Management Decision Problem Facing Wendy over the Intention to Expand to the United States - Case Study Example

1. According to the marketing concept, marketing managers should meet and anticipate the needs of the s. Against this backdrop, it can be d that marketing research can play a great role in helping a fast-food restaurant such as Wendy’s formulate sound marketing strategies. Thus, according to Strydom (2004), marketing research can help an organisation to systematically design, collect, interpret and report on information that can be used to help marketers to solve specific marketing problems while at the same time taking advantage of marketing opportunities. The main purpose of research is to gather information that can be used to satisfy the needs and interests of the consumers profitably. It is imperative to gather as much information as possible about a market so that the marketers will be better positioned to be able to identify the factors that can give them competitive advantage over the other rival competitors. Market research is important as it seeks to create an environment that will give the organisation competitive advantage. 2. The management decision problem facing Wendy over their intention to expand to USA is that they may be over ambitious and fail to penetrate the market due to competition in the industry. It is a bit difficult to penetrate an industry and manage to sweep through the other established businesses entities already established without better marketing strategies than they will be using. For instance, McDonald’s uses cutting edge marketing strategies and this will be an uphill task for Wendy’s to easily surpass this performance given that they are just comfortable with their current performance which is even comparatively lower than that of the rival competitors. It has to be borne in mind that establishing a new business enterprise should not be rushed and there is need for proper plans to be put in place so as to ensure that there would be higher chances of surviving especially in a competitive environment. Launching a new product in the market is not always a guarantee that it will succeed but the need to be acquainted with market trends that are constantly changing. 3. The marketing research facing Wendy is that they are out of touch with their market since they are not venturing into something new by virtue of performing fairly in the market. It is pretty difficult to penetrate a market without knowledge about it. The problem is that when one does not have current knowledge about the interests of the customers, it can be a bit tricky since the chances of flopping would be very high especially when the targeted customers have no product knowledge about something offered in the market. Careful consideration ought to be taken with regards to information gathering before embarking on a drive to launch a product since marketing is primarily concerned with satisfying the need of the customers profitably. The environment in which businesses operate is dynamic and is constantly changing. These changes ought to be taken into consideration so as to make the organisation to be better positioned to keep pace with these changes. 4. The research objectives of an organisation shows clearly show the major goals to be achieved by an organisation. Goal setting influences the formulation of the objectives. Thus, the research objectives for Wendy include the following: I. To identify the needs and interests of the customers. II. To analyse the market trends with regards to competition. III. To assess how the competitors operate. IV. To segment the target market. Having outlined the objectives, the organisation will be better positioned to have a clear direction to follow with regards to the attainment of its goals. 5. Qualitative data is any form of data that cannot be statistically quantified (Struwig and Stead 2004). This includes published literature which has relevance to the study and the advantage of this type of data normally referred to as secondary data is that it saves time is essentially used in order to give a clear understanding of the industry structure given that it will be based on previous studies already done by the other writers. Basically, qualitative research can play a very significant role in helping Wendy’s expand further in the United States given that already published literature about the fast food business in USA is readily available from different sources which include the following: academic books, newspapers, journals as well as websites. Data already published is reliable in most cases given that it would be based on factual surveys already done by the others. Information obtained from the newspapers or official websites is likely to be reliable given that these are everyday sources of information to different informational requirements of the people in their everyday life. 6. Wendy’s has developed a new fish sandwich but there is need to determine consumer’s response to this new sandwich before introducing it in the marketplace. Internet survey is the most appropriate method that can be administered to gather consumer preferences. According to Cant (2000), the internet survey is a self-administered questionnaire that is placed on the World Wide Web (www) site for prospective subjects to read and complete. Kotler (1999) also concurs that computer technology has revolutionised the way people do business particularly in marketing of products. Internet administered questionnaires are seen as an appropriate survey method in that each respondent is presented with similar questions and there are likely chances