Executive Summary
The Oriental Organic Garments is a garment manufacturing company in London. It is engaged in production of garments from 100% organically grown cotton. For exploiting the increasing trend of organic cotton garments among the consumer segments in UK, the company aims to follow appropriate marketing and financial strategies. The firm’s business goal is to create a brand image of high quality product at low rate through appropriate business strategy and thus achieve customer- loyalty for their product.
Topical Headings
In this module the topics discussed are marketing strategies, strategy overview, mission, marketing objectives, financial objectives, target markets and positioning.
Marketing Strategies
The Oriental Organic Garments Company produces 100% pure organic cotton garments. For the marketing of its products, the company aims to start its own retail units across UK. The products are ranging from T-shirts for men and women.
For entering into a highly competitive market like the garment market, a well planned marketing strategy is essential. Fluctuating customer needs and keen competition by rival firms imposes more pressures on marketing. Appropriate marketing strategy is essential for achieving customer satisfaction in a continuously changing business environment. The sensitivity of identifying the external market environment and sustainable competitive advantages for the firm is important factors that help to formulate the marketing strategy. Anticipating the competitor’s actions is the key determinant of success of a marketing strategy.
The marketing strategy followed by the Oriental Organic Garments is as below:
- TV promotions;
- Developing own websites;
- Fashion magazines.
In case of garment products the adoption of TV promotions is an appropriate technique as it helps to present the unique designs of the brand in time for attracting the customers. Most of the customers are influenced by TV adds for their product selection. By developing own websites the business will get a prestige. Through website they can able to inform the customers about their product features. The introduction of new designs on products can be easily transmitted to the customers through its website. Fashion magazines should also adopt for the presentation of unique designs of the firm’s products.
Through the application of strict cost control techniques on entire production process, the company aims to reduce the cost of production at its lower level. The quality of products is ensured through appropriate quality measurement techniques at all stages of production. Thus it ensures that only standardized quality products are send out for marketing. Company aims to create a brand image of high quality products at competitive prices for its products for creating brand loyalty among different customer groups. Industry and competition are crucial factors that influence strategic choice. The rivalry among existing firms, threat of entrants, threat of substitutes, bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers also should be analyzed for taking strategic decisions.
Customer satisfaction is a significant factor of profitability of any business. For getting sustainable profit growth customer loyalty is essential. “Provision of customer service is a good way to achieve greater customer retention which will provide higher profitability to the business.“
Strategy Overview
For ensuring continuous market growth, timely modification of policies according to changing environment is prescribed by the company. The company estimates that with the products made up of 100% purely cotton, it should attain good market share in the garment manufacturing industry.
The key trend in garment industry is continuous change in customer needs and habits. Thus firms are involved in continuous innovation and restructuring of their business.
Due to the scarcity issues relating to water, cotton, and skilled labor resources for the garment production, the firms follow “consolidation and relocation strategies” for existence.
Due to these changing trends in garment industry, strategy overview with continuous changes in policies is followed by the company according to the environmental changes.
Mission
The mission of the company is to provide good quality organic garments at low rates to customers. They aim to create a brand image of high quality organic garments at economical rate for their product. It aims to achieve market leadership within the next five years. Through customer satisfaction its object is to become a prominent organic cotton retailer in the UK.
Marketing Objectives
Customer satisfaction is the key element for achieving growth in garment industry. Customers always attracted to quality products at reasonable rate. Thus the company aims to produce quality products at least cost. Appropriate pricing policy also followed for placing it in the competitive garment market. The pricing of products is done by taking into account the expectations of customers. For getting market acceptance at the initial stage of marketing low price should be charged with least profit content. Better after-sale customer support also arranged for solving customer complaints in time. Sales personnel should be selected and trained properly for canvassing different types of customers. Customer satisfaction experience has a great effort on achieving customer loyalty. The “growth, profitability” , and market value of a business is depends on its customer relations.
Product differentiation can be introduced by applying various color, design and graphics on products. For achieving customer satisfaction, the firm provides chance for them to incorporate their ideas on the products. The firm also assures that only limited number of production on a particular design in order to reduce too many similar items.
