...ABSTRACT This report provides an in depth comparative analysis between Walmart and Amazon with respect to each company’s demographics, marketing, operations, and finance. The intent of this analysis is to determine the better stock to buy and hold over the next decade. It addresses the questions of market mispricing, the changes each entity must address to be competitive in the long run, and the importance of profitability. Jon Dages, Mei Li, and Chris Moore WALMART VS. AMAZON: The Economist Case Competition 2016 Table of Contents CUSTOMER DEMOGRAPHICS ........................................................................................................................ 2 MARKETING................................................................................................................................................... 4 OPERATIONS ................................................................................................................................................. 7 FINANCIAL ANALYSIS ................................................................................................................................... 11 RECOMMENDATION ................................................................................................................................... 13 APPENDIX .................................................................................................................................................... 14 WORKS...
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...Walmart: Supply Chain Management Walmart was founded in 1962 by Sam Walton and is considered one of the global giants in supply chain management. The company has become the world’s biggest retailer with the largest amount of sales per square foot, the highest inventory turnover rates, and net operating profit of any of its major competitors. This powerhouse manages approximately $32 billion in inventory and stocks products manufactured in more than 70 countries worldwide. With these kinds of numbers, it is vital that Walmart is able to continue to effectively and efficiently run its supply chain. The organization is dedicated to a business strategy that drives out costs and enables consumers to save money and live well. The way in which Walmart conducts business is distinctly different from its rival, Amazon, who also dominates the North American and global retail environment. Walmart has found continued success by working with fewer links in its supply chain, expanding strategic vendor partnerships, utilizing cross docking to replenish inventory, and embracing technology to track and restock inventory. Additionally, the company has made great strides in developing a highly structured and advanced supply chain by meeting customer demands and achieving cost structures that allows them to provide low everyday pricing on products. As with any company, Walmart has faced many challenges within its supply chain and continues to execute strategies to overcome such challenges. In...
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...Amazon’s Business Model For this assessment, I chose to write about Amazon.com; this online retailor is one that I utilize numerous times each month, though never really stopping to examine how they became such an important part of my shopping routines, or how they accomplish the online store front, purchasing ease and fast shipping capabilities that I’ve become accustomed to. Amazon has strategically woven its way into our everyday conversations about products and purchasing decisions; including reviews from customers who have purchased items in the past, to the pricing discounts available, and how .com pricing and product quality compare to traditional retail locations. In these discussions, Amazon is always one of the first sites considered. How Amazon accomplishes its ability to predict consumer trends, ease purchasing transactions and deliver products quickly and efficiently is as much about common sense as it is about strategy, integration, utilization and creation of new technology. When Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos began analyzing a business to begin utilizing a unique competitive strategy to eliminate the cost and delay that retail locations added to a business process, he looked for opportunities that offered low priced products, contained a large market of current and future customers, and one that offered a wide range of choices; he decided that the market for books offered the greatest area for advancement and improvement. Books offered a variety of possibilities...
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...| How Walmart became a Super Power | E-Business EBUS308 | | By Dorine | 10/20/2014 | Table of Contents Business Model 2 Description of Stakeholders 4 Supply Chain Management 5 Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) 6 Supply Chain Flow 6 Customer Relationship Management (CRM) 7 Customer Satisfaction 7 How Customer Satisfaction is Measured 7 E-Commerce Business Plan Template 8 Mobile Applications 8 Market Analysis Summary 9 Key Competitors 9 Walmart vs Amazon 10 Walmart vs WinCo 10 Data and Information Management Plan 11 Information Collected 11 How Information Collected Is Used 12 Policies to Protect Information 13 References 14 In today’s world shoppers like to have a one stop shop where they can go to get everything they need at a low price. Wal-Mart has provided that type of store for customer to be able to shop for groceries, clothes, house hold items, furniture, toys, pharmacy, and electronics. They are good at giving the customers what they want, they were the number one business of the Fortune 500 list for 2014 the second year in a row (Fortune 500 2014, 2014). Wal-Mart opened their first store in July 1962 in Roger, Arkansas. In 1991 Wal-Mart went international by opening up Sam’s Club in Mexico City. “Today, Walmart operates over 11,000 retail units under 71 banners in 27 countries (Our Story, 2014).” Walmart employs 1.3 million in the United States and 2.2 million associates around the world. Walmart’s mission statement...
