Strategy Implementation, Evaluation and Control

STRATEGY FORMULATION 8

Strategy Formulation

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MGT/498

March 20, 2017

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Strategy Formulation

Long term Goals and Objectives

The mission and vision statement of Coca Cola Company, a range of the internal and external factors to the organization are integrated by the relevant inputs to the strategic planning process. The Coca Cola Company is currently an international organization and they target different areas across the globe with various products, improving their popularity and brand name. Basically, all the bottling partners function closely together with their customers such as grocery stores, convenience stores, street vendors, and movie theatres. The Coca Cola Company is considered to be a frontrunner in the beverage industry with a huge global presence and a reliable brand. The objectives of the company are to enlarge its profitability by reducing the cost via efficient and productive facilities, focus on environmentally friendly bottling production and enforce the aspect of sustainability in their business. Additionally, the company aims at diversifying its portfolio via partnership and innovation to keep the demands of consumers.

Through market segmentation, the company does not put their target to a particular segment but is adapting its marketing strategy by creating new products. Additionally, it employs a mixture of undifferentiated and niche directing strategies to steer their sales. Coca Cola uses competitive positioning strategy to emerge beforehand their competitors within the beverage industry. It is noted that the company does not have a specific target market but most of their target marketing is targets young people.

The company should pursue people who are around 12 years old. Coca Cola also needs to pursue health-conscious consumers. They also need to target affluent young people with products such as Coca Cola Life. In the selected young the company will use product diversification to give their customers a variety of products to choose from. The company will provide a powerful and extensive portfolio of beverages to the consumers and unceasingly explore the encouraging categories of beverages to ensure development in the various markets. The beverage portfolio of the company consists of the carbonated soft drinks, juices, bottled water, teas, milk, coffee, and orangeades. The company considers participative marketing by developing common values for the entire stakeholders. They will tailor their wide portfolio of products as well as the packages for the stores on the native socioeconomic population, appropriate consumption events and the distinguishing characteristic of the stores.

The company has adequate resources and capabilities to ensure that they remain competitive in the beverage market. First, the company has strong and sustainable financial resources. This can be used to put heavy financial investment in such markets. The investment will be used to build a strong brand, infrastructure, and also develop a close partnership with distribution firms. The company will be divided into four departments that include the sales, marketing, Human Resource, and the ICT department. Every department will be armed with appropriate facilities to effectively run such departments. The ICT department will be very crucial in testing the product quality.

The general brand of Coca Cola will give the company a sustainable competitive price. The company will capture value and sustain a competitive advantage by by producing quality products. Additionally, they will continue to advertise their brand and image and acquire more franchise networks across the globe. The systems of the company will be based on the organizational structure and offer timely decision making to ensure that the company operates efficiently. The company will also ensure that the customers are fully satisfied with their services and products. This will include an efficient customer feedback channels in which the customers will be able to air their concerns, views, and needs.

For the company to be successful, it will be competition oriented. It will have good competitive strategies that will focus on the weaknesses of the competitor and avoids their strengths. Some of the strategies that this company will employ include cost focus, cost leadership, differentiation, as well as differentiation focus. This will be adopted to gain control in the market. The company will produce goods that are far much different from other competitor. Differentiation will be achieved via product modification and increase the quality of the products and put slightly higher prices. This is a psychological way of winning the confidence of the consumers. The high premium charges will cover the additional production cost. The company will focus on producing its products at the lowest cost. Doing a market analysis will be very essential to determining the special needs of customers. With enticing packaging and different labelling techniques, the number of sales of their products will basically improve. Following the differentiation strategy by investing in advertisement to differentiate and develop a unique image for their product will enable customers to understand the products offered and gain a leading position among competitors.

Through vertical integration, the company will own the supply chain. It will manufacture and sell their products and own the brands, and control consumer brand marketing initiatives. Vertical integration will be a check for Coca Cola and it will increase its reach to the consumers.

Coca Cola will work together with other bottling companies globally aims to operate in a more extensive distribution system. More essentially, the company will need to form partnership with McDonald’s Corporation. Many consumers are normally habituated to taking a meal with a coke. This means that soft drink is a important revenue stream for McDonald’s Corporation. Because of the incredible contribution of McDonald’s to Coca Cola Company’s returns, it would strategic to form an alliance with them.

Under competitive advantages, the company will provide world class management training to its executives to improve their capabilities exchange experience. It will also incorporate advanced business models to maximise their sales revenue. Being excellent in customer relationship and focus extensive portfolio of packages and beverages according to the requirements of the consumer will be an added advantage to gain control of the market. To come closer to the consumers and satisfy their ever-changing needs, the company will open many one-stop shops for its customers in various places and offer a complete range of beverages. Additionally, the company will continuously increase its distribution and manufacturing capacity to maximise their efficiency of operation.

The Organization Chart

References

Dess, G. G., & Miller, A. (2013). Strategic Management. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Hitt, M., Ireland, R., & Hoskisson, R. (2013). Strategic Management: Concepts and cases: Competitiveness & globalization (10th Ed.). Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage learning.

Wheelen, T. & Hunger J. (2010). Concepts in Strategic Management & Business Policy: Achieving Sustainability (12th Ed.). Prentice Hall: Pearson Education.