The JC Penney Case

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).

2) JC Penney's most immediate goal is to maintain its present customer base and to attract new clients. They can do so by introducing higher-scale brands to their stores in order to attract another category of customers, in other words, customers who are drawn to premium brands. Therefore, JC Penney's brand image will be enhanced; its reputation will be improved. Introducing premium products, and attracting customers who have higher purchasing power will bring in higher revenues to the company.

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

JC Penney is an unfavorable choice for investors because the company analysis indicates that the company is unprofitable. Along with the bad financial analysis and

Ex- Chief Executive Officer Ron Johnson appointment to reinvent the failing retail monster JCPenney’s was short lived. JCPenney’s having a great run as the pinnacle of shopping destinations for the Baby Boomer and the X-generations was now on the decline. Likewise, both the retailer Sears, and JCPenney have been slow to recognize the changing retail market and adjust to the “point and click” shopping habits of the internet savvy Y-generation millennials.

J.C. Penney has its fair share of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. J.C. Penney has been struggling these past few years in order to sustain their business. As a result, they hired Ron Johnson as their CEO in 2012 in hopes of turning their business around. However, he caused more damage than good so J.C. Penney has been struggling to recover ever since. In order to fix Ron Johnson’s mistakes, they hired Mike Ullman to improve all aspects of their business through e-commerce and brick-and-mortar. J.C. Penney has a lot of obstacles to endure regarding their weaknesses and threats. However, their strengths and opportunities could possibly turn their business around and could land them success in the future.

Without the correspondence to the business group, it is communicating something specific that they are esteemed less when in all actuality the system is depending on them more. The promoting effort came up short by imparting why clients should abhorrence and suspend taking an interest in the perplexing high-low evaluating models and neglecting to convey and instruct how their new estimating structure made esteem. This absence of correspondence likely caused the greater part of client disarray and impression of lower esteem observation, higher costs, and less deals. What works for Apple retail experience or Target retail understanding, may not really work for J.C.Penney retail encounter. Without understanding J.C.Penney Customer and without doing what's necessary client inquire about, CEO Johnson chose to take Apple's retail involvement and simply uphold it onto J.C.Penney with the supposition that what worked for Apple will likewise work for J.C.Penney. This was a noteworthy

Penney company is a holding company started in the year 1902 by James Cash Penney. Since its foundation, J.C. Penney company has enjoyed a series of tremendous growth which is evident from its big number of shares (306,883,865) of common stock outstanding as well as depressions in its business cycles. The company has done a wide range of investments in different ways, for example, by placing separate stores and boutique-like spaces within the larger department store (Salil R. Virkar J. C. PENNEY COMPANY, INC). This has lured many different consumers and investors to the business. Also through these investments, it has been able to build stronger financial muscles which would enable it regain its strength and hopefully keep it on its toes during

Throughout my research, JCPenney's has been losing money because , through a marketing perspective, they have lost their identity. To explain, JCPenneys in the past was a department store targeted for middle income familes. The store promised to display the fashion of the middle class, catering to families. The company sold family products. It was based on the ideal of the family. During its peak, that was craze, a nuclear family, and JCPenneys catered to that craze. As time passes, trends come and go, this was no exception, when a company does not replace their customers, their older ones will die out (also in a literal sense). On top of that, other department stores such has Macy's and Khols, came out offering similar product, but at cheaper

Since becoming the CEO of J.C. Penney, Ron Johnson made some serious changes to bring customers back to their stores (Kinicki & Williams, 2013). First, he evaluated J.C. Penney’s current strategy to determine the strategy that he needed to create. His strategy involved lowering prices, less promotions, less private-labeled clothing, and restructure the highest traffic area in the middle of the stores (Kinicki & Williams, 2013).

In 2011, Ron Johnson was appointed CEO of J.C. Penney. Johnson entered the position and began to change J.C. Penney 's strategy which ultimately led to an annual sales drop of six billion dollars. Johnson’s new strategy involved eliminating J.C. Penney 's discount culture and began to refashion stores as collections of boutiques and higher end brands. He launched this new strategy and design without any advanced testing, which is a crucial step for changes in department stores. Johnson also removed store discounts and coupons. These changes led to the loss of many long time loyal customers. That is, Johnson and his new strategy miserably failed. The changes led to the firing of 40,000 employees, the closing of dozens of retail stores, and forced the company to sell valuable assets in order to build up cash reserves. By 2013, Johnson was fired as CEO, prompting J.C. Penney’s new management to spend the last few years reversing Johnson 's strategy (fortune.com).

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.

The problems that JC Penney is experiencing have been brewing for years. Before Ron Johnson took over and accelerated its decline JC Penney was having difficultly maintaining a profit. There is no denying that JC Penney is not the retail giant that it used to be. However, when looking at the sales and revenues of the company they still manage to sell billions of dollars worth of merchandise to consumers. Therefore, even though JC Penney’s customer base has been shrinking, the ones that are left still hold considerable buying power. JC Penney still has an opportunity to save what was started over a decade ago. In order to make it profitable it is necessary to take a look at what has been causing the massive losses in the first place and address

Based on J.C.Penney’s current situation, and the above issues, we recommend the following strategic models.

he type of clientele that comes to J.C.Penney, Apple products as far as I remember have been for high end customers, whereas, JCPenney mainly begin a clothing stores attracts customers from every section of society. His strategy of removing cosmetic counters and putting a Town Hall, is not very attractive. Why would anyone offer food in a clothing store. There are high chances of customers with sticky hands going through the racks of clothes, and not knowingly stain some fancy apperallels.