Introduction
In introducing a new commodity into the market, it is necessary to evaluate critical features that influence the entrance of such goods in the market. One of the key factors considered in the launch of the new commodity in the market is the targeted market (Amin & Bashir, 2014). Determining the intended market is essential in production forecasting and sales. The intended market will dictate the amount of the commodity to manufacture, the packaging design, pricing, advertising and promotional methods (Beaver, 2000). The character of the intended market concerning the geographical arrangement of the intended market will facilitate the modeling of the varied channels of distribution of the commodity. The behavior of competing or similar commodities available in the sector will be carefully considered. The evaluation of these commodities will aid in determining promotion methods and pricing strategies for competing favorably in the product’s sector (Clowes & Tapp, 2008).
The paper will outline the sales and marketing plans considered by the Premier foods firm in the introduction of the new commodity. The manuscript will analyze the commodity’s nature and its feasibility in the market. Projected sales of the commodity in the target market will be reviewed. The author will evaluate the target market segment, the type of existent competitors and the new commodity characteristics that will offer the organization an advantage in the spirit of outdoing the competition. The paper will explain the Premier foods core strategy and values that it will adopt to attain, in an effective way, the set goals. The manuscript will review the marketing mix about the institution promotional and communication strategies, their pricing, distribution channels, and customer service relations.
Premier foods Company
Nature of the Product: Fortified cheese
Product Mission Statement
Evaluation of the Target Market
Analysis of the Nature of the Competition
Fortified cheese features
Core Marketing and sales strategy
Promotions and Communication Strategy
Pricing Strategy
Channels of Distribution
Customer Service relationship management
Premier Foods Company
Premier Foods Company is among the leading food companies in the United Kingdom and has a global presence. The firm has been in operation in the United Kingdom from the eighteenth century to the present. The purpose of the Nation is to provide the modern foods that are loved across the nations. The firm’s strategic plan is to develop growth within the critical categories of their operations. In so doing, the customer benefits from the development of the categories of the business. The firm has eight manufacturing sites and three distribution centers. The firm has a category that deals with the Cadbury’s cakes. In the firm commitment to introducing the modern categories of the foods that people love, it wishes to introduce fortified cheese in England (Premierfoods.co.ke, 2016).
Nature of the Product: Fortified cheese
Fortified cheese is a product that can be utilized by almost every single individual in the community. Cheese, being a milk merchandise that has successfully been scientifically proven and believed to be critical for the welfare of all the people across genders and is significantly appreciated by many consumers. Fortified cheese can be taken at any period of the day, as well as in all the seasons of the year (Boughanmi, Al-Musalami, Al-Oufi & Zaibet, 2007).
Objective/mission statement
The customers are estimated to retain loyalty to the brand for a period of five years. It is estimated that an annual increment of 5% annually will be attained and the amount of the total sales done by the fifth year will amount to 1.145 Billion Euros translating to 40% of the cheese market share. The industry growth is estimated to be linear and directly proportional to the rate of the growth of the England economy. However, an upper hand of 0.25% was put into consideration owing to the changes in the consumption trends that would be enhanced by the changes in the preferences and the tastes of the customers, entry of the new competitor commodities in the market as well as political stratification in the target region.
Analysis of the Target Market
England is the United Kingdom’s second largest country and borders Wales to the West and Scotland to the North. The country has a population of over 53 million people making it the most famous country in the United Kingdom. The country had a stable economy with the majority of the population being the productive class. Many different ethnic communities that had migrated from across the entire globe inhabit it (Office of the national Statistics, 2013). In England, the productive population formed the largest portion of the community with a portion of 67.2 % of the entire population. In England, the Christian religion and way of life dominated in the religious sector. The largest of England's population dwelt in urban centers (65.02%) and the other lot of the people occupied the rural areas (Office of the national statistics, 2013, p 1).
Economic Analysis
England economic analysis indicated that it had a low number of populations at risk of poverty according to the United Nations poverty measurement that stood at 15.9% (Europa.eu, 2015). England was open to international trade and collaborated with many nations and trading blocs with the key participants in the trade being China and the US (Surendra, 2007). The expansive European Union trading bloc opened England to the global trade. Most of England’s economy was driven by pasture with livestock and cattle derivatives forming the largest of its exports. The most of the urban population dwelt in rented apartments while the majority of the rural population lived in owned premises. The economically challenged that could not afford a home or to rent an apartment stood at 6.6% of the entire England population. (Office of the National Statistics, 2013, p. 5).
