How the Company Seeks To Deliver Customer Value - Assignment Example

?Using an Organisation of Your Choice Write a Report That Explains How the Company Seeks To Deliver Value Table of Contents Introduction 3 Organisational Objectives 3 Product and Brand Portfolio 5 Pricing Strategies 6 Distribution Strategies 7 Promotion Mix 8 Conclusion 10 References 12 Introduction The Coca-Cola Company is one of the leading multinational companies, which operates in more the 200 countries across the world. The company was established during the late nineteenth century. Headquarter of the organisation is located at Atlanta in the United States of America. The company is regarded as one of the most respected organisations around the globe. Furthermore, it is regarded as world’s largest non-alcoholic beverage company in terms of manufacturing, marketing and distribution. The corporation is committed towards, meeting the needs and tastes of its discriminating customers spread across the world with continuous innovation and by delivering quality of drinks. In order to strengthen its brand image and increase customer awareness, the company makes considerable investment in sales and marketing activities. The operations of the company are categorised into six major segments which involve Eurasia and Africa, Latin America, Pacific, Europe, North America, Bottling Investments and Corporate (Hartogh, 2007). Correspondingly, the purpose of the report is to critically examine and explain how the selected company i.e. The Coca-Cola Company seeks to deliver customer value. Organisational Objectives The Coca-Cola Company has established missions and objectives in order to guide its operations in the future period. Accordingly, the mission and objectives of the company are to: Refresh the entire world Inspire moments of cheerfulness Create value and ascertain transformation everywhere the company involves Similarly, the organisation has also articulated certain vision in order achieve its missions effectively and smoothly. Correspondingly, the visions of the company are subdivided into six major categories which include profit, people, portfolio, partners, planet and productivity. The vision of the company is briefly explained below: Profit: The company intends to provide fair returns to its shareholders while performing its organisational responsibilities People: The organisation aims at offering a cordial place for its employees to work wherein every individual is inspired to contribute their best towards the accomplishment of the organisational missions Portfolio: Coca Cola further intends to create new brands and sustain strong ‘brand portfolio’ by prudently meeting the needs of its customers Partners: The company also intends to grow its business along with ensuring the growth of its partners as well as aims at creating nurturing relationship with all its business partners Planet: Coca Cola not only strives to increase its ability to generate the revenue but also desires to become one of the most responsible corporate citizens Productivity: It aims at being a highly operative, lean and fast-moving corporation Source: (The Coca-Cola Company, 2013) Product and Brand Portfolio Coca-Cola offers an assortment of 500 brands and 3500 beverage products in different locations of its operations. The products of the company include sparkling and still beverages such as water, teas, coffees, juice drinks, sport drinks and energy drinks. It can be stated that the organisation has strong brand image across the globe. Essentially, a brand can be defined as the promise made by the business organisation to satisfy the needs of its customers. A strong brand image facilitates the business organisation to reinforce its reputation as well as seek large customer base. As far as branding is concerned for Coca-Cola, it has been ascertained that the company has made maximum utilisation of available resources for developing a strong brand image. The strong brand image of the company has facilitated it to acquire greater competitive market in the non-alcoholic beverage segment (Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc, 2010). Moreover, the superior brand image of the company has also facilities it to attain loyal and large customer base which has ultimately contributed towards increasing the revenue generation capability of the corporation. Undoubtedly, it can be argued that the company possesses augmented brand value and a strong brand portfolio. During the year 2009 and 2010, Coca-Cola was ranked as the best global brand. During the year 2010, the brand value of the company was calculated to be more than US$70,452 million. The company owes large portfolio of product brand. The organisation is the owner of the world’s top four non-alcoholic beverage related brands comprising Diet Coke, Coca Cola, Sprite and Fanta. It has been ascertained that every day the company serves more than 1.1 billion Coca Cola beverages. It can be argued that the company’s forward looking strategies have significantly helped it to emerge as the most popular beverage brand across the world. Moreover, it can be firmly advocated that the corporation has always been engaged in identifying the customer preferences and tastes so that the requirements of the customers are met in a timely