Marketing Considerations and Plans Essay Example for Free

Marketing Considerations and Plans Essay McDonald is one of the most internationally recognizable companies within the hospitality industry. Although I have not worked with McDonald ever, I am quite familiar with it as one of closest friends has been working with the marketing team of this restaurant chain for last four years. He keeps telling me about his company, how it runs its business so that it can maintain its top position within the fast food sector world wide. Apart from listening to my friend about his company, I also do research on McDonald by reading stories relating to McDonald published in various magazines, newspapers and on various websites as I am a fond of McDonald food staffs and love this fast food restaurant chain. McDonald Corporation listed in New York stock exchange has emerged as one of the world’s largest chain of fast food restaurants. It is most popular for its hamburger. Its customer base is so huge that worldwide it sells its products to around 47 million people on daily basis. The menu of McDonalds includes various sorts of burgers like hamburgers, cheese burgers etc. , products made of chicken, different sorts of breakfast items, French fries, various kinds of shakes, desserts and soft drinks. Mcdonald’s, however, quite often gets criticized over the healthiness of its products. These products are considered to be one of the important factors which are taking active part in increasing obesity in the western countries. The company, however, has made some effective measures in response to the rising obesity trend in the western countries and the criticism over the healthiness of its signature products. It has made some modifications to its menu by introducing several healthy food items like different types of salads, wraps and fruits. In spite of getting criticized over the healthiness of its products and having increasing competition within the industry, McDonald has been able to maintain its strong position within the industry it operates in. Its popularity has not decreased. Thus it would be quite interesting to look at the sources of its competitive advantage which have helped it to win the competition. In order to examine the sources of competitive advantage of McDonald, the strengths of the company will be analyzed in detail as strength of any company can be defined as a distinctive competence of the firm that gives it a competitive advantage in the market place. A firm can gain its strength from its financial resources, the image of its brand, leadership quality within the market and buyer-supplier relationships. (Competitive advantage, 2010; Ghosh, et al. n. d) In case of McDonald’s, its biggest strength is its brand image. Since McDonald’s is one of the most known chains of fast food in the world, its brand recognition seems to be its biggest strength. Its marketing campaign always focuses on brand recognition through continuous promotion of the brand name. Through its extensive marketing campaign world wide the company has been able to create an image in the people’s minds and introduce them to the fast food culture. Its customer base ranges from kinds to old generation. It has nearly 30,000 branches in as many as 120 nations across the world. However, 80 percent of its revenues are generated from the market of eight countries including US, UK, Japan, Australia, Canada, France, Brazil and Germany. The company has been able to expand its stores on the basis of three core strengths- cleanliness, delivery speed and customer care. McDonald has created a corporate symbol and through its highly successful marketing campaigns all round the world it has been able to develop a brand image and establish its logo in the minds of the people across the world. People are attracted to this logo and brand image and this attraction brings them to the stores. Although a number of competitors have emerged in the fast food industry, its rigorous marketing campaigns which are based on the company’s internal resources, external conditions and its relations with its shareholders have been able to strongly maintain its brand value in the market. (Ghosh, et al. n. d; Vijayarani, n. d. ) The brand name will not work in longer run unless brand value is mixed up with high quality product value. In order to obtain and maintain a strong position in the market, every company needs to use an appropriate marketing mix and product occupies one of the most significant positions within the marketing mix. Product value has been one of the greatest strengths of McDonald’s. When a customer enters into a McDonald’s store he/she know what to expect. The company places huge importance on its human resource and takes appropriate steps to satisfy it customers as well as its employees. As far as the product related issue is concerned, the company is also found to be quite innovative in introducing new products according to changing trends and tastes of the people. Not only that, it also offers different menu to the people living in different countries according