Marketing Management Research Proposal Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Marketing Management - Research Proposal display caseThis paper provides an overview of the crisis encountered by Sainsburys and aims to assess the companys recovery plan. Furthermore, this paper analyses the firms internal and external environment through the exercising of analytical tools such as the PEST and SWOT methods of analysis. In view of the results of the industry analysis, this paper as well recommends some strategic options that the company may undertake in order to facilitate its full recovery.Sainsburys grasp of supermarket was once the market leader in the UK supermarket sector. However, it currently occupies the third place, behind its major competitors Tesco and ASDA. The firm has been fight to keep hold of its market share since the mid-1990s. With this, the company posted dramatic onlyy declining profit margins (Wikipedia 2005). Indicative of Sainsburys dull performance, the firms pretax profit as at end-March 2005 plunged by almost 98% year-on-year, from 610 million in 2004 to only 15 million (Profits collapse at Sainsburys 2005). To note, it would have generated a negative bottom-line if not for the extraordinary gain on the disposal of its subsidiary in the United States (Wikipedia 2005).According to recently appointed Chief Executive Justin King, the bare(a) financial result is attributed to Sainsburys diminishing competitive edge. He cited that in the past years, as the companys competitors have intimately improved, Sainsburys failed to keep up. (Madslien 2005)Recovery ProgramIn view of the much needed improvement in the companys trading operations and marketing system, King spearheaded a 400-million recovery program. The proposed program covers a three-year period and aims to enhance Sainsburys marketing strategy (Profits collapse at Sainsburys 2005).To start off, King launched a direct mail campaign to about a million customers as part of its business review. This is undertaken in order for the company to be aware of customer s expectations as well as identify the critical areas for improvement. The result of this campaign was consistent with the contention of retail analysts that Sainsburys has grim problem ensuring stock availability. (Wikipedia 2005)This perceived weakness as revealed by the business review is immediately communicated to all store managers. Aside from this, the outcome was also announced publicly and was generally well received by the market and the media. With this, King pushed through with the recovery scheme by laying off about 750 headquarter rung and recruiting around 3,000 shop floor staff to ensure quality customer service and efficient replacing of stocks.Since the firms main problem is keeping shelves fully stocked, Sainsburys management activated two distribution centres to enhance logistics and turn to issues on stock availability (Wikipedia 2005). It was also reported that Sainsburys opted to end its ten-year contract with Accenture. After the system in place was deeme d ineffective, the firm decided to bring its IT infrastructure back in house over the forthcoming months (Ranger 2005).Apart from this, Sainsburys also announced the halving of the fund allocated for dividends. This is because the firms earnings would be plowed back to finance the recovery program. (Wikipedia 2005)In addition, to keep up with the competition, King appointed industry experts to join the