OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

Operations Management

Operations Management

Introduction

The Hovis and British Bakers (BB) brands had evolved dramatically since 1997 for becoming the dominant market force in the bread industry of United Kingdom. Cathy, who had the good history of managing different brands and proves herself as successful brand manager of major FMCG companies, she was appointed as the brand manager for Hovis white bread. Her team was given key objectives for making the Hovis the number one bread in UK bread industry over the brown bread sector. Their aim was to achieve the growth in market share from to 12 percent to at least 18 percent in UK market.

Question 1

The main objectives of Hovis crusty were to capture the new markets, which should restore the firm for earning long-term profits and have competitive advantage in the bread market. They aim to satisfy customer needs and requirements by achieving their goals and objectives. They wanted to do something efficient that no one else have done before. This could solve the most important market segments. However, Hovis crusty main goal was to increase its market share, but in order to achieve its strategic marketing plays a big and important role. SWOT analysis and PEST analysis are better tools or identifying and measuring the areas of operations which need to be improved. These tools identify the strengths and weaknesses of Hovis crusty existing products and the threats and opportunities assess the external environment majorly the threats from other players in bread market. The identification of opportunities and threats provides company with new ideas for better improvement (Klassen & Menor, 2006). For example, they decided to keep white bread, but they had potential to make it better, and thus a completely new product (crusty bread) was introduced.

Cathy and her team believed that for maximum customer attraction it is necessary to have strong visual display to their products. So they achieve this target by gondola ends as well as the special in special point of sale units, window and shelf display, in store advertisements and promotional visuals. The whole promotional campaign was backed by the very strong nationwide television and print media advertising tools. The total launch spending on advertising was around £ 2.4 million and they have plans to increase it to £ 5 million for whole year campaign.

Four P`s of marketing is also necessary for market research. This includes the product, place, price and promotion. Crisp breads are already popular, but only on weekends, because they have a short life. The other objective of Hovis crusty was to make bread crispy and last longer in such a way that it satisfies the need of customers and bread remain crispier and be better to eat all week. However, much of the research is needed for achieving these targets. Overall, the main objective of Hovis crusty is to make them popular with their customers and society and have a bread machine in the foreground. These objectives can be achieved by using a marketing strategies discussed ...