Analysis of the Nature of the Competition
The critical advantage of the commodity in England lay in the source of the raw materials for the production. England was the greatest of the producers of livestock and cattle derivative products. Milk that was the primary raw material for the fortified cheese manufacturing would be available from the local livestock farmers. By purchasing the raw materials from the local producers, the brand will form a loyal customer base, as they will develop a sense of ownership to the fortified cheese product.
The initial trials will be made in the urban centers. Premier foods firm will employ mass production to facilitate low pricing that will ensure a competitive upper hand in the cheese market in the region. Since everybody can consume cheese, the product will be packaged in varying sizes, colors and flavors to entice the majority of the population in relation to their tastes and preferences, particularly children, teenagers and women that are attracted to colors and varying packages (Young, 2010).
Fortified cheese features
The commodity is unique because it has fortifiers that are critical in dietary needs and comes in varying flavors to go with the different tastes as well as preferences of the customers. The fortification of the product will give it an obvious advantage in the sector’s fierce competition. Our cheese will be fortified with three classes of fortifiers for three different reasons. One of the fortifiers will be lysine that will be used to modify the taste of the cheese. Lysine has a lingering after taste that will make our product significantly different from our competitors (Hlais, Reslan, Sarieddine, Nasreddine, Taan, Azar & Obeid, 2012).
The second additive will be ascorbic acid. Ascorbic acid has many benefits to the human body including being anti-oxidant. Ganoderma herb will be added to the cheese product. The fungus belongs to the class of nutritious edible fungus that had been established in the old Chinese herbal medicine along with the Ginseng. Ganoderma is legendary believed to be more nutritious and to contain more medicinal values than Ginseng and other fungus in the traditional Chinese medicine (Siwulski, Sobieralski, Golak-Siwulska, Sokół & Sękara, 2015). The addition of the Ganoderma will be two parts per thousand of the cheese.
Our product is comprised of varied sizes as well as packages that have a different price tag. Our product will be packed in 50 g, 75 g, and also 100 g and 200 g and a king size of five hundred grams. The 50-gram piece will be retailing at $ 0.25, the 75-gram package will be retailing at $ 0.35, 100 gram will be costing $ 0.45, the 200-gram piece at $0.80, and the five hundred gram package will be retailing at $ 1.50. Most of our competitors start their packaging at 100-gram packages that retail $0.5 to $ 0.60. The packaging excludes the low-income consumers and children that would want to consume cheese in small quantities (Perreault, Jr., Cannon & McCarthy, 132).
Core Production and Marketing strategy
Premier foods’ critical strategy is to manufacture a unique commodity that adds value to our customer’s expenditure. By the promotions and the brand marketing, the organization will gain loyalty of the commodity from the clients (Gupta & Lonial, 2009). The pricing and packaging will seek to appeal to the entire composition of the England population and will serve for all the festivals and occasions. In so doing, Premier food’s brand will compete favorably and attain 40% of the cheese market share in 5 years.
Promotions and Communication Strategy
Premier foods firm will offer special discounts on particular events or days such as specialized packages for couples, birthdays, families and so forth. The shapes and the wrappers of the cheese products would vary to effectively appeal to the intended groups such as the heart shape to entice the couples. AB product testing will be done, and consumer oriented marketing and promotional techniques will be applied (Chini, 2006). Direct retailing to the final consumer will be used for the facilitation of the interaction of the firm`s direct sales representatives and the end users. Brand marketing will facilitate the identification of the consumers with the brand thus building the consumers loyalty. Personalized promotion and advertisement will be done by personalized emails, online open platforms facilitating the interaction of the consumers with the product and leave helpful feedback to the brand ambassadors (Samiee, Theodosiou & Katsikeas, 2013).
