Tastykakes Sensables Case Study
I. Introduction
Founded over 90 years ago, Tasty Baking Co.’s Tastykakes have been one of the most popular snack foods in the Philadelphia area. However, due to stagnant sales, CEO Charles Piźzi decided that a line extension for Tastykakes would be the right solution to boost performance. With the help of marketing manager Karen Schutz and research manager John Sawicki, Tasty Baking Co set out to ride the emerging trend on healthier snacks and embark on the journey to produce and launch a new line of low-carb Tastykakes (later to be named Sensables) with a tight deadline.
II. Problem Statement
Given the story on the development process of Sensables, how did that process compare with the new products process discussed in the book? Would you question anything Tastykake did? Do you think the Sensables line will succeed? Why or why not?
a. Objectives
i. To analyse the differences between the Sensables product development process and the new products process presented in the book. ii. To analyse critical factors/events that Tasty Baking Co. did or did not do.
III. Analysis and Findings
The book by Crawford and Di Benedetto present a new products process separated into 5 phases (see Appendix). For the purposes of this paper, the group shall analyse, discuss, and present their findings by phase. Due to the lack of information provided by the case, certain assumptions may be made throughout this part of the paper.
Phase 1: Opportunity Identification and Selection
Since the first phase is strategic in nature and is difficult to define or describe (Crawford and Di Benedetto), it is not the group’s place to truly say whether Tasty Baking Co. followed the process or not. However, what we can see from the case is that there was already an existing trend in healthy low-carb products. While the case doesn’t mention if a proper study was done by the organization, the group can only assume that the decision to create a low-carb brand extension was born out of an internal mandate,
Founded over 90 years ago, Tasty Baking Co.’s Tastykakes have been one of the most popular snack foods in the Philadelphia area. However, due to stagnant sales, CEO Charles Piźzi decided that a line extension for Tastykakes would be the right solution to boost performance. With the help of marketing manager Karen Schutz and research manager John Sawicki, Tasty Baking Co set out to ride the emerging trend on healthier snacks and embark on the journey to produce and launch a new line of low-carb Tastykakes (later to be named Sensables) with a tight deadline.
II. Problem Statement
Given the story on the development process of Sensables, how did that process compare with the new products process discussed in the book? Would you question anything Tastykake did? Do you think the Sensables line will succeed? Why or why not?
a. Objectives
i. To analyse the differences between the Sensables product development process and the new products process presented in the book. ii. To analyse critical factors/events that Tasty Baking Co. did or did not do.
III. Analysis and Findings
The book by Crawford and Di Benedetto present a new products process separated into 5 phases (see Appendix). For the purposes of this paper, the group shall analyse, discuss, and present their findings by phase. Due to the lack of information provided by the case, certain assumptions may be made throughout this part of the paper.
Phase 1: Opportunity Identification and Selection
Since the first phase is strategic in nature and is difficult to define or describe (Crawford and Di Benedetto), it is not the group’s place to truly say whether Tasty Baking Co. followed the process or not. However, what we can see from the case is that there was already an existing trend in healthy low-carb products. While the case doesn’t mention if a proper study was done by the organization, the group can only assume that the decision to create a low-carb brand extension was born out of an internal mandate,