...Harvard Business School 9-199-009 July 8, 1998 Quality Furniture Company In March 1992, Richard Allan, an assistant credit analyst for the Quality Furniture Company, was concerned about changes in two of Quality’s accounts in Minnesota—Lloyd’s, Inc., of Minneapolis and The Emporium department store in St. Paul. He therefore brought the credit folders of these two customers to the attention of Watt Ralphson, the credit manager of Quality Furniture. The Quality Furniture Company had its headquarters in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and manufactured a limited line of high-quality home furniture for distribution to department stores, independent home furnishing retailers, and regional chains. Lloyd’s retailed quality home furnishings from three locations—one in the downtown section of Minneapolis and the others in nearby suburban areas. Sales were somewhat seasonal, with a slight downturn in the midsummer months and a slight upturn during the December holiday season. Lloyd’s sales were approximately 75% for cash or credit cards and 25% on six-month installment terms. Installment terms called for 25% down and the balance in equal monthly payments over a sixmonth period. Lloyd’s had been established as a partnership and was later incorporated. In June 1991, two of the four original partners sold their shares in the company to the two remaining owners. Lloyd’s had been a customer of Quality Furniture for over 30 years and had previously handled its affairs in a most satisfactory manner...
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...Name of the business: The Quality Furniture Company (Lloyds) Nature of the Business: Manufacturer of home furniture Marketing Analysis: Quality furniture manufactured a limited line of high quality furniture to strong market. The demand for company’s products is mostly seasonal. In summer Quality furniture experience downtown in sales and a slight upturn in winter. Sales growth rate were -20.1% and 0.6% for the years 1991 and 1992 respectively. In that period customers switched to high priced and quality furniture and it influenced negatively to sales of company as it had retailers with low-priced furniture lines. Customers buy their product because the sell high quality furniture. Quality Furniture tried to support their customers in order to keep rational distribution of its products. They have very clear strategic plan, which is to make national advertisement and allocate their products through stores that are located in particular marketing area. This market has great potential to grow faster. I think they can increase their sales if managers of Quality Furniture will do broad market analysis in order to meet needs of customers and sell actually what is demandable in market. Operational Analysis: The Quality Furniture Company manufactures furniture itself and distributes it to department store. Consequently it has merchandise inventory which means inventory probably one of the largest costs of its business. I would say company’s asset intensity is not moderate...
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...inputs in order to produce the desired outputs. At Stickley Furniture, the primary mode of operation is continuous production. Also referred to as flow production, continuous production mainly entails the approach of processing or manufacturing the various parts in order to come up with the final product on a continuous basis. There are several major reasons as to why continuous production is evident at Stickley Furniture: * Firstly, the company assesses the nature and/or quality of timber prior to feeding it into the saw. The process of assessing the quality of timber at Stickley Furniture is achieved in two main ways: manually and also through the use of computers. Employees at the Stickley Furniture closely examine all the timber in order to ascertain the quality more so in terms of knots. * On the other hand, specially designed computer software is also used by the company to verify the quality of timber before feeding it into the saw for processing. This kind of approach goes a very long way towards ensuring that the quality of furniture produced at Stickley Furniture is excellent and meets the high expectations of clients. * The next step after sawing the timber is to produce the various types of furniture in line with the orders that have been placed by clients. All these are clear indications that the most commonly used operations system at Stickley Furniture is flow production. At Stickley Furniture, despite the fact that flow production is the principal...
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...BatesManor Furniture, Inc. BatesManor Furniture, Inc. Case Analysis Khyatiben Patel Davenport University MKTG610 Dr. Loughran January 28, 2011 Case Recap In early 1900s, Charlton Bates’ great-grandfather opened BatesManor Furniture Inc.; the company manufactures medium-to-high-priced wood bedroom, living room and dining room furniture. BatesManor sells its furniture to independent furniture stores and high quality department stores nationwide; it’s very selective in choosing retail outlets. BatesManor had 10 full-time salespeople and 2 sales managers for fiscal year 20071. And sales personnel receive his salary and commission on the base of the sales. Bates believes that the company has been successful because they have employees who are committed to the company and they are not only taking the order but motivate the retail sales people and suggesting them about displaying the furniture in the store. The total promotional expenditures allocated by BatesManor for the operating year 2007 were $3,675,000, which did not include the salary of the vice president of sales. For the same year the company had net sales of $75 million. Problem Identification For year 2008, Mike Hervey, from BatesManor’s ad agency, proposed that they would increase the advertising expenditures by $225,000. This would increase new product exposure, brand awareness, and enhance the quality image of the manufacturer. However, the $225,000 increase in advertising is slightly out of line...
