Customer and Talbot
What went wrong in 1997? Was it flawed strategy or execution?
The problem with Talbot in 1997 seemed to be partially from both flawed strategy and execution. The first reason why I think their strategy is flawed is because they didn't think about the effects the new strategy would have on it's existing customers. Talbot failed to clearly define their target audience. If they could have just secured their best customers and let go of other customers Talbot could have avoided this incident. By just focusing on its core customers and serving them better Talbot could have made more profits. What Talbot did was they wanted to expand their customer base and target young hipper crowds. By doing so it apparently defected their core customer to other competitors. Because of this Talbot was unable to sell a lot of its merchandise which led to share prices fall from $1.91 to $0.81. The problem with executing this strategy was that they tried to sell these other merchandise in the same stores. If they wanted to expand their customer base Talbot should have opened up new stores with a different name that focused on young hipper crowds. Instead of marking down prices they could have just transferred the younger assortment of merchandise to their new store with different name. This could have prevented their core customers from deflecting from Talbot since it would have not interfered with the taste of older customers and the stock price wouldn't have dropped drastically.
Has Talbots fixed the problem?
Talbots started taking immediate actions as soon as they realized problems with their merchandise offerings in 1997. They reviewed their upcoming merchandise to bring it back to classic. To realize this problem they did a market research and took customer surveys. From the survey Talbot learned that younger customers liked the colors and styles but were concerned about the price whereas older customers were concerned about the colors and length of the skirt. By doing this
The problem with Talbot in 1997 seemed to be partially from both flawed strategy and execution. The first reason why I think their strategy is flawed is because they didn't think about the effects the new strategy would have on it's existing customers. Talbot failed to clearly define their target audience. If they could have just secured their best customers and let go of other customers Talbot could have avoided this incident. By just focusing on its core customers and serving them better Talbot could have made more profits. What Talbot did was they wanted to expand their customer base and target young hipper crowds. By doing so it apparently defected their core customer to other competitors. Because of this Talbot was unable to sell a lot of its merchandise which led to share prices fall from $1.91 to $0.81. The problem with executing this strategy was that they tried to sell these other merchandise in the same stores. If they wanted to expand their customer base Talbot should have opened up new stores with a different name that focused on young hipper crowds. Instead of marking down prices they could have just transferred the younger assortment of merchandise to their new store with different name. This could have prevented their core customers from deflecting from Talbot since it would have not interfered with the taste of older customers and the stock price wouldn't have dropped drastically.
Has Talbots fixed the problem?
Talbots started taking immediate actions as soon as they realized problems with their merchandise offerings in 1997. They reviewed their upcoming merchandise to bring it back to classic. To realize this problem they did a market research and took customer surveys. From the survey Talbot learned that younger customers liked the colors and styles but were concerned about the price whereas older customers were concerned about the colors and length of the skirt. By doing this