Chapter 9.2, Problem 2C

Walgreens pharmacy began in 1901 as a single store on the South Side of Chicago and grew to become the largest chain of pharmacy retailers in America. Walgreens was an early pioneer of the “self-service” pharmacy and found success by moving quickly to build a vast domestic network of stores after World War II. This growth-focused strategy served Walgreens well until the beginning of the 21st century, by which time it had nearly saturated the U.S. market. By 2014, 75 percent of Americans lived within five miles of a Walgreens. The company was also facing threats to its core business model. Walgreens relies heavily on pharmacy sales, which generally are paid for by someone other than the patient—usually the government or an insurance company. As the government and insurers started to make a more sustained effort to cut costs, Walgreens’s core profit center was at risk. To mitigate these threats, Walgreens looked to enter foreign markets. Walgreens found an ideal international partner in…

internationally—and taking on debt. It strove to improve the in-store experience for shoppers, added cafes, and experimented with new concepts. Such a strategy may have worked a few decades earlier, but while Borders was investing in physical real estate, shoppers were flocking to the Internet. Borders was left with a conflicted strategy: Declining sales forced it to close hundreds of stores (including its entire Waldenbooks chain), while it doubled down on other retail outlets. Unfortunately, it treated the Internet like a passing trend instead of as a transformational phenomenon. The company outsourced its Web operation to Amazon—which obviously became a fierce rival. It waited until 2008 to develop its own Web strategy. Meanwhile, Amazon became the dominant player in online bookselling and e-books, introducing the Kindle e-reader. Its big brick and-mortar rival, Barnes & Noble, a laggard itself, later introduced the popular Nook e-reader and invested heavily in its own website.…

Give a critical reflection of Disney integration with ESPN and the change in market scenario with the arrival of 3D technology.