.As a result, acquiring a good understanding of SCM practices has become essential to sustain profitable in today’s highly complex and competitive business world. From a hypothetical perspective, this study shows the involvement of various kinds of resources to different performance measures. The research findings provide feasible insights for managers to comprehend the effectiveness, and also weaknesses, of distinctive supplier management practices in enhancing different operations performance measures of firms.

As IKEA operates as a monopoly dominating the wood furniture and ready-to-assemble goods, who is not greatly affected by the bargaining power of suppliers, bargaining power of consumers, threats of new entrances, threats of substitutes or industrial rival, the firm operates similarly across different countries and therefore its supply chain management focus more on the pull side from consumers (Enquist & Hay, 2006). On the other hand, Walmart sells a wide range of products, although it can benefit from diversified risks, the intense competition from retail players do impose pressure on the company to continuously work with suppliers to create promotional deals and trade discounts to cut costs and attract customers (Fonsson et al,

Wal-Mart’s supply chain is obsessed with cost and is facilitated by a low implied demand uncertainty, their impressive logistics system and their management information systems. Their supply chain is able to respond quickly to fill a wide variety of products to keep merchandise on Wal-Mart’s shelves. Wal-Mart’s level of coordination along the supply chain is excellent; it would

Many people may ask the same question. “Is Wal-Mart good for the economy?” or even “What are Wal-Mart’s standards for suppliers?” Wal-Mart currently has over 4,000 stores in the United Stated and about over 3,000 internationally. As many people may know, Wal-Mart is the largest retailer in the world. In the year of 2004 Wal-Mart had accounted for 6.5 percent of the retail sales. The wellbeing and prosperity of specialists over their production network is the Mindful Sourcing bunch 's top need, which may be the reason Wal-Mart suppliers are contractually needed to sign their “Benchmarks for Suppliers” before they can even be endorsed to deliver stock available to be purchased at Wal-Mart. These Norms for Suppliers make clear their essential desires for suppliers and processing plants in regards to the treatment of laborers and effect on nature. Suppliers are as well needed to show the “Norms for Suppliers” in the nearby dialect in all industrial facilities where items have been made for them, so specialists know the desires of suppliers and plant administration. In this case, many citizens may believe that Wal-Mart may be both good and bad for America in many different ways. This store has been the cost of many people losing their jobs, but it has also helped keep the United States inflation down. Although Wal-Mart does help create many jobs for people, it does not pay them at

Any retailers without loyalty buyers will quickly fail. Therefore, attracting more potential customers, acquiring more new customers, and maintain more loyal customers will help a company success in the high competing industry. Also, if retailers can get the suppliers with lower price or better quality product, the more likely a retailer could win in the industry. Since there are only limited number of suppliers in the industry and the merchant they supply account for a larger part of the retailer’s sales. All of the retailers are competing for the

Wal-Mart, the largest private employer in the globe and the third among the largest corporations in the world, is known to apply a wide range of logistic and supply chain techniques in meeting the dynamic demands from their clients. Additionally, the need to stay at the top in the world of business has made this concept mandatory for the multinational organization. Wal-mart, in its drive to achieve these ends has presented a number of implications, not only to the organization but also to its clients and the society at large (Fishman, 2006). Various positive attributes, say the history of the corporation, its application of information technology and computerized systems and the culture of the organization has, to a great extent catapulted the organization to great heights (Keil & Spector, 2005). Other attributed that have been of help to the organization and its client base include the corporation's strong global marketing procedures, practical distribution networks and strategic geographical locations just to mention but a few. On the negative side of the corporations activities and performance include the likes of rapacious pricing, poor labour and employees relations and poor working conditions among others.

The Invisible Impacts of Wal-mart “A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business,” said Henry Ford, the founder of Ford Motor Company (qtd. in “Remember”). This famous quote is a reminder for every business to commit moral business practices if they wish to achieve productivity and long-term success. Meanwhile, business should contribute to the community and its people rather than insisting on making money at any cost. Sooner or later, the consumers will figure out about unethical practices that one is trying to hide, and then losing business is unavoidable.

Logistics is a broad, far-reaching function which has a major impact on society’s standard of living. In a modern society, we have come to expect excellent logistics services, and tend to notice logistics only when there is a

Additionally when choosing suppliers, Wal-Mart has the upper hand because “Wal-Mart will only pay the most competitive prices” (Ehring 4), meaning that if Wal-Mart finds a supplier that will give them a lower price, the current suppliers will lower their prices to match it (price matching). One aspect of Wal-Mart that sets them apart from other corporations is how they manage their relationship with their suppliers. Wal-Mart is a dominant force and has become such an important account for their suppliers that they have managed to eliminate Supplier Power therefore they can pursue achieving their goals and concentrate purely on their Cost Leadership Strategy, which serves the consumer with "Everyday low prices."

In this present era, many companies that are trying to compete against their rival giant, Wal-Mart, have found it to be quite difficult. The reason being is because Wal-Mart has managed to get their suppliers to provide them with the lowest prices possible in order to increase profits. Additionally, Wal-Mart has decided to purchase as much output of any of their suppliers. In contrast, Sears has never purchased more than 50%. As a result, Wal-Mart continues to grow, while Sears deteriorates and begins to vanish.

The supplier bargaining power depends on the importance of volume, level of supplier uniqueness and threat of forward integration. The supplier’s power is high in term of unique product, less product differentiation and high threat of forwards integration, affecting their customer’s ability to acquire profitability (Porter, 1980). However, large firm like Chloe and Hermes international, accrued the power and the capital to pose a threat for forward integration by owning their own channel of distribution, giving opportunities to achieve high market share thus being strong competitors for other suppliers. In contrast, for new entrants, as a result of the high fragmentation of small scale suppliers, achieving economic

The bargaining power of suppliers is medium. Since corporates conditions vary, whether the power of suppliers is strong should be determined accordingly. But to survive in the online retailing industry, keeping a close relationship with the suppliers is imperative. Many of the multi-national companies in the industry is depending on limited numbers of suppliers that are concentrated in production, differentiated in products, and not heavily relied on a single industry, which give them great bargaining power and can better facilitate the corporations’ success. Small companies may not have established such strong alliance with its vendors.

The bargaining power of suppliers is high, when there are few substitutes available in the market, suppliers provide a unique product, and there is high supplier switching costs. According to the case, Wal-Mart is a retail store that holds a huge market share, and the suppliers are well aware of this fact. So, the bargaining power of suppliers is low in case of Wal-Mart.