ECW Case Study Essay

Introduction
ECW made and sold decorative pottery and other household items targeted at middle-to upper-income households. Hines, the owner of ECW believed that her product lines were differentiated from others because ECW’s pieces were both unique and functional. Most of Hine’s whole sale operation focused on various retailers, including boutique shops throughout Ontario and Quebec, a consignment-based decorative goods chain and several franchise locations of a national pharmacy chain. She had been very successful with the new locations she had approached.
Of particular interest to Hines was her country (CP) line, it typically featured a hand-painted design that Hines created. Therefore, it is very popular among the customers because of
She found out three feasible options would help her to get free from the dilemma.
1. Alternative 1: Purchase Decal Equipment
Hines recognized that using a digital decal computer system to print the decals on CPs would be a nice attempt. The usage of the system will replace Hines by an unskilled worker who would be trained only several times. This will not only reduce Hines working time and increase the production capacity also control the whole production and design processes completely. If so, Hines can concentrate on working on butter chum lamps which will generate $210.00 profit ($350*0.6) for each week two to three additional units. However, the fixed cost of purchasing decal equipment will be $6600. If ECW wants to fulfill the order of 3000 CPs in coming year, the total variable cost will be $35,070.00. The profit will be $33,330.00 by subtracting $41,670(fixed cost + variable cost) from $75,000.00. But Hines concerned about the negative impacts by using decal computer system because she claimed that her pieces were “hand painted” and