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Case study marketing

‘Yet another poor year’ reflected the senior executive of Mephisto Products.’
P r o f i t s d o w n b y 1 5 p e r c e nt , s a l e s a nd t u r no v e r s t a t i c i n a m a r k e t w h i c h w a s recko ned to be growing at a rate of some 20 per cent per annum. It can’t go on.’ These were the thoughts of Jim Bullins, and he contended that the company would-be out of business if the next year turned out to be as bad.
Jim Bullins had been senior executive at Mephisto for the past three years. Ineach of these years he had witnessed a decline in sales and profits. The company produced a range of technically sophisticated electromechanical control devices for industry. The major customers of Mephisto were in the chemical …show more content…

Again,
Watkinson’s old philosophy still prevailed. “ If they want the product badly enough, they will wait for it “. and “ Why offer discounts for large quantities – if they did not want that many they would not order them”.
During the previous five years, from being a relatively successful company, market share for Mephisto Products dropped substantially. The market became much more competitive with many new entrants, particularly from EU Countries coming in to the UK
Market, which had traditionally been supplied by UK manufacturers. Many of these new entrants had introduced new and updated products to the market, with such products drawing upon recent advances in electronics. These new products were seen by the market as being technically innovative, but the view taken byMephisto management was that they were faddish and once the electronics novelty had worn off, customers would come back to their superior products.
Unlike many of his colleagues, Jim Bullins was worried by developments over the past five years, and felt that there was a need for many changes. He was aware that the more successful new entrants to the industry had introduced a marketing philosophy into their operations. Compared with ten years ago, it was now common practice for companies to appoint

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