Question

Listed below you will find some WEAKNESSES and THREATS for Starbucks, read them

carefully then proceed to answer the questions that follow:

Starbuck Weakness

:

1) Customers not willing to wait in long lines at stores during morning rush hour and lunch hour.

2) Coffee dominant business with a poor reputation for creativity around new product and companion product development.

3) Too dependent on word of mouth to create brand awareness.

Starbucks Threats:

1) Better value offered by local coffee house shops and national companies like Dunkin Donuts and McDonalds McCafe.

2) Downturn in the economy can decrease customer traffic and spending.

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PART I : MARKETING ASSIGNMENT QUESTIONS

1). Assume you are the Vice President of Marketing for Starbucks.

Select 1 Weakness and 1 Threat from the list provided above,and explain how you would recommend taking that selected weakness and turning it into a strength and the selected threat and turning it into an opportunity.

Part 2:

Provide 2 explanations as follows:

2a) Explain how the weakness turned into a new strength would impact the disciplines of Marketing, Finance, Management and Operations.

2b) Explain how the threat turned into a new opportunity would impact the disciplines of Marketing, Finance, Management and Operations.

(3-4 Pages)

Answer 1

1). Let us take weakness as - Customers not willing to wait in long lines at stores during morning rush hour and lunch hour.

We can create an online portal where customers can place their order with FURTURE time of arrival. This will have the company to receive orders in advance and employees can start working as per it so that customer does not have to wait in long lines for orders. Also, we can mark orders with unique number, and this will help the employee to segregate orders.

We also can have self-ordering automated machine which will be placed at stores and customers can order through that machine. This will help the company to channelize its employee in other activities which will speed up order closure time and customer will not have to require in long lines.

Let us take Threat as - Better value offered by local coffee house shops and national companies like Dunkin Donuts and McDonalds McCafe.

We can offer premium and higher quality products which are currently not offered by other companies. We also can provide better value products we can have combo of products with attractive discounts which will increase in the volume of sales as well.

2a) As stated above, we can convert this weakness to opportunity by online portal / self-ordering machine.

Marketing –

· This will help to uplift the customer satisfaction.

· This will help to lower order closure time.

Finance –

· This will help to increase sales, as there will be an increase of footfalls because customers now will no longer wait in lines for order.

· This self-ordering machine will reduce cost as requirement of employees in store will be less.

Management and Operations –

· Online portal as well as self-ordering machine will help for smoothening operations at stores.

· It will also help to create a database of customers

2b) As stated above, we can convert this threat into a new opportunity by adding new products in the list.

Marketing –

· This will help to attract new customers and increase market share for the company

· This will create a better brand value.

Finance –

· This will help to increase volume, which will lead to higher sales.

· This will lead to higher company value.

Management and Operations –

· This will help us for optimize utilization of resources.