Case Analysis: Leading Culture Change at Seagram
Joseph E. Seagram Sons, Inc., a major alcohol distilling company of its time encountered new business challenges in the 1990s; increased government regulation and taxation on liquor, the 90’s recession, decline in sales, criticism of spirits marketing, and an eroding core market as the business plateaued. The President and CEO of Seagram Company, Edgar Bronfman Jr., recognized the crisis at hand and embarked upon a new vision to reposition and redefine the company’s competitive advantage based on changing its core values. Bronfman took crucial actions to differentiate company’s products and activities by taking ownership in other various industries such as an oil company, Martell USA (cognac), Tropicana (fruit juice beverages), DuPont (chemical), later acquired Dole Food, expanded spirit business into China and Asia Pacific, and purchased an entertainment company (MCA Inc. of Universal Studios and its theme parks). Through his visionary eyes, Seagram is to be “the best managed Beverage Company” with focus on growth, consumers and customers, reward, teamwork, development, training, motivation, and honesty—its values.
This paper’s purpose is to review the corresponding actions of a mature organization in plateau, its need for companywide transformational change in culture and value; its management style in correlations to its implementation processes—emphasizing on being the “best managed Beverage Company” through high productivity yields increased profitability, diversification, and company competitiveness by unlearning the old and learning the new which ended unsuccessfully.
First off, why did Seagram need to change? Bluntly because it is a reaction due to the lack of profit intake, lost in sales, “new sobriety”, and the comfort feeling it gets as a mature company. It has remained the same in product and services of distilling alcohol beverages for more than a decade and time has caught up to Seagram. Carol Bartz said it best when she said, “change if you’ve
This paper’s purpose is to review the corresponding actions of a mature organization in plateau, its need for companywide transformational change in culture and value; its management style in correlations to its implementation processes—emphasizing on being the “best managed Beverage Company” through high productivity yields increased profitability, diversification, and company competitiveness by unlearning the old and learning the new which ended unsuccessfully.
First off, why did Seagram need to change? Bluntly because it is a reaction due to the lack of profit intake, lost in sales, “new sobriety”, and the comfort feeling it gets as a mature company. It has remained the same in product and services of distilling alcohol beverages for more than a decade and time has caught up to Seagram. Carol Bartz said it best when she said, “change if you’ve
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