Kudler Fine Foods: Marketing Research.
Kuddler fine food can be described a s a popular San Diego area gourmet food store with strong revenues. The main goals of the company have always remained to expand the company and increase revenues and profits. It is also important to note that not only is the food offered by the company popular revenue, but also a high calibre gourmet store in great demand. It is also important to note that the main reason why the company was established in the year 1998 was to fulfil the needs of completely stocked Gourmet food store in La Jolla neighbourhood. The company mostly specializes in quality organic bakery items, produce cheese and dairy, meats among many others.
Importance of marketing research in the development of Kudler Fine Food’s marketing strategy and tactics
Marketing research can be defined as the chained process of collecting, recording and analyzing the data that is related to individual products and specific services within an organization towards customer satisfaction. The need for market research is based on the fact that it is only through the customer/audience need understanding that an organization can effectively meet them thus organizational achievements become major steps forward surpassing the competition within the market structure. There arises the need to collect and basically analyze the customer and competitors’ data within the marketplace.
Market research is also useful in the sale increment. Through company product or service sale increment, the organization gains the ability of profit maximizations. The customer needs, wants and attitude understanding towards company products helps in the gross determination of whether the products fit the bill so that the marketers are able to increase the sales per unit. This not only is significant in sale increment to the target consumers and those already in the product consumption process but rather key in attracting the non-users into the product customers.
Marketing research helps in competition survival. Organizations are able to survive stiff competitions since the research is helpful in ascertaining and understanding the potential competitors through provision of relevant information on their marketing strategies and networks, identity, their customer focus and operation scales. This in certain cases provides tactical survival techniques even without any competition. Additionally, market research enables in the understanding of the under-serviced consumers within the market structure.
On a third perspective, market research is significant in key decision making. The decision that pertains the products or services is reached at by the marketers through a market research. This helps in avoiding deceptions in cases where the marketers hold on the belief that their product satisfies the consumers while one on one research may have an indication of dissatisfaction from the products and so resorting to meeting their needs using products from the market competitors in many instances. Research ensures that proper information is acquired especially for the new products thereby reducing the risks associated with introducing a new product into the market.
Market researchers are also important in the manner that they assist in the achievement of profit maximization. Other than steps such as item optimizations, analysis, customer profitability and elasticity of the product or service price, the process of marketing research gives an open door to establishment and excavation of other proper profit maximization strategies. In real life, the price elasticity of a product is useful in ascertaining the effect of price inflation on the sales and consequent profits of individual products. This is important as it may change the objective of the firm from that of profit maximization to that of profit increment thereby gaining the vigour to survive in the long run.
Three areas where additional market research is needed
One of the area where additional marketing research is needed is product positioning. This is because product positioning is a competitive strategy that can easily lead to increased profit when handled with care. Therefore, Kudler Company should comprehensively research on the product positioning in order to come up with the best position for positioning the product so as to ensure that it remains relevant in the competitive market.
Another crucial area which needs further marketing research is the area that deals with customer retention. This is because customer retention is vital for any given company to succeed. Competitors should never be given chance to take away customers. Therefore, I recommend that further research be done in this area so as to find the best way for retaining the existing customers as well as attracting other new clients. This is because an organization with a large customer base always enjoys a large market share. In addition, the larger the customer base, the higher the profit margin.
It may be wise to introduce some types of rewards programs especially to the loyal customers on a long-term basis. Many other successful stores have similar programs and marketing research in this area would be very useful to find out how well this would work for Kudler. Another area of marketing research that might be useful to help build revenue is catering. There has been little catering involved with Kudler however, it has had good reviews. If catering is an area that will do well, then Kathy may focus her attention out there.
Kathy should also, look into hiring someone to take some of her responsibilities or at least learn the ordering process. That is in case something happens and someone else knows how to successfully run the business. There is also room to be able to save some money which in turn shall be used to purchase specialty products. There tends to be a lot left behind since the freshness preservative free items tend to be perishable sooner. Upxsuccess.com (2012). Yes, it is wonderful that Kathy is able to donate to those in need as well as staff can take home food, she still needs to look at the idea from a business aspect and waste of food is not profitable for her business. She should look into developing some type of plan to know exactly how much to order, when to order, and this can be done by doing additional marketing research in this area.
Analyze the importance of competitive intelligence and analysis in regards to the development of Kudler Fine Food’s marketing strategy and tactics
Competitive intelligence
It is the process of gathering and refining information about the companies’ goods and services. The information gathered will be vital to the Kudler Fine food company. This is because such information may be used to make strategic business decisions such as market positioning, product branding, and product differentiation among others. The collected information can be used to modify the products and services being offered so as to meet the customers’ satisfaction. The information gathered can also be used to decide on what business strategies to adopt in order to record higher profit margin and to also compete favourably in the market. Therefore, it is worth noting that the major importance of competitive intelligence and competitive analysis is to ensure that sound marketing strategic decisions are made within the company in order for the company to remain relevant in the competitive market. When perfect decisions are made as pertains to what market strategies to employ, the company is likely to favourably compete in a stiff competitive environment. This implies that superb decision making is vital for the success of the Kudler fine food.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is prudent to note that this company has a very powerful marketing strategy in the region. Its strategies such as branding and product positioning have seen it fully maximise on the profits being made. However, further research has to be done on the areas such as branding, product positioning and customer relationship. This is because they are the basis of success of any given organization.
References
Upxsuccess.com (2012). Virtual Organization for Kudler Fine Foods. Retrieved on 21st September, 2012, from http://www.upxsuccess.com/FIN370_Week5_Guide_Kudler.html.
Chase, R.E., Jacobs, R & Aquilano, N. J. (2006). Operations Management for a Competitive Advantage, (11th ed.). New York: The McGraw Hill Companies.