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...Since San Walton opened his first store in 1962, Walmart has grown into a global retailer with more than 4,000 store in the United States and more than 6,000 internationally. Walmart is comprised of three business segments, Walmart US, Walmart International and Sam’s Club. Walmart Global eCommerce works across all three segments. Walmart’s mission statement “We save people money so they can live better”, is not indicative of where its strategic focus areas are, but it does sound good for the average customer who has a limited budget. This mission statement leads directly into Walmart Global eCommerce goals which include combining online, social innovations with physical stores to give consumers “anywhere, anytime shopping experience” in addition to its organizational sustainability goal of creating zero waste, using only sustainable energy and selling products that sustain the environment which is important to all of Walmart’s segments including eCommerce. Walmart’s overall objective is to deliver shareholder value by increasing earnings per share, returns and maintaining strong stable returns on investment. According to Walmart CEO, Mike Duke, Walmart’s strategic focus areas are: •Making sure the company has the best retail talent at every level of the organization by recruiting, developing and retaining the best associates; •Delivering on the productivity loop that enables Walmart to operate for less so the company can drive prices even lower for its customers ...
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...Discussion Board Forum 2 Thread BUSI 330 Amazon believes in keeping its marketing plan simple in order to be effective. Consequently, their marketing plan is based upon the 4 P’s (product, price, place, and promotion). Amazon’s product is to provide an unparalleled selection of any item that exists on the planet. Its prices are extremely competitive and often lower than traditional stores and it is more convenient for people to shop on the internet (place) than it is in a physical location. Finally, its promotion emphasizes big ideas, innovation, technology, and customer centricity, enabling it to market itself as the most convenient place for consumers to shop and satisfy their needs (Kerin & Hartley, 2015). This strategy targets Generational Y cohorts and the millennials who will respond to technology-driven promotions. The primary advantage that Amazon has over brick and mortar department stores is the depth of their selection and inventory. Amazon is able to list more goods than a department store would ever be able to store in its building. Consequently, consumers are almost absolutely sure that they will find what they are looking for when they shop at Amazon while they are not sure that their local department store will carry those items. Another advantage that Amazon holds over brick and mortar department stores is the convenience of the shopping process. Customers can research alternatives online far quicker than they could at a physical store. Furthermore,...
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...INNOVATION AGILITY DECISIONS INVESTMENT SUPPLY Want to Innovate? The supply chain discipline is replete with rules that most managers live by. But in certain cases, true innovation and breakthroughs come only when those conventional rules are broken. By clearly understanding the nature of the rules and the details of your supply chain, you can better determine where and when rule-breaking makes sense. By Robert Sabath and Richard Sherman Robert Sabath and Richard Sherman are Supply Chain Discipline Experts at Trissential, a management consultancy focused on business improvement. They can be reached at bsabath@trissential.com and rsherman@trissential.com. F rom college courses to on-the-job training to professional seminars, we’re taught that supply chain is a complex set of processes that follows specific rules to achieve the best results. Yet most supply chain innovations and breakthroughs evolve from situations where the basic rules were actually broken or changed. Is there a disconnect? Breaking the rules has to do with knowing when it’s beneficial to make an exception to accepted practice or to challenge the conventional answer. It entails scanning the horizon for new technologies, best practices, or approaches that change the paradigm of how we do things. Winning companies often excel because they saw a situation differently and were willing to take the risk and the initiative to break with the accepted logic. Innovation is all about breaking the...
