Optimization of Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) marketing channels in China: a case study

JEL classification: M31The operation conditions of marketing channels, regarded as the crucial external resources of enterprises, directly influence the market position of a company. Good marketing channels are significant links for enterprises to perceive market change and adjust enterprise behavior and decisions. This thesis seeks to clarify and define various factors influencing marketing channels optimization by using fast moving consuming goods (FMCG) as the focus of the research topic and by taking Rainbow Company as an example, based on data of an actual marketing channel operation and deep research on the case company. On this basis, the concept and basic framework of marketing channel optimization of FMCG enterprises has been considered from the perspective of channel relationship selection and marketing channel integration, considering the influence of direct online marketing models on traditional marketing channels. Finally, it has put forward the implementation strategy of marketing channel optimization from three aspects, building strategic alliance of marketing channels, putting more effort in developing a network channel and in strengthening regional marketing team construction by applying relevant theories and concepts of marketing channel optimization.As condições de operação dos canais de marketing, considerados como recursos externos essenciais das empresas, influenciam diretamente o posicionamento de uma empresa no mercado. Um bom canal de marketing constitui um elemento muito significativo para que as empresas se apercebam das mudanças ocorridas no mercado e possam ajustar os seus comportamentos e decisões em conformidade. Esta tese procura clarificar e definir os diversos fatores que influenciam a otimização dos canais de marketing a partir do estudo de caso da empresa Rainbow Company e adotando, como base de pesquisa, o caso de produtos de rápido consumo (FMCG “fast moving consumer goods”). Deste modo a tese definiu o conceito e o enquadramento básico da otimização de canais de marketing sob a perspetiva da seleção de relacionamentos e da integração, considerando a influência de modelos de marketing direto online sobre os canais de marketing tradicionais. Por fim, e tendo por base as teorias e conceitos relevantes, a tese desenvolveu uma estratégia de implementação da otimização de canais de marketing sob três perspetivas: construção de alianças estratégicas; reforço do desenvolvimento de redes; e reforço do desenvolvimento de equipas de marketing regional

Strategies and tactics of Chinese contract manufacturers and western OEMs (2001-2011)

As policy makers seek to draw lessons from the growth of Chinese manufacturing, we need to better understand the evolving strategies adopted by Chinese manufacturers since the economic reforms of the 1980s. Focusing on the apparel and electronics sectors, we look at how Chinese manufacturers sought to move to higher value-adding parts of the supply chain in different ways during the period 2001–2011 and how their western OEMs responded. As a first step towards understanding the co-evolving strategies and tactics of Chinese contract manufacturers and western OEMs, we use a simple game-theoretic framework of contract manufacturer and OEM strategies to look at the actual tactics many Chinese contract manufacturers adopted. Our findings are that Chinese contract manufacturers ended up co-operating, competing, or co-opetiting (i.e., cooperating and competing at the same time) with western OEMs. Also, western OEMs used their position in the supply chain to devise counter-measures, possibly ending with win–win solutions for both sides

Distribution of environmental and social sustainability in supply chains : analysis of green and social bullwhip effects

Stakeholder demands for environmentally and socially sustainable operations are at an all-time high as the repercussions of global crises, such as climate change, are becoming clearer when business is conducted “as usual”. By better understanding the distribution of sustainability in supply chains, stakeholders could apply pressure on the least sustainable tiers of the chain. Green bullwhip effect refers to the transformation of external stakeholder pressure to environmental requirements within a supply chain. Stakeholders exert pressure on the most visible company in the downstream wherefrom each tier in the chain renders the requirements content- and implementation schedule-wise more stringent for the next-in-line to create a safety buffer or in anticipation of future demands. Environmental requirements, as a result, are tightest at the upstream of the supply chain. Green bullwhip effect has been studied to some extent, whereas possible social bullwhip effect has been scarcely explored. Instead of environmental requirements, in the case of social bullwhip effect, demands for social reforms are analogously magnified throughout the supply chain. These two phenomena could shed light on sustainability patterns in supply chains. Using environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) data from 290 European companies involved in manufacturing supply chains, analysis of variance was applied to test for statistically significant differences between the group means, groups referring to different supply chain positions and industries. Each company was given a supply chain position and an industry attribute to test the distribution of sustainability between tiers, and between industries. Results support the existence of both green and social bullwhip effect to some extent. Industry was discovered to have no effect on sustainability. Results imply that stakeholders should turn their attention towards wholesale and retail activities, as they perform the worst in comparison to other tiers in a supply chain, namely end product manufacturers and raw material suppliers/component manufacturers

A Contingency Approach for Supply Chain Preparedness to Pursue Circular Economy Business Models

