BUSINESS REPORT

Business Report



Business Report

Introduction

Revolution in internet industry created a boom in business growth. Opportunities were created for businesses with a significant change in the business operations. Firms having global approach timely adopted IT strategies to take their business up scale. Waterstones is one the renowned Bookstore that is having its sales operations on Internet. Since its formation, significant changes have been observed in the operational strategies of Waterstones to target global markets. Starting as a traditional bookstore, Waterstones now has a dominating presence in e-bookseller industry. An exceptional increase in its customer base was observed since 2005. It currently has more 3 million loyalty cards customers globally. This has enabled the Waterstones to be the biggest e-bookseller in UK.

Introduction

A progressive change has been observed in the business strategy of Waterstones since its formation. Waterstones was opened by Tim Waterstone in 1982 in London, England. It was a traditional bookstore in London, which was relatively unaffected by the early 1980s recession. Operations of Waterstones increased unrealistically in first ten years of its formation. Eventually, new branches were opened and Waterstones started leading the UK bookseller industry. Waterstones characterized his bookstore, made literary biography and enigmatic travel writing seems viable high-street products in UK (Thompson 2005, 144). For number of years, Waterstones shops began to stock a narrower range of books in favour of bestsellers and brand-name authors, squeezing out less established titles and writers. However, due to weak financial position of Waterstones, it was sold to HMV Media Group in 1998. Currently, Waterstones has more than 300 retail stores in UK, Ireland and in Continental Europe.

Waterstones marked its presence in e-book industry in early 2006 by launching its own website. Significant growth was observed in business, as its club card customer base increased more than the expected population size (Marieke 2009, 126). Including that, competition from online retailers and supermarkets, like Amazon and Tesco, is cutting into Waterstone's sales. It has distinctly marked its presence as the largest book selling store in UK by achieving sales of 466 million pound in 2005

Environmental Factors Analysis of Waterstones Books

Growth in business sector is always associated with remarkable change in environmental factors, which makes differential impact on the business strategy (Kotler, 2009). Environmental factors that shape the business strategies and marketing of Waterstones Books are discussed in the below part.

Technological Factors

The most important environmental factor that influences the marketing strategies of Waterstones comes under technological factor. More than 70% business for Waterstones is generated from its e-book store. This enhances the need of technology integration in its core operational strategies of business (Baines, 2008). Software compatibility, piracy, and online data theft is the most challenging issue that Waterstones is required to manage (Jobber & Fahy, 2009). Considerable measures have been taken by Waterstones to improve its internet security and online purchase systems. However, wide inequality of technology distribution in the global arena undermines the endeavours of technology and innovation-based firms (George 2006, 57). 

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