Pricing Strategy
Premier foods will employ mechanisms that would lower the cost of the production per unit of the product. The reduced cost of production per unit will facilitate the low pricing of the commodities in the market without reducing the amount of revenues generated from the sales (Berrick, Shauffer & Rodriguez, 2011). The brand marketing strategy will make the consumers identify with the product and remain loyal to the product and to the firm. In addition, most of the competitors do not use the brand marketing hence Premier foods will have an upper hand in the business. Discounts and customary markups will be offered directly to the bulk consumer at the point of sales and in the retail outlets. Cash discounts, offers and trade discounts will be offered to our customers on certain days and occasions in the year (Young, 2010). The packaging sizes will be different from our competitors and will comprise of the packages designed to target the majority of the population in England irrespective of the earnings.
Most of the competitors in the industry do not provide packages for the low-income earners. The Premier foods packaging will comprise of smaller 50 g and a 100 g packets retailing for $ 0.15 and $ 0.25 to cater for the low-income earners and teenagers. The low-income earners and the teenagers will form the greater portion of the target market as our competitors in the pricing have sidelined them. Varying methods will be used to entice and lure customers to our products such as colored wrappings for the children, heart shapes for the couples, and birthday offers of products inscribed “HAPPY BIRTHDAY.” (Graham, 2014). Other competitors in the industry do not use the method and this will give our firm a competitive upper hand in the market.
Distribution Channels
The main distribution method will be through the railway to reach the interior urban centers. The railway transport is well established in the region and connected all the major rural urban centers. The trains were reliable, cheap, and had established networks in the intended market. Most of the competitors in the market relied on their transport network that were costly and did not reach to the local urban centers. Ferries will be used for the short waterways where they were already in operation. The ferries provided free transport and would thus lower the transport cost for our goods. The lower cost of transport will aid in decreased prices while making profits that will outdo our competitors. Vans will be employed within the major cities. The vans will be branded and will be used for two purposes. One purpose will be for the transport and the second purpose will be for marketing and advertising. The many branded vans prying in the cities will increase the visibility of our brand.
Labeling and Marking will be made according to the regulations of the business product patent and registered trademark. The enterprise will produce the fortified cheese in England to lower the cost of production by reducing transport costs and using the available local raw materials. The production in England will be done by the transfer of the production rights to a local firm in England thus eliminating import taxes and warehousing expenses. The firm will run and maintain retail and wholesale outlets aimed to reach the majority of the population in England (Kundu & Kar, 2013).
Customer Service Relationship Management
The firm will strive continuously to embed their innovative ideologies and procedures into their manufacturing design that would give value for their customers while reducing cost and increasing brand quality and efficiency. The enterprise will continually evaluate the changing customer`s needs and preference. The varying customer behavior will direct the business on the model of the technology to adopt in their production process. The organization will introduce and implement the SAP Netweaver digital platform to enhance effective communication and institutional transformation plan within all the organization units (FBR, 2008).
The firm will focus on ensuring that their service is best for the critical points of distinction between the various competitors in the cheese industry in the country. The excellent customer care service will be extended to every consumer on every user`s shopping trip. The firm will establish an excellent testing platform and create more quality commodities to suit their consumer`s needs. The firm will offer two-year direct contracts to goat and beef farmers. The firm projects that the farmers thus awarded the supply contracts will remain loyal to the firm and the business products and influence the localities within that they live (Clowes & Tapp, 2008).
Conclusion
The introduction of the fortified cheese provides a unique commodity that will make it have a competitive upper hand in the cheese industry in England. Cheese can be viewed as a universal commodity that can be utilized by the majority of the England population irrespective of their religion, age, and is tome and season independent. Through selecting fortified cheese as the commodity to launch in England, Premier foods stand to have many benefits and advantages. The cheese manufacturing raw materials are available locally in England. Secondly, the largest of the England population uses livestock derivatives as the components of their staple meals. Thirdly, fortified cheese can be used by everyone and is independent of the time of the day.
Premier foods pricing and packaging designs will serve to provide the preferences, tastes and the needs of the consumers concerning their gender, age, occasions, and the economic status. Pro The firm`s advertising and the promotion plan that focuses primarily on brand marketing will foster loyalty to the product by the consumers buyers. By the extemporary customer service relationship entailing different product flavors, one-on-one interaction of the consumers and the product sales representatives will facilitate research and the development of the product for the effective meeting of the changing customer tastes and preferences. Having observed all these production and marketing factors, the introduction of the fortified cheese in England will be a success and will be controlling the market segmentation of 40% by the fifth year from the launch.
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