A growing stream in circular economy (CE) research is about circular economy business models (CEBM). It suggests how firms could learn to adopt unique material and product designs, newer business models, value chain networks and potential enablers that satisfies CE ideologies about economic, environment, and society. However, the understanding about how firms could integrate CEBM practices at internal, supply chain, and external levels is limited. Given the rising complexities in supply chains, the goal of this dissertation is to: (a) understand the landscape of CE concepts within the supply chain management context, and consequently (b) comprehend how firms’ preparedness about their internal, end-to-end supply chains and external environment, help them in pursuing business models that are guided by CE principles. In this dissertation, the first study provides an inclusive understanding of CE in a supply chain management context using bibliometric-network analysis. One key insight suggests CEBM is a promising theme within CE but remains unexplored in supply chain context. Using contingency theory lens, the second study identifies factors related to a focal firm’s CEBM practice as the response, its contingencies as context, its supply chain preparedness as output, and its CEBM performance as a consequent outcome. Using multi-industry multi-tier supply chain case-study method, the study explores how supply chain preparedness is related to CEBM practices and CEBM performance, and the factors upon which this relationship is contingent. A set of propositions and a contingency research framework is proposed. The research implications shall benefit scholars of transdisciplinary interests and serve as a guiding tool for practitioners and consultants presently acting upon CEBM implementation in their supply chain systems

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. Strategic Corporate Research Report

[Excerpt] Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (hereinafter Wal-Mart) is the second-largest company in the world. It has more annual revenue than the GDP of Switzerland. It sells more DVDs, magazines, books, CDs, dog food, diapers, bicycles, toys, toothpaste, jewelry, and groceries than any other retailer does worldwide. It is the largest retailer in the United States, Mexico, and Canada, the second-largest in the United Kingdom, and the third largest in Brazil, With its partners, it is the largest retailer in Central America. Wal-Mart is also the largest private employer in the United States, Mexico, and Canada, and it has 1.8 million employees around the globe. Wal-Mart is so huge that it effectively sets the terms for large swaths of the global economy, from retail wages to apparel prices to transoceanic shipping rates to the location of toy factories. Indeed, if there is one single aspect to understand about the company, it is the fact that Wal-Mart is transforming the relations of production in virtually every product category it sells, through its relationships with suppliers. But its influence goes far beyond the economy. It sets social policy by refusing to sell certain types of birth control. Its construction of supercenters molds the landscape, shapes traffic patterns, and alters the local commercial mix. The retail goliath shapes culture by selling the music of patriotic country singer Garth Brooks but not the critical (and hilarious) The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Presents America (the Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction. It influences politics by donating millions to conservative politicians and think tanks. Wal-Mart is, in short, one of the most powerful entities in the world. Not surprisingly, Wal-Mart has developed a long list of critics, including unions, human rights organizations, religious groups, environmental activists, community organizations, small business groups, academics, children’s rights groups, and even institutional investors. These groups have exposed the company’s illegal union-busting tactics, its many violations of overtime laws, its abuse of child labor, its egregious healthcare policies, its super-exploitation of immigrant workers, its rampant gender discrimination, the horrific labor conditions at its suppliers’ factories, and its unlawful environmental degradation. They have also chronicled the deleterious effect Wal-Mart has on the public coffers and the quality of community life. New Wal-Mart stores and distribution centers often swallow up government subsidies and tax breaks, take public land, create more congestion, reduce overall wages, destroy retail variety, and increase public outlays for healthcare. To its critics, Wal-Mart represents the worst aspects of 21st-eentury capitalism. Wal-Mart usually counters any criticism with two words: low prices. It is a powerful mantra in a consumerist world. The company does make more products affordable to more people, and that is nothing to sneeze at when wages are stagnant, jobs insecure, pensions disappearing, and health coverage shrinking. With low prices, Wal-Mart helps working men and women get more from their meager paychecks, more necessities like bread, and more luxuries, like roses, too. It is a brilliant and incontrovertible argument, and Wal-Mart’s most ardent defenders take it even farther. They say its obsession with low prices makes the entire economy more efficient and more productive. Suppliers and competitors have to produce more and better products with the same resources, and that redounds to everyone. In the micro, it means falling prices and rising product quality. In the macro, it means economic growth, more jobs, and higher tax revenues. To its defenders, Wal-Mart represents the best aspects of 21st-century capitalism. Despite their radical opposition, critics and defenders of the world’s largest corporation agree on one thing: Wal-Mart represents 21st-century capitalism. It symbolizes a system of increasing market penetration and decreasing social regulation, where more and more aspects of life around the world are subject to economic competition. Wal-Mart’s success rests upon the ongoing destruction of social power in favor of corporate power. It takes advantage of the conditions of the neo-liberal world, from the availability of instant and inexpensive global communication to the continuing collapse of agricultural employment around the world to the rapid diffusion of technological innovation to the oversupply of subjugated migrant labor in nearly every country to the continued existence of undemocratic and corporate-dominated governments. For some, this is as it should be, all part of capitalism’s natural and ultimately benign development. For the rest of us, Wal-Mart is at the heart of what is wrong with the world

Plastic circular economy in the EU: Material Flow Analysis and Transition Analysis

