Kudler Fine Foods Case Study
Kudler Fine Foods (KFF) is a personally own and run company by Kathy Kudler. Kathy originated the culture of the market and oversees everything from the hiring and firing of employees, the orders being placed, and paying the bills. Through the 2003 Strategic Plan for KFF, it is clear that store expansion out of the current local area (La Jolla, Del Mar, and Encinitas) are in the making. Because KFFs has been built around the culture of providing the finest, highest quality, gourmet foods, it is important the proper marketing research is done in order to determine the best way to expand into new areas.
Kathy Kudler has been the sole proprietor of KFF store since its inception. KFF has specialty bakers and employees that require a high pay-roll and a small management that has many responsibilities on his or her …show more content…
plate as it is. Expansion into an area that Kathy would not be able to visit regularly, as she does with the current stores in place, means that more management and business departments like R&D, HR, and finance would need to be developed and position filled. This would result in Kathy having less hands-on control over the individual stores as she currently has.
The Del Mar store has already shown signs of weakness. Although it has been built in an area that had a median income of nearly $100,000 a year, there was not enough research done to confirm if this very small town with a population under 4,500 people would be able to generate profits. Instead, the Del Mar store has been struggling to keep afloat.
The strategic objective for KFF in 2007 is “Increase Loyalty and Profitability of Consumers” (phoenix.edu, 2007). KFF plans to do this by expanding services by offering in store parties in order to teach its customers how to prepare specialty foods, provide a Frequent Shopper Program to better track consumer purchases while offering incentives to its consumers, and Increase store Efficiency to reduce costs.
Because KFF is striving to expand to more locations, it is critical that its running at maximum efficiency within its operations department and that the business is growing the customer purchase cycle.
Since KFF plans to offer these in store parties to the consumer with world-renowned chefs, it must be understood that this will come at a high cost for the company in hopes to boost its customer base. This is an area that needs further market research to see if there will be an interest in this and how it is going to boost sales when it is offering a premium service for free.
KFF is also offering these classes to its customers to be done in his or her home at a premium cost. This is something that the company is spending resources in marketing and advertising, while offering the same service in its store at no cost. To think that its customers would prefer to pay a premium fee for a service the customer can get for free appears to be a waste of resource and time. A solution to this would be to either drop the costly free in-store classes, or offer them at a premium fee in the store to offset the cost of the chefs it plans to have run the
classes.
KFF needs to also do further market research in the area of merchandise selection. The 2013 survey results showed that there were a significant amount of customers that were unsatisfied with the cost of the goods being sold in the KFF store. In order to find out what products the consumer is most interested in or want, KFF can do customer surveys either in the store, by mail, email, and even over the telephone. This will allow the consumer to rate foods and products as well as giving in-site to what the customer likes best. Compiling a database of this information will allow for KFF to do price comparisons with competitors that may be offering the same food or product.
The importance of competitive intelligence is to better assess, make informed strategic decision, provide early warning of opportunities and threats, and track competitor’s actions (Armstrong & Kotler, 2009). The best way for KFF to do this is through newspapers, word of mouth, magazines, email, and surveys. Competitive prices are an area that KFF needs to take seriously.
In conclusion, KFF has a desperate need to further invest into marketing research to better its strategy and tactics in the expansion of stores outside of the Southern California area. Further market research needs to be done in regards to the in-store costly classes it plans to offer for free to its customers. There needs to be a more strategic plan that will not only draw in the current customers, but that will encourage them to bring friends along that will want to buy from KFF as well. Lastly, competitive intelligence will give KFF an upper-hand to better develop its marketing strategy and tactics in having that “edge” on its competition for current locations and for future.
Kathy Kudler has been the sole proprietor of KFF store since its inception. KFF has specialty bakers and employees that require a high pay-roll and a small management that has many responsibilities on his or her …show more content…
plate as it is. Expansion into an area that Kathy would not be able to visit regularly, as she does with the current stores in place, means that more management and business departments like R&D, HR, and finance would need to be developed and position filled. This would result in Kathy having less hands-on control over the individual stores as she currently has.
The Del Mar store has already shown signs of weakness. Although it has been built in an area that had a median income of nearly $100,000 a year, there was not enough research done to confirm if this very small town with a population under 4,500 people would be able to generate profits. Instead, the Del Mar store has been struggling to keep afloat.
The strategic objective for KFF in 2007 is “Increase Loyalty and Profitability of Consumers” (phoenix.edu, 2007). KFF plans to do this by expanding services by offering in store parties in order to teach its customers how to prepare specialty foods, provide a Frequent Shopper Program to better track consumer purchases while offering incentives to its consumers, and Increase store Efficiency to reduce costs.
Because KFF is striving to expand to more locations, it is critical that its running at maximum efficiency within its operations department and that the business is growing the customer purchase cycle.
Since KFF plans to offer these in store parties to the consumer with world-renowned chefs, it must be understood that this will come at a high cost for the company in hopes to boost its customer base. This is an area that needs further market research to see if there will be an interest in this and how it is going to boost sales when it is offering a premium service for free.
KFF is also offering these classes to its customers to be done in his or her home at a premium cost. This is something that the company is spending resources in marketing and advertising, while offering the same service in its store at no cost. To think that its customers would prefer to pay a premium fee for a service the customer can get for free appears to be a waste of resource and time. A solution to this would be to either drop the costly free in-store classes, or offer them at a premium fee in the store to offset the cost of the chefs it plans to have run the
classes.
KFF needs to also do further market research in the area of merchandise selection. The 2013 survey results showed that there were a significant amount of customers that were unsatisfied with the cost of the goods being sold in the KFF store. In order to find out what products the consumer is most interested in or want, KFF can do customer surveys either in the store, by mail, email, and even over the telephone. This will allow the consumer to rate foods and products as well as giving in-site to what the customer likes best. Compiling a database of this information will allow for KFF to do price comparisons with competitors that may be offering the same food or product.
The importance of competitive intelligence is to better assess, make informed strategic decision, provide early warning of opportunities and threats, and track competitor’s actions (Armstrong & Kotler, 2009). The best way for KFF to do this is through newspapers, word of mouth, magazines, email, and surveys. Competitive prices are an area that KFF needs to take seriously.
In conclusion, KFF has a desperate need to further invest into marketing research to better its strategy and tactics in the expansion of stores outside of the Southern California area. Further market research needs to be done in regards to the in-store costly classes it plans to offer for free to its customers. There needs to be a more strategic plan that will not only draw in the current customers, but that will encourage them to bring friends along that will want to buy from KFF as well. Lastly, competitive intelligence will give KFF an upper-hand to better develop its marketing strategy and tactics in having that “edge” on its competition for current locations and for future.