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...Let's look at the competitive forces model specifically as it applies to the company that interest you or pick one of the following companies, such as Google, Ebay, Amazon, Walmart, Apple, Microsoft, Starbucks, AT&T, Coke, Home Depot, Aflac, etc.... For maximum credit for this post, please be sure to address each of the questions below for your selected company 1. Who are their existing competitors? To name a few EBay, Walmart and Alibaba are some of Amazons competitors. 2. Are there any potential new market entrants? Considering the nature of the business there are always potential new market entrants because it is less costly to enter the market and setup operations. Traditional stores can be the biggest threat because they already have the consumer base. For instance Walmart already enjoy economies of scale, they have brands that people recognize and they have a strong supply chain. 3. Are there any substitute products and services? Yes there are a ton of companies that offer some of the same products and service that Amazon offer. 4. Can customers easily switch to a lower cost provider? Yes customers can easily switch to lower cost providers, but most will not because of the customer service provided by Amazon. 5. Who are the suppliers? Amazon.com provides any type of product there is in its online stores. This means that there is a strong supplier base relationship that cannot be replicated. In addition, as...
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... Every company has their own supply chain in order to sort or produce goods. However, the company needs to manage supply chain to maximize its highest benefits. By having effective supply chain management, the company can ensure that the right product or service will be available at the time to the right place and at the right price (Kamal 2007). Amazon is one of the companies that have best supply chain practices in order to respond high level of responsiveness for the customers. Thereby, this paper explains about Amazon Company, analysis of Amazon’s supply chain, recommendations and barriers to implement will be discussed. Company background Amazon is an American commerce company based in Seattle, Washington, USA. The company used to be only a bookstore, but now it diversified into difference type of products. The goal of Amazon is to provide one stop shop experience where the customer can find everything on Amazon as earth’s biggest selection (Warman 2012). Amazon operates as a pure internet retailers that does not have retail store at all while the delivery will be done through Amazon’s networks of distribution centres. This operation makes the company is able to provide wider range of goods and lower cost of products with high quality. Moreover, it is also increase customer satisfaction as it supports customer convenience. An effective supply chain strategy makes the company is able to respond high level of responsiveness. Amazon balances between cost of distributions...
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...The Publicly traded company I have chosen to conduct a SWOT analysis of is Walmart. I think Walmart is a fascinating company because they are America’s largest retailer. Also, according to http://www.businessinsider.com/facts-about-wal-mart-2014-6 90 percent of Americans live within fifteen minutes of a Walmart. Strengths * A strength of the company is Investment capabilities. During fiscal 2014, the company generated total revenues of $ 476 billion, which was primarily comprised of net sales of $473 billion. I base this assessment on http://marketrealist.com/2014/05/berkshire-hathaway-ups-position-wal-mart/ * Another strength of the company is that they have the widest selection of products among retailers. This gives the company a better chance of keeping customers in one place because of the possibility of finding anything at Walmart. I base this assessment on http://www.businessinsider.com/facts-about-wal-mart-2014-6 which states that the average Walmart supercenter has at least a hundred and forty thousand individual items. * Walmart also has a technologically advanced information system to support its logistics; real-time order, inventory tracking for better decision-making and more efficient supply chain management. I base this assessment on http://www.cio.com/article/2437873/infrastructure/45-years-of-wal-mart-history--a-technology-time-line.html Weakness * A weakness of the company is that they have been involved in multiple lawsuits involving questionable...
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...Walmart E-Commerce Prepared by: Ahmed Abdel Moneim Kamal Walmart E-commerce Arab Academy for Science & Technology Ahmed Kamal Contents Introduction to Walmart ............................................................................................................................... 3 Criticism of Walmart ................................................................................................................................. 3 Walmart VS Amazon ..................................................................................................................................... 5 Wal-Mart.com become the dominant e-tailer in the world, replacing Amazon or vice versa ..................... 6 Shopping aids offered at walmart.com Compared to those at amazon.com ............................................... 7 Online services can be purchased at walmart.com ...................................................................................... 7 Buying a song from walmart.com versus buying it from Apple’s iTunes ...................................................... 8 Common features and unique features of online marketing in walmart.com, target.com, marksandspencer.com, and sears.com ........................................................................................................ 8 The options for international customers on the Wal-Mart Web site ........................................................... 9 References ..................................