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...internship report of Partex INTERNSHIP REPORT Partex Furniture Industries Ltd. (A Partex Star Group Company) REPORT ON ‘MARKETING STRATEGY OF PARTEX FURNITURE: A STUDY OF PARTEX FURNITURE INDUSTRIES LIMITED’ Prepared for: Md. Shahin Ahamed Chowdhury Lecturer Department of Business Administration Dhaka International University Prepared by: Md. Ershadul Haque Class Roll No: 11 Registration No: 209181 18th Batch Program RMBA 1Year Major in Marketing Dhaka International University Submission Date: February 26, 2011 Letter of Transmittal February 26, 2011 To Md. Shahin Ahamed Chowdhury Lecturer Department of Business Administration Dhaka International University Dear Sir, It is my pleasure to hand you the Internship Paper for PARTEX Furniture Indus. Ltd. The Subject of my analysis is Partex Furniture, one of the concerns of the Partex Group- a renowned national conglomerate. The study encompassed, a through analysis of Problem and Pattern of Partex Furniture. I have completed my analysis of the current situation with recommendation that is believed to be fruitful for the concern of the conglomerate. I would like to thank you for providing me with the opportunity to conduct a study such as this, which...
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...or team attempting to reach those goals. The business or organizational plan include location of organization , describe the area in which it works. In the plan introduce an organizational structure of organization. Name of the organization Our company name is ‘Sohag Furniture Ltd’. Nature of business We form our business as a “partnership” business. The types of our business are Manufacturing Furniture’s, Distributor/ Wholesaler. There will be 7 partners in their respective posts. Size of Business This business will produce & provide consumer product and organize medium size business. Initially we will cover the 1 division of the country but our prospect will be whole of the country. Business Description COMPANY PROFILE COMPANY PROFILE Sohag furniture will launch on year of 2014. Sohag Furniture manufactures basic, durable home and office furnishings. Principal among these is a line of hardwood desks, dressers, bed sheds, dining tables, chairs, and home entertainment centers. The company's typical retail and service customers include upper-middle class residents of the residential area who seek to maximize the purchasing power of the interior decorating budget. These customers are attracted to Sohag Furniture because it provides...
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...Stickley Furniture Stickley Furniture Stickley Furniture founded in 1900 by brothers Leopold and George Stickley manufacturing fine cherry, white oak, and mahogany furniture with a prestigious line of mission oak furniture. Stickley Furniture has a production facility outside of Syracuse, New York but now has various showrooms in New York State, Connecticut and North Carolina. Employing 1,350 employees, Stickley Furniture has been able to gain report with local customers and gain a large market share in the north eastern part of the country. With continued growth and technological advances, they have the opportunity to increase production and streamline production processes. (Stevenson, 2012) There are different types of production processing that can be used, such as job shop, batch, repetitive, or continuous as the primary mode of operation. Job shop consists of a variety of custom-made products that are produced in batch numbers but somewhat few in diversity. The batch process occurs when many similar items are produced at one time, stage by stage from station to station and many items are produced simultaneously. Repetitive processing is large categories of standardized items are produced at one time in factory lines. The continuous processing method is products that are being processed are continuously in motivation with activities being done to them as they are moved down the line. Stickley Furniture uses...
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...Online Marketing Plan for Doe Furniture Doe Furniture is a new business venture that will be located in State. The business wants to focus on building custom heirloom quality furniture however; there is a current customer base that also knows Doe Furniture for its custom kitchen and kitchen refinishing. The focus of the online presence is building custom furniture without ignoring the current customer base that is previously purchased custom kitchen cabinetry. Viability Doe Furniture does not currently have a website but it is looking to create one to drive business to its brick and mortar location. Having an online presence for a brick and mortar store would allow Doe Furniture to have an online portfolio to showcase their work, have a place for previous customers to drive referrals, and allow the company to find new customers and interact with current customers. The initial plan of the website would not be to actually sell furniture because each item is custom made. The customer niche that Doe Furniture is trying to fill is for customers who want high-end quality custom furniture. When working at this caliber a website would be useful to schedule appointments and show previous examples of work, but when it comes to a discussion of what will actually be built a personal consultation is more effective and less confusion about style and detail arises. The market for higher-end furniture can be tapped into most easily by interior designers and customer referrals...
