Question

Describe Walmart's Raw Materials, R&D, Production/Manufacturing, Distribution, Sales marketing/sales, & Customer service (Primary areas).

For each functional area please give a description of the major processes where they (building blocks of competitive advantage) may apply, Superior efficiency, superior quality, superior customer service, and superior innovation, and or strengths and weaknesses.  

Answer 1

Below is the desription for Walmart's Primary Areas :-

1. Raw Materials - for them the raw material for them would be the consumer products that they procure and sell from different companies. The moat for them in raw material space is that they procure the goods in bulk which gives them an exceptional advantage of negotiations with the companies to get the best price & offers and this reduce the middlemen like distributors in between, so they are able to provide the goods at discount prices to their customers.

2. R&D - the R&D applies in their customer relationship management (CRM), in which they keep on innovating & experimenting. They have an exceptional client database which they use to manage the preferences & tastes of their customer and provide an individual-centric experience whcih help them achieve higher footfalls to their stores.

3. Production/Manufacturing - they mainly procure goods from the market but also sell goods under their own branding for which they produce & manufacture at their own facility. With having a huge customer database they can easily find out the choice & taste of the customer and what the other producers lack in their products which they can include & push the customers to switch brands and sell their own products.

4. Sales marketing/Sales - this has been the key area for Walmart, with their big retail stores & eye-popping discounts they have been able to sell in huge quantities. The placing of the products is such that customers tend to buy more and due to the bigger store size they are able to pursuade the customer to shell out more money from their pockets. Also the negotiation ability with the producers help them to provide more discounts to customers than other retail stores and have a good profit margin at the end to be the market leader and grow at a rapid pace.

5. Customer Service - this is a prime area for which Walmart has been world renowned, the good use of CRM, loyalty programs, collaboration with credit card companies & banks, providing customer centric offers and usage of analytical tools make them best in their space. The quality which they maintain also helps to draw customers to their stores. Also their has been instances in the past where they have stopped selling goods from a particular brand after receiving compalints from their customer, which shows their commitment.