MARKS & SPENCER PLC

Business Strategy: Marks & Spencer Plc



Business Strategy: Marks & Spencer Plc

Introduction

Today there is increased competition in every industry, companies are facing great variety of external and internal challenges as they attempt to attain competitive advantage and remain profitable in the industry. Effective strategies are implemented by the companies to combat with internal and external challenges and to attain their ultimate goal of profit earning. Externally organizations face with threats like intense competition both globally and domestically, today there are increasing demands of customers and rapid advancement in technology. External environment provides organizations with huge opportunities to combat with threats (Bahanda, 1999, 12). Organizations not only have to compete with the external environment but they also have to make their internal environment better they have to improve their customer service product quality along with reduction in cost, it will help companies in creation of customer value. In this paper I am going to strategically analyse internal and external environment of Marks and Spencer and future strategies to compete with these challenges will be suggested accordingly.

Company Background

Marks & Spencer was founded in 1884 in the UK by Michael Marx and Thomas Spencer and is currently working in over 30 countries worldwide. In the UK there are more than 850 chain stores Marks & Spencer and more than 200 operating around the world. Marks & Spencer is the largest retailer of clothing in the UK with sales of £7-8 billion, representing 9.9% of the market of clothing and footwear. The company specializes in selling women's and men's clothing, children's clothes, underwear, cosmetics and home furnishings (www.marksandspencer.co.uk). The company sells clothes for men, women and children, lingerie, cosmetics, shoes, food, household items, groceries and meals. Its private labels are Classic, Portfolio, Indigo, Autograph, North Coast, Blue Harbour, Limited Collection. In future, they have planned opening of several stores in Moscow and other regions. Marks and Spencer is one of the largest and popular retailers of the world. It is known as the major retailer that trades a variety of merchandise range under their brand.

Mission

The mission of the company is” to make aspirational quality accessible to all” (www.marksandspencer.co.uk). This is the mission of the company since the company was formed. The company want to become socially and ethically responsible by providing quality products in the area of food, cloths, and home.

Vision

The vision statement of Marks and Spencer is "to be the standard against which all other are measured” (www.marksandspencer.co.uk). The company want to become one of the most famous and leading company in the ever growing competitive market.

The values of Marks and Spencer focus on quality service, value, trust and innovation. Therefore it can be said that mission, vision, and values of M&S are focused on meeting customer needs.

Objectives

The main objectives of M&S are:

Maximize profit

Growth

Increase sales

Market leadership

Reward shareholders

Offer high quality products and services

Core competences

Core competences are processes or activities that critically underpin competitive advantage of an organization. The company is customer oriented ...