DISTINCTIVE COMPETENCIES
STARBUCKS:
Starbucks is a coffee company operating its own outlets in different markets of the world. It is maintaining a sustainable market share with an average market growth. The competition is tough in the coffee industry and many rivals are competing to get the competitive advantage but Starbucks have been succeeded to maintain its competitive edge in the coffee industry. Starbucks differentiated it self from competitors with the following distinctive competencies (Kirbyson, 2004; Starbucks, n.d.):
- Well designed and maintained supply chain which allow the company to provide premium coffee quality with related items that are considered as a supportive food to eat with coffee.
- Progressive personal policies and procedures that are specially design to give the value to the customers.
- Innovation and high quality leading to attracting more customers, for instance the unique drink names with the stylish designed outlets appealing the customer.
- Effective and efficient customer responsiveness which results in creating strong relationship with the customers to create sustainable band image for a long term period. This in turn results in the creations of strong emotional association with the customers to retain them for a long term.
HEWLETT-PACKARD:
It is a computer manufacturing and distribution company and operating in different parts of the world. It is competing with huge rivals like dell, Samsung, apple and Google. Hewlett-Packard is still succeeded in sustaining its market share with an increasing market growth in this tough competitive industry. The focus of the hp is on making continuous innovations in the product and procedures. Three distinctive competencies of hp are (Hp, n.d.; Zhang, 2010):
- Reduce complexity:
The cost of containing IT staff in every branch is too costly in any business of the today’s world. So the hp has made the innovation in the structure to make available the services of IT professionals in every branch by linking all the branches with the centralized office and made a single network for solving all the issues.
- Lower cost competitive advantage:
Hp is reducing its cost of all the functions by converting it on a single network and executing it by the few specialized professionals. Also producing new innovation in production processes to eliminate the wastage material cost.
- Enhance the supply chain process:
It has made good productive relationship with its suppliers and distributors to improve the supply chain process of the company to get the competitive advantage other than the production.
BURGER KING:
Burger king is one of the largest fast food chains in the US and has more then 40 franchises in different parts of the world. It is competing with huge rivals of the fast food chain industry that are MacDonald’s and KFC. They are giving the tough competition to the burger king chain. But still burger king is competing with a sustainable market share along with good market growth in the international market. There are few differentiating factors and distinctive competencies of the burger king which led it to get the competitive advantage which are as follow (Burger King, n.d):
- The process of flame broiling the burgers.
- Cost control measures in order to offer lower prices as compare to the competitors and come up with attractive deals with suitable complementary items.
- Well trained staff and well defined standard operating procedures in order to create the three minute service standard which provides extra ordinary value provided to the customers
- Ability to tailor the services according the customer needs. This in turn allows the company to focus on building relationship with the customers to retain them for a long term. At the same time the company strong analyzes the needs of different customer groups belonging to the different countries to make innovations or changes according to the needs and wants of targeted customers.
References
Burger King. (n.d.). About BK. Retrieved July 12, 2013, from http://www.bk.com/en/us/company-info/about-bk.html
Hp. (n.d.). About HP. Retrieved July 12, 2013, from http://www8.hp.com/us/en/hp-information/index.html
Kirbyson, G. (2004). Howard Schultz: uncommon grounds. Retrieved July 12, 2013, from http://www.brandchannel.com/careers_profile.asp?cr_id=47
Starbucks. (n.d.). Our Starbucks mission statement. Retrieved July 12, 2013, from http://www.starbucks.com/about-us/company-information/mission-statement
Zhang, H. (2010). Research Hewlett Packard through its value chain. International Journal of Business and Management, 5(8), 179-190