of getting a reliable set of responses. The survey can either be unstructured where the respondents are required to give their own opinions. The survey method has various advantages including the following: Relatively cheaper. No formal arrangements may be needed. Can include a wide range of the respondents from a wide geographical area. Respondent can consider responses. There is a possibility for anonymity of the respondent. It can be noted that the advantages of using the internet far outweigh the other methods of collecting data given that it is instantaneous and can reach a very large number of respondents the same time. The use of the internet is widely seen as the most ideal during the contemporary period where virtually all facets of business are done electronically. Chances that a large number of people would participate are quite high. Information collection is a very important aspect of market research since inferences can be made to assume that the sample population would represent the ideas of the whole population at large. 7. The sample is mainly based on gender and age where the major aim is to come up with a comparison in consumption patterns of food from Wendy’s fast food restaurants. The computations of the data are based on the frequency each category visits the fast food and the mean is calculated using the total number of all the visits by all the people. The mean is the average where the aim is to show the average number of days a person from a particular category would visit the fast food. Basically, the patterns vary from age group to age group and the aspect of gender has a bearing on the samples. Basically, it can be noted that these two demographic aspects mainly determine the samples of data used in the case study. In most cases, demographic factors such as age, gender as well as income in some cases play a major role in determining market segments to target since these mainly contribute towards the identification of people with similar interests. Such a sample often represents the whole segment. 8. According to the statistics obtained from the data given, it can be noted that during the past four weeks, there have been 640 and 810 visits to Wendy’s fast food restaurants by males and females respectively. This brings us to the conclusion that there is a difference of 170 which is not a very significant difference. Indeed, the difference in numbers in terms of quantity with regards to visits may partly matter but a close analysis shows that on average men frequent the restaurant more than the women do. The mean for men is 8.2 while that for women 7.36. This brings us to the understanding that on average, men go to the restaurants more than the women. The mean denotes the average frequency of the occurrence of something. 9. A close analysis of the statistics show that there is a slight difference between the participants consideration for the amount of fat their kids eat, versus the amount of fat they eat personally. A difference of 0.9 between 3.09 and 3,18 is not very big to cause alarm. It shows that the parents are aware of the amount of fat they consume as well as that consumed by the kids and are considerate about it. Basically, the average represents the general frequency or level of occurrence for a certain action to happen. 10. Below is the equation that attempts to show how these variables would be tested in a regression (where ‘Wendy’s rating (out of 10)” is the dependent variable). W=10x + 30 +4 I. W representing Wendy is the dependent variable because it depends on the other variables such as gender, age as well as the consumption habits of food with large quantities of fat in the fast food outlets. II. The second equation below 5x + 20 + 4 = W If the other independent variables are varied, while the other independent variable is held fixed, they will have an impact of the dependent variable which is Wendy. III. Basically, a coefficient is a number in front of a variable. The coefficient for gender is age. This is so because age varies for different customers and is not constant. Age is always in front of gender as it seeks to properly position different people in the right category they belong as far as consumption of food is concerned. IV. An interpretation of the coefficient for ‘I consider the amount of fat in the foods I eat at fast food restaurants’ is the number of frequency when that food is consumed. Indeed, people do consider the amount of fat they consume but what matters most is the rate at which they consume that food. They may be aware but of particular interest is the level of consumption. This coefficient may vary depending on the rate they may consume this kind of food with large quantities of fat. V. The independent variables explain the dependent variable in different ways. First and foremost, it must be noted that the dependent variable is dependent on the independent variables. For instance, Wendy’s is dependent on the independent variables such as age and gender as well as the consideration given to the amount of fat consumption from the fast foods outlets. If the independent variables change, they will have a bearing on Wendy’s where there is likely to be a positive or negative impact as far as the change is concerned. Wendy’s business is dependent on the consumers who are characterised by various factors such as age as well as gender. Referencing Cant M.C. (2000), Marketing Management, 4th Edition Juta and Co Ltd, SA. Kotler P. (1999), Kotler on Marketing: How to create, win and dominate Markets, Free Press, London. Lancaster G. & Reynolds P. 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