manner. Thus, one of the vital reasons behind its success can also be attributed towards its ability to accurately identify the preferences and tastes of its customers spread across the globe. It is further determined that over the years, the company has brought significant changes in its product assortment in accordance with the changing market trends (Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc, 2010). Pricing Strategies As stated earlier, The Coca-Cola Company is the leading beverage organisation in the world. The company over the years has been able to gain momentum and growth in the rapidly growing beverage industry. It started to globalise its business operations during the year 1990. Correspondingly, the marketing strategies of the company have significantly aided it in successfully globalising its business operations (The Saylor Foundation, 2013). It can be firmly asserted that the organisation faces stiff competition from local competitors as well as from international firms. The major competitor of the company is ascertained to be PepsiCo (McKelvey, 2006). It is worth mentioning that both the companies are engaged in extremely fierce competition. The degree of competition has radical impact on the pricing strategies of the company. Nonetheless, in order to meet the level of competition, the company has set the prices of its products almost in the same level as its competitors’ products. It can be admitted that Cola-Cola offers a wide range of products relatively at affordable prices. It is ascertained that in order to be successful in the global business environment, an organisation is required to maintain fluent and consistent pricing strategies. In this regard, it can be stated that the pricing strategies of Coca-Cola has always been fluent and consistent across the different locations of its operation. The stiff competition from competitors such as PepsiCo has forced Coca-Cola to act smartly and proactively related with the formulation and the implementation of its business strategies. Although the pricing strategies of the company are embedded with the pricing strategies of its competitors’ products but the ultimate goal of the company behind its pricing strategies has always been to increase the value of its shareholders. Furthermore, it is worth mentioning that the company uses lower pricing strategy for penetrating into the new markets. At the same time, its pricing strategies are followed by the increasing promotional activities which have proven to be quite effective for the company in attracting large base of customers towards its wide range of products (Balaji eKnowledge, 2013). Distribution Strategies The Coca-Cola Company distributes its branded beverage products through self-owned network and independent bottling partners, distributors, wholesalers and retailers. It can be argued that the company employs the distribution channels that are identical to franchisors but are slightly different. More specifically, it follows two types of distribution channel which include direct selling and indict selling. The company obligates its bolting partners to sign a separate contract which is referred as “Bottler’s Agreements”. The bottling partners entering into this agreement are authorised to purchase the entire requirements either from the company or any other authorised suppliers of the company. This facilitates the bottling partners of the company to manufacture the products as per requirement and distribute them at a faster rate with relative ease. It is worth mentioning that the production and distribution process adopted by the company is executed through decentralised process rather than centralised process. The organisation has also setup selling depots and integrated kiosks in convenient stores and groceries so that customers are able to access the product of the company with little effort (United States Securities and Exchange Commission, 2012). The company is committed towards identifying the innovative ways for offering its products to customers. At the same time, it can be argued that the distribution strategies adopted by the organisation have immensely served to offer competitive advantages for the company across the different markets of its operations. The company has developed an innovative distribution system called Manual Distribution Centers (MDCs) which are run by small entrepreneurs by engaging local workers in order to deliver products to the desired and required destinations. The establishment of such distribution model has also facilitated in the development of the region to a great extent (Polaris Institute of Research, 2005). Promotion Mix In the present highly competitive business environment, it is not sufficient to gain substantial profit by placing right product in the right market at the right time. It is thus crucial for a company such as Coca-Cola to engage in effective communication with the target customers in order to ensure greater success at the marketplace. Notably, promotion is one of the important elements of marketing mix strategies. Effective promotional strategies facilitate in generating awareness regarding the products of the company along with serving as a mechanism to persuade the customers to buy and experience the tastes of the products. Over the years, the