to their tastes and the country’s culture. Fro example, in India it offers a menu which is completely different from its international offerings. In the stores situated in India, it has eliminated ham, mutton and beef burgers from the menu. India is found to be the only country where McDonald offers vegetarian menu. Which is more interesting is sauces, cheese etc, are also completely vegetarian in India. In India according to changing taste and preference of the customers, it has introduced Chicken Maharaja Mac. Thus the biggest strength of McDonald lies in the fact that it brings an internationally reputed brand with high class food quality and brilliant customer specific product features. This strength provides the company with huge competitive advantage. Vijayarani, n. d. ; Ghosh, et al. n. d) Till now only the sources of competitive advantages of McDonald have been discussed. But in order to survive amidst strong competition a company has to possess sustainable competitive advantages. Hence, it is now the time to look into sustainable competitive advantages of McDonald’s. For a company, its sustainable competitive advantage can be defined as the advantage which seems to be difficult or unfeasible for other co mpanies to own or infiltrate. The brand value, cost structure, vibrant customer care or its patent can be considered as sustainable competitive advantages for a company. An advantage should be considered as sustainable advantage only if the advantage has a distinct character or it is proprietary in nature. The sources of sustainable competitive advantages for McDonald’s can be as follows: ( Reidenbach and Goeke, 2006; Vijayarani, n. d) In order to build sustainable competitive advantage there should be a good integration and coordination between the company’s managerial and organizational process. If such integration takes place then there would be created the essential value as everyone will be chasing a common goal. In order to develop sustainable competitive advantage an organization is required to learn and introduce changes according to the need of the time and it should always be flexible towards changes that takes place in the external environment of the company, such as changes in customer’s taste and preferences, changes in government or legal restrictions, and development in the areas of technology. For McDonald’s, one of the principal reason behind surviving within current market competition is that the company is placing its focus on sustainable competitive advantages by making efforts to integrate organizational behavior with managerial expertise. McDonald’s, however, did not recognize the need of building sustainable competitive advantage previously. Earlier McDonald’s used to ignore this advantage as it was more interested in expanding its outlets across the globe than focusing on its core advantages. As a result of it, the company did not experience any massive change in its revenues with opening up of new outlets. In fact, it suffered huge loss unless it recognized the importance of building sustainable competitive advantage. The company was right in detecting the need of the hour and bringing about changes in its management process in order to possess completive edge over its competitors. ( Lamb et al. 2008; Levy and Weitz, 2001) A company can obtain an excellent position in the market through its financial, structural, and technological assets. All these assets significantly help in building sustainable competitive advantage for an organization. McDonald’s has been able to obtain a strong position in the market by its abundant financial resources along with plentiful structural and technological assets. Since 2003, the company has started to concentrate on identifying and implementing these assets in right direction that would bring improvement to the company. Thus these assets build one of the greatest advantages for the company. (Lamb et al. 2008; Levy and Weitz, 2001) Apart from all these, the vision and mission with which the company started its journey can be considered as one of the biggest competitive advantage fro McDonald’s. McDonald’s ability to sustain its dream over the years has provided it with a huge competitive advantage over its competitors. When a brand revolves around its vision in order to sustain and work in lieu with it, this results in developing significant sustainable competitive advantage for the brand. The McDonald’s started its business in order to help those people who did not have much time to cook or were too busy to go to an appropriate restaurant. The vision of McDonald’s was to offer quick service, and high quality food staffs at cheap rate. Over the years the company has been able to sustain this vision. Lamb et al. 2008; Levy and Weitz, 2001) Thus to sum it up it can be said that McDonald’s has been able to implement its best value based strategy by utilizing all its advantages which are unique to it and can not be copied by any of its competitors and thus it has build its competitive advantages which the company has been able to sustain over the years.

