Jcpenney Industry Analysis

Although the company did show an increased gross profit of $8,255,000 with $6,358,000 less Net Sales in 2013 versus 2012, that increase is due to the reduction in product Cost of Goods Sold by $14,613,000. Since increases in product price will negatively affect sales, one of management’s primary goals is to keep prices stable. This objective is achieved through implementation of cost cutting programs, investing in more efficient equipment, and automation of more steps in the production process.

In the past, JCP had, on average, one price campaign every day. The stores were full of sale signs and retail rise was getting out of control. JCP partnered with numerous exclusive collaborations which was hoped to bring about an expansion for the firm. However, due to the economic slump, the oversaturation of the market, and an expected lack of quality in the goods from the consumer perspective, JCPenney’s success was degrading in contrast to its competitors. (Sloan, 2010).

J.C. Penney is a retail outlet that operates in many locations globally. It deals with product lines such as clothing, footwear, beauty products, electronics, and jewelry. There are several changes that have taken place in the macro environment that promises to increase the fortunes of the company. The advertisement in technology is one single important factor that has increased the performance of the business (Ali, 2007). The company has an elaborate website through which it uses to tap the online market. In fact, thirty percent of the company’s revenue comes from the website.

The industry we have chosen is the department store-retail industry. Within this industry, we have chosen the department stores of JCPenney and Macy’s. We find this industry, as well as these two companies, interesting from a strategic perspective. JCPenney has recently undergone a massive strategic restructuring in regards to its pricing, brand offerings, and store layout, pushing it away from the typical department store strategy of discounts and coupons. Its new strategy has become much closer to Wal-Mart’s strategy of every day low prices. Macy’s, on the other hand, has restructured with a push from the economic

This report presents data describing the differences amongst the two department stores, their fundamental visions, and comparative statistics. Macy’s or Dillard’s: Differences amongst these competitors There are several aspects you can analyze from each department store. Major pieces do set each one apart from the other. Brand names carried by Macy’s and Dillard’s from an average shoppers point of view can go completely unnoticed unless price is involved. For trend shoppers brand names can either make or break a retail store. It can easily determine if he or she will walk to Macy’s or Dillard’s because they already know the store does or does not carry that brand. This is consistent with each department throughout both stores and

In this segment, the retailer J.C. Penney will be analyzed against the department store retail industry, with particular emphasis placed upon their competitors, Macy’s and Kohl’s. The major components to be discussed will include the general external environment (i.e. demographics, economics, politics, legal requirements, technologies and global expansion), the industry environment, the competitive environment, the driving forces and the key factors for success within the industry. In terms of the general external environment, the retail industry is a multi-trillion dollar business in the United States alone and maintains operations primarily due to consumer spending. Such purchases rely upon the disposable income of

As one of the major retailers in the United States, JCPenney has 1,104 department stores in 49 states and Puerto Rico as of February 2, 2013. The key success of its business is tremendously depending on the sales performance. However, the retail business is highly competitive, with low barriers to entry and low profit margin. Due to large sales plunge in 2012, the company is in financial trouble. The thorough analysis of JCPenney’s financial statements is vital to judge the future performance of its business.

Reading Kohl’s K-10 report and learning more about their new initiative, The Greatest Agenda, I identified several of Kohl’s top assets. It was easy to see how important Kohl’s customers are to their profitability and sustainability. Customers equal sales and sales equal profit and growth. Unfortunately, conditions such as customer’s spending habits, income levels, and economic factors could have a negative impact on Kohl’s sales .1 The condition of the economy is outside Kohl’s control, however, loyalty programs and quality merchandise offerings encourage customer loyalty.

J.Crew at Stonestown mall is having difficulty targeting San Francisco State students to shop at their store, even when J.Crew offers a 15% off discount to college students.

JC Penney had to undergo and withstand several competitive issues to include changing of brand image, selling strategy and marketing strategy. JC Penney also had to account for Environmental Factors to include: a population that continued to age and also unemployment rates. JC Penney tried to influence customers by portraying an everlasting sale. No matter how hard JC Penney tried to market their products, if people didn’t

The industry backdrop remains very challenging but with extremely weak investor sentiment and several drivers for improved earnings/FCF, we see value in shares for contrarian investors…We’re encouraged by the turnaround story unfolding at JC Penney and see a path to over $1 billion of EBITDA in F2017. Given cyclical headwinds facing apparel retailers (late cycle environment = apparel losing share-of-wallet) and secular pressures facing traditional, mature, brick & mortar department stores (i.e., Amazon.com (AMZN)), we expect valuation multiples to remain low; however, we see favorable risk/reward at current levels. Our $9 price target is based on ~5.9x our NTM +1 EBITDA, between current levels (~5.2x) and the one-year historical average

In order to become more aware of the competitive nature of the retail environment, our group conducted a competitive analysis over three different retail stores. In order to see a difference between stores, we knew we would analyze one discount/mass store, one department store, and one specialty store. From there, we chose one classification of products to analyze: women’s cropped workout leggings. We then graded this classification of products on multiple topics including: presentation of product, service, depth of assortment, location of store, shopability of classification, promotion/marketing of product, price of products and product pricing, return policy, and website. For grading purposes, we assigned each topic a score from one to five,

JCPenny’s is a retail chain of American mid-range department stores located all around the United States. This establishment offers a wide variety of consumer goods such as: clothing for the entire family, home goods, cosmetics and much more with prices tailored to the middle class American budget. JCPenny’s keeps its customers in their store buying products with weekly coupons, mark downs such as Penny Days, as well as their own private clothing brands that can be found only at their store (Baileys, 2015). JCPenny’s generates half of its revenue from its own brands like Liz Claiborne to Arizona Jeans to St. John’s Bay (Bailey’s, 2015; Wahba, 2014). Due to the retail chain having its own brand it allows the company to have control over

When offers of reduced pricing are accepted for equipment, meeting delivery expectations becomes an important part of enhancing the customer experience to maintain satisfied loyal customers. An inventory specialist in the current distribution center would be given the additional task of segregating and maintaining inventory levels to meet the needs of the customer loyalty department.

According to [5], Just-in-Time (JIT) inventory management enables an organization to gain competitive advantage by not having a large or excessive amount of inventory in warehouse. The organization only needs to order the parts when they are actually needed and new materials are produced only when old materials have finished. One advantage of adopting this strategy is that there will be no excess of inventory that needs to be stored and hence the inventory levels will be reduced as well as the cost of carrying and storing goods. One major disadvantage of this is that the organization will expose it in the risk of ordering problems for example a supplier is not able to provide parts on time. The result of this is that the organization cannot fulfill the order and contributes to customer dissatisfaction.