company has adopted almost all the tools and techniques of promotion, ranging from traditional medium such as radio and print media to recent social media. The company has constantly projected itself as pleasurable along with refreshing drinks provider before the target customers. It has also launched numerous campaigns as a tool for promoting its products amid the target customers. Moreover, it has also been involved in sponsoring sports events across the world and has hired famous personalities and celebrities for endorsing its products. With the advent of internet and the growing popularity of social networking sites, the organisation has also entered into promoting its products through social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and MySpace among others. Consequently, it can be argued that the company has been able to make the best use of available technologies (United States Securities and Exchange Commission, 2012). Conclusion It can be concluded that Coca-Cola has emerged as one of the globally foremost multinational firms that is engaged in manufacturing, marketing and distribution of non-alcoholic beverage products. Coca-Cola is an American based company with headquarter located in Atlanta. The mission and vision of the company is oriented towards attaining the comprehensive goals of accomplishing common organisational objectives of providing adequate returns to its shareholders, meeting the needs of its employees and customers as well as fulfilling its social obligations towards community and environment. The company also offers an assortment of products to its customers spread globally. Accordingly, it has been ascertained from the above observation that the organisation possesses around 500 brands and 3500 products under its belt. At the same time, it has been ascertained that Coca-Cola has been able to establish itself as one of the most respected global brands. In this context, it has been further identified that the company during the year 2006 and 2010 was chosen as the most popular global brand. Moreover, Coca-Cola has adopted pricing strategies for its products in keeping with the pricing strategies of its competitors such as PepsiCo. The company has deployed stable and fluent pricing strategies across the market segment of its operations. As far as the distribution strategies of the company’s products and services are concerned, it has been observed that it distributes its products through both direct and indirect methods of distribution. The direct method of distribution includes self-owned distribution network of the company while the indirect distribution channels comprise distribution through bottling partners, wholesalers and retailers. In order to boost the sales of its products, the company has made considerable investment on the promotional activities. It has used almost all the pertinent promotional tools. Thus, it can be argued that over the years Coca-Cola has been delivering value to the customers through adoption of a variety of strategies. Concerning the future development prospects of Coca-Cola, it has been observe that the company has established a set of well vision endeavours for the period leading to 2020. Furthermore, the company is determined to accomplish these visions profitably by meeting the ever-evolving tastes and preferences of its varied global customer efficiently. References Balaji eKnowledge, 2013. Coco Cola – Marketing Strategy and Market Plan. Place and Distribution. [Online] Available at: http://www.beknowledge.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/16790Coco%20Cola%20%E2%80%93%20Marketing%20Strategy%20and%20Market%20Plan.pdf [Accessed November 11, 2013]. Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc, 2010. The Coca-Cola Company. Business profile. [Online] Available at: http://assets.coca-colacompany.com/48/a6/a93c6fec415e983e534ffa225144/TCCC_2010_Annual_Review_Business_Profile.pdf [Accessed November 11, 2013]. Hartogh, M., 2007. The Real Thing: A Profile of the Coca Cola Company. University of California [Online] Available at: http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/5616/2/MPRA_paper_5616.pdf [Accessed November 11, 2013]. McKelvey, S. M., 2006. Coca-Cola vs. PepsiCo —A "Super'' Battleground for the Cola Wars. Sport Marketing Quarterly, Vol. 15, pp. 114-123. Polaris Institute of Research, 2005. Corporate Profile. Marketing. [Online] Available at: http://www.polarisinstitute.org/files/Coke%20profile%20August%2018.pdf [Accessed November 11, 2013]. The Coca-Cola Company, 2013. Coca Coal’s Mission, Vision and Values. The Coca-Cola Company Mission. [Online]Available at: http://www.coca-cola.co.uk/about-us/coca-cola-mission-vision-statement.html [Accessed November 11, 2013]. The Saylor Foundation, 2013. Globalization and the Coca-Cola Company. Global Marketing Strategies. [Online] Available at: http://www.saylor.org/site/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/BUS208-2.5.6-Globalization-and-The-Coca-Cola-Company-FINAL.pdf [Accessed November 11, 2013]. United States Securities and Exchange Commission, 2012. The Coca Cola Company. Distribution System and Bottler’s Agreements. [Online] Available at: http://www.coca-colacompany.com/annual-review/2012/pdf/form_10K_2012.pdf [Accessed November 11, 2013]. Read More