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...Company Description IKEA started up with the woods of southern Sweden with the inspiration by the founder at 1943 in Switzerland. The founder of IKEA is Ingvar Kamprad. The company name is inspire by the first letter of the name of founder, Ingvar Kamprad (IK) and the name of the place that he grew up, Elmtaryd and Agunnaryd (EA). IKEA’s vision is “to create a better everyday life for the many people” (IKEA/MY/EN, 2014). Besides that, the company’s business idea is to offer a wide range of well designed, functional home furnishing products at affordable prices so there will be many people able to purchase them (IKEA/MY/EN, 2014). Now, IKEA had established in about 40 countries with 345 stores, such as France, China, United States and so on and it’s still growing. IKEA is positioning as good quality furniture with low price. IKEA is known as a values driven company with a passion for life at home (IKEA /GB/EN, 2014). IKEA has offers varieties of home furnishing products with affordable price to people. IKEA furnishing products are designed to let customers easy to carry back to home and install it by themselves. IKEA promote that the furnishing products provided is a way to a beautiful home to fulfill with love and make life better. IKEA’s stores decorated in a way that how actual home look like. This design is making for the convenient of people to get inspiration on what to put in their home by choosing the products they want. IKEA’s furnishing products can be classified...
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...reinvent the pasta experience for individuals, families, and take out customers with discretionary income by selling high quality, innovative products at a reasonable price, designing tasteful, convenient locations, and providing industry-benchmark customer service. In order to grow at a rate consistent with our objectives, Sigmund's is offering an additional $500,000 in equity. Existing members will be given the first option to subscribe to the additional equity to allow each of them to maintain their percentage of ownership. The portion not subscribed by existing members will be available for prospective new investors. Read more: http://www.mplans.com/pasta_restaurant_marketing_plan/executive_summary_fc.php#ixzz1gEUppQdh SWOT Analysis The following SWOT analysis captures the key strengths and weaknesses within the company, and describes the opportunities and threats facing Sigmund's Gourmet Pasta. Strengths • Strong relationships with vendors that offer high-quality ingredients and fast/frequent delivery schedules. • Excellent staff who are highly trained and very customer attentive. • Great retail space that is bright, hip, clean, and located in an upscale mall, suburban neighborhood, or urban retail district. • High customer loyalty among repeat customers. • High-quality food offerings that exceed competitors offerings in quality, presentation, and price. Weaknesses • Sigmund's...
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...OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT GROUP PROJECT Report on the Operations Management strategy of Xuan Hoa Furniture and IKEA Prepared for Prof. Noel By - Group 7 - Lê Quang Anh Đỗ Thị Hà Anh Vũ Kim Phượng Nguyễn Thị Mỹ Linh Nguyễn Thị Thùy Linh May 22, 2014 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Operational management is line management of organizations that highly affect the company’s performance. It is a business function that organizes, coordinate and control the resources needed to produce a good, operational management is a business process to create highest level of efficiency and value add. Operations management is a dynamic field and presents exciting new issues and challenges for operations managers. This is also a very important coursework for everyone of us who want to become a successful leader in the future. For that reason, after completing a 3-week Operations Management course, we – Group 7 would like to present a report about our findings on the comparison of the operations management strategy between 2 companies on the field of furniture manufacturing and retailer: Xuan Hoa Furniture and IKEA. Our report is divided into 9 main parts, each one represents a strategic Operations Management decision. And every main part will be broken into 2 part: one from Xuan Hoa Furniture and one from IKEA. 1. General Introduction 2. Operations Strategy 3. Product Design 4. Managing Quality 5. Process Strategy 6. Location Strategy 7. Human Resources and Job Design ...
