Caterpillar Case Study Answers

The adoption of new technologies and trends is being facilitated in the industry for the competition and the customer’s overall experience. Many suppliers that are having similar strategies face a strong competition. The barriers for exiting the markets are high. Products and services of are undifferentiated leading the customer to focus on the prices offered. Low market growth, so it can be increased only by taking another firm’s market share.

Vera Bradley providers have met quality standards for this company because quality is a very important factor for the company. There is a significant amount of Vera Bradley products which are manufactured entirely abroad. This is because the company does not rely on a single vendor for their products because if there is any problem in this way would be easier to fix. The size of the order is given by the following factors: demand delivery of specific products, current inventory levels and the minimum order quantity visionary. Produce abroad has become for many companies like Vera Bradley cost savings and reduced capital investment.

One of the internal weakness identified is a challenge to find and retain employees who can deliver positive results to the shareholders. The external strength identified is being above the curve according to consumer perspective. Consumers are important assets to an organization because they are the reasons why a particular business remains in operation and therefore their positive feedback means a lot to the company (Dirk, 2014). The external weakness identified is a high rate of unemployment in this sector. The company addressed these issues through coming up with strategies for attracting and retaining employees such as competitive salaries, providing the Aflac products to its employees freely or at subsidized prices and so

In the 1860’s new resources were exploited leading to a wider range of improvements and opportunities. These new natural resources caused rapid economic growth, but at a cost. There were many pros and cons, which resulted in a substantial need for change. The industrial revolution aimed to increase the GDP, which it did, and create more jobs for the growing population. The newly made factories came with many jobs, but compelled men to work long hours with low pay in horrid conditions.

Introduction Numerous organizations are integrating the information technology into their supply chain management operations. In the present world, customers have become progressively demanding by setting their anticipations high for the quality of the product or the service. Also the supply chain management has realized that the advanced technology could serve the consumers with better answerability and liability. This visibility makes them maintain a tight control over the customers and stand ahead of the competitors. Information technology has extensively helped to balance the organizations production on track, repairing mistake and making reforms that provides a top quality product.

Secondly, businesses need to play to their strengths and not all businesses have the same strengths. Thirdly, many markets are segmented and what is important to one set of customers may be less important to another set. So businesses need to decide which segments of the market they are targeting. Ways of seeking to gain competitive advantage include: offering lower prices, offering clearly superior products at above average prices, delivering products more quickly. offering superior customer service, including after sales service.

For that reason, the top officials of Zara consider this problem at the time of formulating their strategy that will certainly bring encouraging retort from the society regarding their products (Peng, 2008). Production strategy However, due to the increasing competition, Zara applies one of the most advanced strategies that support them to execute their paper plan practically and get the possible competitive advantage over their competitors. It is noted that Zara have team of experts that are able to assess the quality of raw material that help them to take quick action before proceeding it further and it will ultimately assist them to minimise their cost and lead time to some extent (Lockett, et al., 2009). Value chain Furthermore, the Zara‘s global value chain varies from its competitors and it is totally matchless for the reason that their lead time is just about two weeks that is quite encouraging for them to compete with their competitors viably. With the help of effective value chain, it helps them to create new and innovative designs in just two weeks (Finney, et al.,

Ac-cording to a study regarding consumer’s responsiveness to sales promotions (Rohr et al. 2013), consumers are highly influenced by such price discounts which affect their purchase decision. The interesting or challenging fact is that customers tend to buy any spirit brand, if it is under price promotion, which means that loyalty is not that high, if the price is attractive enough. This problem was faced over the past years, and brands spend a lot of time and effort for making brands competitive enough to assert themselves against its competitors. There-fore, it is vital for the brand to be attractively represented at the point of sale, in-cluding several merchandising materials, which create high visibility.

Introduction The machine’s ability to perform cognitive, physical, and social tasks is changing jobs and the labor market at a rapid pace. Automation has already taken over many tasks of which minimal labor input is necessary. Low-skill jobs are stagnating, middle-skill workers are being provided with lower pay, and those of higher skill roles are receiving even greater pay. The polarization of work availability is growing as machines’ ability to perform the tasks of lower-skilled workers is only developing further; however, machines’ presence in the labor market is not always apparent. With a focus on balance between wages and investment required for the transition into automation, the labor market of many developed and developing countries

The purpose of Supply Chain Segmentation for a company is to use and develop different supply chain management to able fulfill different level need in more efficient and effective ways. Nowadays, more and more international business is apply Supply Chain Segmentation strategy to take competitive advantage in this competitive market and this is the unique and compulsory for them to fulfill their huge customers and distribution channels. So, the single supply chain will be often lost their competitive advantage and very hard to live long in this competitive market place. The most important is, what is the reason for a company to apply the Supply Chain Segmentation and apply the ways to Supply Chain Segmentation is the most important question and issues for a company to pay high attention. Moreover, the botto-line benefits is need to set up by a company and what actions, steps and technologies need to be apply and begin for a company?

Others are offering price comparison apps, so customers can access to the store prices and their competitors to show them the best deals. Stores need to focus on meet customer’s expectation and to win back their trust and create a strong brand loyalty. Also, because competition is already high, incumbents can use more of its financial resources to create stronger barriers for new competitors or to merge with companies that help to create more value to the overall company