“Product differentiation” is essential for existing in a competitive market. Business firms always require making differentiation in their product for retaining their customers. “Product differentiation” is a key factor that affects the buying decision of customers.
For influencing the purchase decisions of customers the outlet units are designed with appropriate planning. Techniques such as outside signs, window displays, counter pieces, display racks etc are arranged for attracting customers. It is followed for the fact that 2/3 of purchasing decisions of customers are made in the stores and thus outlet designing is also very important.
Financial Objectives
The long term financial objective of Oriental Organic Garments is to attain a market share of 33 % within next five years. On the short term basis it aims to achieve break even sales at the end of the financial year with continuous growth in sales with reducing cost of production. For achieving improvement in financial performance the business needs to fix its financial targets. Through the timely measurement of financial performance the strength and weakness of business in meeting its financial goals can be analyzed. Setting up of clear cut financial objectives is essential for measuring improvement in financial performance of the business. Accurate financial strategy should be followed for achieving the business objectives. “Weekly or monthly “based observation of financial performance is necessary for meeting performance targets. The measurement will provide valuable information on financial performance and thus corrective action can be taken in time.
The Oriental Garments aims to get profitable growth through appropriate cost control techniques. For this proper financial planning has made on a monthly basis. Business targets are initially fixed and efforts are made to reach the target. Thus the firm can ensure the timely growth of the business. The required financial resources for the business are collected from comparatively low cost sources such as banks and other financial institutions under government control.
Pricing strategy. For creating the brand image of low priced product appropriate pricing policy should be followed. This type of brand image limits the company’s product’s price to a lower level. They aimed at reducing the operation cost through the application of various cost control techniques. Thus they can achieve the goal of creating the brand image of low priced and quality goods.
Cost saving strategy. For attaining the proposed brand image of the product, Oriental Garments has required to adopt strict cost control techniques in all levels of the business. The production and marketing should be done in cheapest ways. They also undertake total quality management techniques such as operational control, performance gap analysis and bench marking to ensure the quality of the product at low cost. :
Target Markets
The target market of Oriental Garments is customers within the age group of 15 to 30 years where among them the trend for organic garments is increasing. A wide range of products such as casual wear, formal wear, sports and swimwear, garments for winter and party wear are manufactured by them.
From the market research it derived that the organic products are already exist in the market. Sale of organic cotton garments have been growing at the rate of 50 %. This increasing trend will be helpful for the growth of Oriental Garments. But due to the growing trend, competition in this field will also growing. In order to overcome keen competition in the industry low, medium and high priced products will have to be produced. This pricing differentiation should be based on designs of the products and not on the basis of its quality.
Target markets involve the ideal selection of segments of the market for the particular product. Along with the “attractiveness of the market segment”, its suitability with the objectives, resources and capabilities of the firm also has to be taken into account before selecting the target market. The Size, growth rate, intensity of competition, brand loyalty of existing customers, the advantages for getting market share, the promotional expenditures of rival firms in the segment, etc has to be considered when selecting the market segments.
Positioning
For getting entry and exist in a competitive market like the garment market creation of a better brand image is necessary. Thus the brand image of low price, high quality organic garment for the Oriental Garments will help firm to attain loyalty customers. In the garment market the price of the product is an important matter influencing the customer’s buying decision. Customers always compete with the industry by forcing down the prices, bargaining for higher quality products at lower price. The firm’s effort to produce high quality goods at low cost will be helpful for attaining continuous market growth.
References
Quick MBA, Marketing, Marketing Strategy. 2008. Web.
Customer Satisfaction – a Critical Component of Profitability, Customer satisfaction by Vadim Kotelnikov. 2008. Web.
Pricing in the Global Garment Industry by Nina Ascoly. 2008. Web.
High Performance and the Customer Experience, Customer Satisfaction in the Changing Global Economy. 2008. Web.
Product Differentiation Helps You Build Competitive Advantage by more – for small business. 2008. Web.
Improving financial performance through clear objectives. 2008. Web.
Target market Selection, Marketing by NetMBA. 2008. Web.