Case Report5 Sealed Air
Igor Petrusca
1. Describe the corporate culture at Sealed Air. What is its business model? How do they make money?
From the very beginning the Sealed Air corporation established itself as a company seeking market leadership and fostering technological leadership. It was a company of “firsts”. In essence, its philosophy was based on the belief that innovation is a customer-generated process and that it brings about market leadership which in turn means greater and sustainable profits. That is why the production initiation process was preceded by the analysis of customers’ needs. This customer-oriented approach was also present in its extensive efforts at market education of the customer with regard to the advantages of coated bubbles and creation of products that were cost-effective substitutes for the low quality alternatives in the protective packaging market. Also part of its philosophy was a “consultative selling approach” through which salespeople spent most of their time making cost-effective research on the products at end-user locations. This not only created brand awareness, educated customers about the advantages of the coated bubble packaging and the importance of quality but also created loyalty between customers and the firm. It is not surprising then that the customers perceived the sealed air salespeople as among the best trained and knowledgeable in the industry. The customer-oriented approach also induced the firm into creating long-term relationships with distributors by creating an extensive distributor network of 370 offices across the US which it educated and allowed to receive benefits even when shipping did not pass through the distributor. This way it created a triangular firm-distributor-customer business relationship to foster loyalty.
The line of business in the protective packaging market was a successful one because of the increasing need to transport fragile products of different nature across vast geographical areas. Since it was
1. Describe the corporate culture at Sealed Air. What is its business model? How do they make money?
From the very beginning the Sealed Air corporation established itself as a company seeking market leadership and fostering technological leadership. It was a company of “firsts”. In essence, its philosophy was based on the belief that innovation is a customer-generated process and that it brings about market leadership which in turn means greater and sustainable profits. That is why the production initiation process was preceded by the analysis of customers’ needs. This customer-oriented approach was also present in its extensive efforts at market education of the customer with regard to the advantages of coated bubbles and creation of products that were cost-effective substitutes for the low quality alternatives in the protective packaging market. Also part of its philosophy was a “consultative selling approach” through which salespeople spent most of their time making cost-effective research on the products at end-user locations. This not only created brand awareness, educated customers about the advantages of the coated bubble packaging and the importance of quality but also created loyalty between customers and the firm. It is not surprising then that the customers perceived the sealed air salespeople as among the best trained and knowledgeable in the industry. The customer-oriented approach also induced the firm into creating long-term relationships with distributors by creating an extensive distributor network of 370 offices across the US which it educated and allowed to receive benefits even when shipping did not pass through the distributor. This way it created a triangular firm-distributor-customer business relationship to foster loyalty.
The line of business in the protective packaging market was a successful one because of the increasing need to transport fragile products of different nature across vast geographical areas. Since it was