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Corporate-level strategy and business level strategy are respectively operationalized in terms of interindustry and intra-industry variation, According to Donald W. Beard. Experts identify different levels of strategy and in many cases, a firm might consider that business and corporate matters are the same; but when divided into strategies, there is a difference. Largely, corporate levels of strategy deal with predominant issues that do not constantly embrace precisely business whereas business level strategy is seldom concerned with anything but the business position of the firm. Every day companies compete against each other to attain and sustain competitive advantages that go to the heart of the strategic mangement. What business should a company compete in and how these companies be managed, is a vital issue. This paper will analyze the business-level strategies, the corporate-level strategies, and the competitive environment to determine the corporation's most significant com petitor. 1. Analyze the business-level strategies for the corporation you chose to determine the business-level strategy you think is most important to the long-term success of the firm and whether or not you judge this to be a good choice. Justify your opinion. Michael Porter offered three strategic options that a firm can use to overcome the five forces and achieve competitive advantage at the business level: overall cost leadership, differentiation, and focus strategies. Each strategy has the potential to allow a firm to surpass competitors within the same industry. The first generic strategy is the overall cost leadership that requires a group of related methods that include the following: †¢ Aggressive construction of efficient-scale facilities.... ...yees fit within the corporate culture believing that truly fun-loving and spirited employees bring superior customer service through their inherent attitudes that are allowed to shine without the confining regulations and propriety that so many other airlines practice. Southwest employees routinely go the extra mile to help a customer because—by and large—they genuinely care about making people happy. Just as most other wildly successful companies, Southwest’s philosophy agrees that happy employees translates into happy customers and happy stockholders. Just how and why organizations do better than other goes to the center of the strategic management. Using Southwest model, I belive the focust stragegy play an important role for the long-term success of the organization. Such strategy enable a firm to enjoy superior performance and improve its competitive position.

History of Caura River Essay

The Caura area was once an Arawak settlement and it lay in the valley along the Tacarigua river approximately five miles north of the eastern main road. When the British captured Trinidad in 1797, nineteen lots were marked along the river area. This represented a strip that began from the Caura Valley entrance and lead right up to the head waters of Tacarigua River. This distance covered became known as Caura River. The location and climate in the mountain area lead to the inhabitation of settlers who initiated the cocoa and coffee estates in the region. The valley was one of the healthiest localities in Trinidad. In 1943, the government and Sir Bade Clifford acquired all the land in and around the village of Caura in order to build a dam to supply the entire north of Trinidad with water. The plan was to dam the Caura River and construct a three hundred acre lake in the village area. In 1946, all the buildings and people were cleared and workers began to lay foundations of the dam. No further work has been carried out on the dam and all that can be seen are remnants from this project. After this, there was an attempt to make Caura and aesthetically pleasing park. Caura recreational park is situated in a central portion of the Tacarigua river valley in the St. George County east which is an estimated nine kilometers from the Tacarigua town on Caura Royal road. The park is approximately one and a half hours away from Port-of-Spain and almost an hour away from Arima. Improved conditions of Caura Royal Road has led to easier access to site hence more visitors. Vegetation is not unique but is important for water shed management and aesthetic reasons. Vegetation is mostly secondary growth. It is estimated that 60 % of the park area is formed by natural vegetation. However, cultivative species such as the Diptoryx ordorata(tonca bean) and calabash are common. Bamboo is also plentiful and is planted in riparian zones for ricer bank stabilization. The vegetation and the present ecological factors encourage a diversity of wild life. There is a presence of many forest ornamentals and fruit trees due to agricultural estates. Mammals present include agouti, lappe, deer, armadillo/ tattoo, opossum, manicou or porcupine. Birdlife include parrots such as the common orange winged parrot and the yellow headed parrot. There is also a population of the blue crowned motmot. Organisms include guabine, tata, cascara, cray fish and mountain crabs. Reptiles and Amphibians include tree frogs, the common iguana and three of the four types of venomous snakes. These are large coral snakes, Mapipire zanara and mapipire balsian.