Plastic is valued for its versatility, but concerns have been raised over the environmental impacts of plastic waste. A more in-depth investigation of the plastic system is still needed to understand current flows and factors to close the plastic cycle. This research applied a material flow analysis (MFA) and transition analysis (TA), using multilevel perspectives, to the plastic circular economy transition in the EU. The MFA covers over 400 categories of plastic-containing products with a detailed analysis of the final destination of waste. The TA identifies the interaction of barriers and drivers to use secondary plastics, with a focus on the regime level along the plastic value chain. The MFA results indicate the EU produced over 66  million tonnes (Mt) of plastic polymers/fibres and an estimated consumption for plastic products of 73 Mt in 2016. Plastic waste increases amounted to over 37 Mt, and a significant amount of plastic waste was not recovered back into plastics in the EU. The uncertainty analysis of MFA highlights important data quality issues that need to be addressed. To understand why using secondary plastics presents challenges, the TA mapped the factors across policies and standards, markets and business models, technology, and consumer preferences and behaviours that create a web of constraints and a web of drivers. TA results highlight that data-information-knowledge is the key gap as most of the aspects are cross-cutting. Different actors are involved in new business networks and play multiple roles in driving the co-evolutionary dynamic. The thesis concludes that significant data gaps need MFA-based knowledge to inform policies that address the barriers and the potential socio-technical changes that can reshape plastic flows. The cases playing out across the whole value chain and four different application areas provide insights that are potentially more widely applicable to the circular economy transition processes in Europe

Effective foreign investment in China : utilizing Taiwanese resources

Thesis (M.B.A.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 2006.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 67-70).It is no doubt that China is expanding its market potential because of its high economic growth and its entry into the World Trade Organizations. This Chinese expansion owes a great deal to foreign direct investment from the US, Europe or Japan. Much of the Japanese investment, in turn, utilizes Taiwanese resources. This paper examines whether, how and why foreign investment in China utilizing Taiwanese resources is effective. This paper is composed chiefly of two parts: the first part addresses the current trends of foreign direct investment in China, the sharp increase of Japanese investments in China utilizing Taiwanese resources, and the pros and cons of these investments, while the second part addresses three case studies to demonstrate the effectiveness of utilizing Taiwanese resources in case of foreign direct investment in China. This paper especially attempts to verify that this effectiveness is not only for Japanese and/or manufacturing but also for Western and/or service industries.by Isao Takeuchi.M.B.A

The effect of mass retail buying practises on competitiveness in the retail value chain

Historically, South African manufacturers and suppliers to the mass retail environment have been compelled to manage significant business risks as a result of the generic buying strategies employed by the mass retailing format. More recently, best practice initiatives such as SCOR’s collaborative planning, forecasting and replenishment have risen to the fore of supply chain management as ways to mitigate the undesired effects of theses generic buying practices for all participants in the value chain.Traditional thinking centred on optimising only the merchandise activities and function, through cost based performance measures, have caused a number of undesired effects and invalid assumptions. These factors in turn have impacted the competitiveness and sustainability of manufacturers and suppliers as well as the supply chain ecosystem as a whole. Systemic theory suggests that in order to identify these conflicting and invalid assumptions one must approach the problem through sufficiency based thinking processes that communicate the core conflict and map out possible solutions for managers. Data for this study was collected based on the widely accepted best practice framework of supply chain management for the mass retail environment. With this in mind, this research aims to provide an academic foundation for deeper collaboration between mass retailers and their vendors, as well as an understanding of the practical implications of decisions for managers and executives, on both the mass retail, and manufacturing and supply sides of the value chain.While statistical variation is a reality in the retailing environment, the mass retailing format and its supply chain partners are particularly susceptible to the negative effects of ‘bullwhip’ due to the large scale of promotional activities undertaken. Much of this problem can be mitigated through collaboration on a meaningful bases that allows not only for responsiveness for supply chain partners but greater profitability for all participant in the value chain. It is argued that an improvement in throughput will have a positive impact on the competitiveness and sustainability of the local supply and manufacturing organisations in South Africa.Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2012.Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS)unrestricte

Exploring sources of competitive advantage in e-business applications: A cross-industries case study in mainland China

A review of existing literature revealed that little theoretical framework exists to capture e-business-enabled value creation through an integrated approach that includes the environmental view and resource-based view (RBV). Furthermore, little empirical research has been conducted to test these theoretical frameworks, in particular in the Chinese business context. The aim of this research is to extend the theoretical and practical understanding of e-business-enabled sources of competitive advantage (SCA) in China. The value chain (VC) concept, virtual value chain (VVC) framework and RBV were identified from the literature as the key constructs to underpin the theoretical basis. The research design used a qualitative research methodology consisting of indepth case studies of nine leading Chinese companies in three industries - housing development, manufacturing, and B2C. The principle finding is the formulation of a theoretical framework for investigating ebusiness value creations which integrates the key constructs of the VVC, online information capabilities (OIC), value system and RVB. This research also proposes a typology of five generic types of key e-business applications which states clearly the relationships between key e-business applications and SCA. Finally, this research demonstrates that e-business value creation features differently between two groups: Internet pragmatist and Internet pioneers. The research offers a number of contributions to the field of e-business value creation. Firstly, it introduces the concepts of OIC and value system to the VVC. It also provides empirical test of the analytical framework. In addition, this research provides an indepth understanding of the relationships between types of e-business applications and key SCA. Finally, this research identifies and explains the key differences and similarities between the three industries, within each industry, and between the two key groups