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...INTERNSHIP REPORT Partex Furniture Industries Ltd. (A Partex Star Group Company) REPORT ON ‘MARKETING STRATEGY OF PARTEX FURNITURE: A STUDY OF PARTEX FURNITURE INDUSTRIES LIMITED’ Prepared for: Md. Shahin Ahamed Chowdhury Lecturer Department of Business Administration Dhaka International University Prepared by: Md. Ershadul Haque Class Roll No: 11 Registration No: 209181 18th Batch Program RMBA 1Year Major in Marketing Dhaka International University Submission Date: February 26, 2011 Letter of Transmittal February 26, 2011 To Md. Shahin Ahamed Chowdhury Lecturer Department of Business Administration Dhaka International University Dear Sir, It is my pleasure to hand you the Internship Paper for PARTEX Furniture Indus. Ltd. The Subject of my analysis is Partex Furniture, one of the concerns of the Partex Group- a renowned national conglomerate. The study encompassed, a through analysis of Problem and Pattern of Partex Furniture. I have completed my analysis of the current situation with recommendation that is believed to be fruitful for the concern of the conglomerate. I would like to thank you for providing me with the opportunity to conduct a study such as this, which help me to gain a deep insight into the activities of the business in complement with the theoretical knowledge provided by Md. Shahin Ahamed Chowdhury. I hope that you enjoy reviewing this report as much as...
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...choosing the level production method 2. We would like to give up 30% of the equity control of our company 3. Based on our analysis, the return on $2 million investment will be 12.9%, which is almost 4% higher than the bank interest rate 4. If the investors can provide us with some extra support, such as management teams, marketing support, branding effect, corporation opportunities, we will consider to give up more equity controls (e.g. 5% more) 5. We believe our company’s differentiation strategy will make us unique and very attractive for investors. We have been focusing on creating high-quality, eco-friendly, durable, and recycled plastics furniture, which represents the future trend. We believe our company has a huge potential growth, and both future demand and sales will increase. As a result, the investors will earn higher return on investment Analysis: Overall, we believe our company has huge potential growth. According to the industry analysis in exhibit 3, most competitors are pursuing low-cost strategy. Their products are basically the same as other competitors with undifferentiated features, thus, their future profit margins are constrained by these disadvantages. On the other hand, for our company, we successfully differentiate our product by creating high-quality, environmental-friendly, durable, and innovative recycled plastic outdoor furniture. This strategy helps us to gain market shares. Our main product is the original Adirondack, which comprises...
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...Guillermo Furniture Store FIN/571 February 4, 2013 Garrick Turner University of Phoenix Instructor: Paul Stevens Guillermo Furniture Store The Guillermo furniture store is the largest furniture store in Sonora, Mexico. The store definitely has established itself as the main provider of fine art furniture, until the late 1990 when two competitors, pose as a problem for the local store. The first company is a foreign furniture company, making a good use of a high-tech approach, building furniture with exact specification. The second competition is one of the largest retailers who have expanded which caused an influx of people and jobs. This paper will evaluate Guillermo processes and determine how to handle the challenges they are facing from a changing market. Guillermo’s financial interest, return, and risk and its ability to maintain its business ethic taken in consideration if they decide to continue business on their own sticking with its traditional way of making fine furniture; Adapt the new high-tech developments of producing furniture or merge with a possible alliances, taking on new services as a distributor. The financial interest for Guillermo Furniture Store is to manufacture a product that best fit the needs of the business and its customer. Examine their budget information, can be analyze to determine if the company will be more profitable by staying independent or merging with its competitor, to become more efficient they must...
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...development 6.1 SWOT Analysis 6.2 Future strategies 7. Conclusions 1. Company’s presentation 1.1 History IKEA is a multinational Swedish company that sells retail furniture and home furnishings and decor, at a low price and with a contemporary design. The word IKEA is made up of the initials of its founder Ingvar Kamprad (IK) plus the first letter of Elmtaryd and Agunnaryd, which are the farm and village where he grew up, respectively. It was founded in 1943 in the province of Småland, Sweden. It’s logo is blue and yellow, as it represents the colors of the Swedish flag. In 1943, Ingvar Kamprad started its business by selling goods by mail in a village in southern Sweden. The idea was to sell items that cover different needs, at affordable prices. Thus began selling pens, wallets, picture frames, watches, jewelry etc. In 1947, expanded his business to selling furniture and four years later published the first catalog IKEA furniture, then took the historic decision to focus exclusively on home furnishings, and leave the other articles. The catalog became a symbol of the company and its main marketing channel. By 1953, IKEA sells by catalog only, but the competition with its closest rival led to a price war that lowered margins and endangered quality. Ingvar Kamprad decided to open its first showroom in Älmhult, a city in southern Sweden. The competitors put pressure on suppliers to complete their supply contracts with IKEA in an attempt...
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