Heart of a Dog - Mikhail Bulgakov - 3407 Words

The Heart of a Dog Mikhail Bulgakov Andrew Wright ‘The Heart of a Dog’, written by Mikhail Bulgakov in 1925, is a satirical parable illustrating the provincial failures of the Russian regime, post-revolution. According to S. Fusso, Bulgakov’s allegory is not, unlike Orwell’s, â€Å"simple or naà ¯ve†,1 but one that offers an exploration of various different themes, from the ethical implications of eugenics â€Å"that so fascinated the scientific community during the 1920s†,2 to the farcical revolution of 1917 and its misguided attempt to create a new Soviet man. The novella chronicles the life of a stray Moscow dog, Sharik, who, upon being rescued by a seemingly benevolent surgeon, Philip Philipovich Preobrazhensky, finds himself subjected†¦show more content†¦Preobrazhensky’s indignation towards Homo Sovieticus and the new regime is plainly apparent throughout the text, with the professor advising that, lest one lose one’s appetite, one ought to refrain from reading s oviet newspapers or discussing subjects of Bolshevism at the dinner table.17 His disillusionment is evident in his failure to recognise the alleged Soviet emancipation of women who were, according to B. Clements, independent from prescribed roles and male domination.18 Unlike Lenin, who mourned what he described as the capitalistic â€Å"exclusion of women†19, Preobrazhensky would appear to remain unconvinced by Marx’s belief that â€Å"social progress can be measured by the social position of the female sex†20, attempting to undermine a female member of the housing committee who he describes, with a disgusted tone, as â€Å"a woman dressed as a man†21 to which they â€Å"fell silent and their mouths fell open†22, questionning the Professor as to â€Å"what difference does that make, comrade?†23 Preobrazhensky’s disdain for the regime is evident in thisShow MoreRelatedThe Heart Of A Dog By Mikhail Bulgakov818 Words   |  4 PagesThe Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov can be read in many different layers. The reader could view it as an absurd comical novel; or it could be read as a political parable of the failings of the soviet union and the Russian Revolution. Throughout the novel it can be seen through the hints of the soviet over power, the characters, and metaphors that the novel was about the creation of the new Soviet man and a criticism of eugenics that the Soviet union s system promoted. This novel was writtenRead MoreThe Heart Of A Dog By Mikhail Bulgakov1171 Words   |  5 PagesThe Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov was written in 1925 at the peak of the New Economy Policy period, when communism appeared to be weakening in the Soviet Union. The novel has been interpreted as humorous tale and as an allegory of the communist revolution. The reader could view it as an absurd comical novel; or it could be read as a political parable of the failings of the soviet union and the Russian Revolution. Throughout the novel it can be seen through the historical hint in the novel, theRead MoreThe Death Of A Dog Essay1585 Words   |  7 Pagesand artists. Each captures and critiques the phenomenon in front of them. Some see beauty in the flames, while others condemn them. Mikhail Bulgakov, a well know science fiction author, wrote a novel about a scientist who gives a stray hound the pituitary gland and reproductive organs of a deceased man. The Heart of a Dog brilliantly pa ralleled the perception of a dog-turned-man to that of an unquestioning communist follower. The Russian Revolution is one of the most well-known and internationallyRead MoreRussia And The Soviet Union1745 Words   |  7 Pagesform of economic inequality and population division. This is a common theme that remained throughout Russian history until the Bolshevik Revolution, a revolution that paved the way for the establishment of the communist Soviet Union. In Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov, the theme of whether or not Russia truly transformed into a new state, and how much of the change is actually of substance and not superficial, was questioned. While Russia was considered a unique communist state after the BolshevikRead MoreThe Soviet Union And Czechoslovakia Essay1679 Words   |  7 Pagescoin were the bourgeois specialist who were middle class citizens that were allowed operated outside of the Communist ideas of redistribution of wealth and property. A great example of this was in the surrealistic novel by author Mikhail Bulgakov titled The Heart of a Dog. In the book Dr. Preobrazhensky, an example of a bourgeois specialist, is confronted by the â€Å"new house management committee†, who are representative of the Communist Proletariat, on the issue of his lavish household accommodations