baskin robins case
Baskin-Robbins: Can it bask in the good 'Ole Days?
It was early December 2008, and Baskin-Robbins Brand Officer Ken Kimmel had just returned from lunch. To his surprise, his walk from the parking lot to the Randolph, Massachusetts, headquarters building had quickly turned into a sprint. Kimmel was trying to avoid the chilly effects of a Nor’easter that was whipping most of New England with arctic winds.
Like the nasty weather that Kimmel had just escaped, the frozen-food retailing industry had become more hostile to Baskin-Robbins ( www.baskinrobbins.com) in recent years. New entrants such as Cold Stone Creamery founded in 1988, and others had popularized the in-store experience, with customers watching their ice cream creations being made before their eyes on cold stone slabs. For years, Baskin-Robbins had turned their back to Cold Stone Creamery's gains, in a similar way the Baskin-Robbins counter staff turned their back on customers to make a banana split. Cold Stone Creamery's sales were now almost 75 percent of Baskin-Robbins' sales.
In response, the Baskin-Robbins executive group along with Kimmel had recently moved to redesign stores, but it was not easy convincing the thousands of franchisees who ran the Baskin-Robbins stores to change. A store redesign could run up to $50,000 and was funded mostly by the franchisees. One aspect of the redesign resulted in lowering the ice cream cases to make it easier for children to look down into the ice cream bins.
Another change being considered was changing the Baskin-Robbins logo to coincide with the redesign of store interiors. The logo appears on napkins, cone wrappers, spoons, cups, uniforms, and signs at each Baskin-Robbins store. The estimated cost for making such a change was $5 million for Baskin-Robbins headquarters. Individual franchisees would have to invest about $10,000 for the logo change to be made inside the stores.
Later that afternoon, Kimmel's brand group was deep in discussion about whether to
It was early December 2008, and Baskin-Robbins Brand Officer Ken Kimmel had just returned from lunch. To his surprise, his walk from the parking lot to the Randolph, Massachusetts, headquarters building had quickly turned into a sprint. Kimmel was trying to avoid the chilly effects of a Nor’easter that was whipping most of New England with arctic winds.
Like the nasty weather that Kimmel had just escaped, the frozen-food retailing industry had become more hostile to Baskin-Robbins ( www.baskinrobbins.com) in recent years. New entrants such as Cold Stone Creamery founded in 1988, and others had popularized the in-store experience, with customers watching their ice cream creations being made before their eyes on cold stone slabs. For years, Baskin-Robbins had turned their back to Cold Stone Creamery's gains, in a similar way the Baskin-Robbins counter staff turned their back on customers to make a banana split. Cold Stone Creamery's sales were now almost 75 percent of Baskin-Robbins' sales.
In response, the Baskin-Robbins executive group along with Kimmel had recently moved to redesign stores, but it was not easy convincing the thousands of franchisees who ran the Baskin-Robbins stores to change. A store redesign could run up to $50,000 and was funded mostly by the franchisees. One aspect of the redesign resulted in lowering the ice cream cases to make it easier for children to look down into the ice cream bins.
Another change being considered was changing the Baskin-Robbins logo to coincide with the redesign of store interiors. The logo appears on napkins, cone wrappers, spoons, cups, uniforms, and signs at each Baskin-Robbins store. The estimated cost for making such a change was $5 million for Baskin-Robbins headquarters. Individual franchisees would have to invest about $10,000 for the logo change to be made inside the stores.
Later that afternoon, Kimmel's brand group was deep in discussion about whether to