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...Walmart’s offers an array of products and services throughout Walmart Stores, Walmart Super Centers and Sam Clubs. The products obtainable from Walmart or Sam can range from movies, books, electronics, jewelry, music, toys, baby necessities, sports, home, garden, patio, clothing, “vision” center, “photo” center, wireless service, auto service and pharmacy to name a few. You can find grocery items in the Walmart Supercenter. When we enter Walmart, we see a variety of items on the shelves, but do you know how they get there. Logistics of the supply chain helps with this part of the business. Walmart moves millions of products from the manufacturers, suppliers and distribution centers to its store’s shelves. For a company like Walmart, “development and research is not only a function which needs to maintain a competitive level with the rest of the industry, but it must outdo the rest of its competitors. When it comes to research and development Walmart devotes a large amount of capital.” Walmart spreads cash across the company’s different functions, whereas a greater of the funds is invested in technology. Walmart established a “satellite system” in 1983 that connected its entire stores, headquarters, distribution centers and suppliers which acted as a just-in-time processing system to keep up with the control of inventory. In other words, as an item is purchased from the store, the supplier receives a message alerting them to include that item in the next day’s shipment...
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...Defining Amazon’s Competitive Edge in Today’s Marketplace Introduction to Supply Chain Management University of Memphis Abstract This paper illustrates the ultimate market power that Amazon now has that was once shared by larger corporations. In the recent weeks, Amazon topped their leading competitor, Wal-Mart, in earnings per share. Amazon had been a market leader in their supply chain strategy by analyzing their customer’s orders to show demand, excellent customer service, and individualized product offerings (Muha, 2014). During their holiday season, they bid with the larger capacity 3PL transportation carriers to pay up to three times their normal rate to pick up their freight and deliver on time. Amazon has also sparked an awful lot of controversy over their “Amazon Prime Air” project which is nothing more than a drone dropping a small package at a customer’s door. While this project is still under much scrutiny, Amazon is still testing and moving forward with it. Defining Amazon’s Competitive Edge in Today’s Marketplace Amazon got their start in 1994 as an online book retailer and did not begin to publically trade until 1997. So how did such a small company become one of the world’s largest retailers with such little capital? Prior to doing this research, and I am still partially correct, I thought Amazon took full advantage of the technology boom of the late 1990’s and just grew based on demand. In 1998 they started their music store and in 2000 they...
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...does it mean to have the mission, “the earth’s most customer-centric company? How well is Amazon achieving this mission? Mission statements define who you are, what you believe, and why you exist. They lay out the guiding principles by which you run your business. They set the course and tone by which your organization and all your employees operate. Amazon’s mission statement is clear and bold. They seek to be the best-not the best online retail site in America or even North America, but the world-“Earth’s most customer centric company.” No one, no customer or employee can question this company’s focus and position. They set the bar high and they have backed their words up through performance. I think they are going good on it. They are making innovation of everything company does, profit and they are increasing their customer portfolio in every section. They are not stuck as book seller, they offer everything that they can do on the website. 2- What are the supply chain or demand chain elements essential to the operations and marketing of Amazon? Where are its warehouses located and why are they located there? How can the lessons learned from Amazon be applied to other forms of e-commerce and integrated marketing strategies? Amazon started in 1994 and opened its website for business in July 1995 with the demand for such a wide array of books could never be met by local stores. Amazon online retailer is located in Seattle, Washington a city known for being on progressive...
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...consumers have seem to have a preference to buying electronics online (Amazon), directly from the manufacturer (as in Apples case), or from a more convenient location where other products can be purchased (Walmart). Although Best Buy does have an online store it simply cannot compete with the powerhouse of Amazon. Amazon has a firm grip on online retail that Best Buy is not likely to make a dent in. Best Buy simply cannot undercut Amazon. Aside from not adapting to the current market place, Best Buy has problems elsewhere. Best Buy has made crucial mistakes in its overseas ventures that have turned some of their international stores into business disasters. In order to compete in an international market Best Buy needs to do better research regarding the demands of consumers in EACH international market they enter to avoid more embarrassing situations such as what happened in Turkey and China. II. General Environment Threats/ Opportunities Some opportunities in the general environment that Best Buy has is the opportunity to successfully integrate into the Asian and European markets. Best Buy has opened several stores in China. If they are successful in creating a good business strategy for these markets there could be a lot of profits to be made. An additional opportunity is to start selling more of the home goods products in their store to attract different markets. Since Best Buy owns Five Star the supply chain is already in place and should be easy to integrate....
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