...“True enjoyment comes from activity of the mind and exercise of the body; the two are ever united.” (von Humboldt, n.d.). As the public becomes more health-conscious and the aging population places greater emphasis on remaining healthy and fit, the fitness industry is maintaining steady growth because of better dietary practices and a resurgence to play and become more active. It is no surprise the demand for gyms and health and fitness clubs will continue to rise. Therefore, my paper will cover the critical concepts as it relates to Bally Total Fitness Case Study. I will highlight Bally’s history, macro environment, SWOT analysis, corporate-level strategy, business-level strategy, and my recommendation for Bally Total Fitness. History, Development, and Growth Dave “Wild man” Wildman is said to be the founder of Bally Fitness, but it was Raymond T. (Ray) Moloney back in the early 1930’s who decided to create an affordable past time of pinball. Anyone could play pinball at the price of seven balls for one cent or 10 balls for a nickel. In January of 1932, Ray founded the popular past time while working under Lion Manufacturing in Chicago. The Ballyhoo pinball game was easy to make and very profitable. With the creation of the “Goofy,” the “Airway,” the “Rocket,” and the “Bumper” pinball machines, Bally Manufacturing, under Moloney’s leadership, took off. Bally Manufacturing headquarters remained in Chicago at the same address for almost 50 years. In 1936, Bally Manufacturing...
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...by the societies they take part in. Sociologist use research methods such as participant observation and surveys to collect their data. In participant observation the researcher spends an extended amount of time in the research location, this is also known as field work (sociology.com, 2013). While at the location the researcher’s gathers information while directly interacting with the participants being observed. They immerse themselves into the culture to better understand the participants being studied. Surveys are another method used for social research. Surveys can gather a large amount of information from various types of sources to research a certain subject. Surveys can come in the form of questions or interviews. The ability of a survey to gather information, quickly, and without manipulation to the subject makes it philosophically justified. Today’s internet technology helps surveys reach even a broader audience to collect data. The World Wide Web allows the ability to take a survey anonymously; this perpetuates the individual to answer more truthfully, and without any external influence. (Jones, 2010) Cultural anthropology studies the variation of cultures among humans. Naturalistic observation and secondary analysis are two very common methods used in the research...
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...Customer Buyer Behavior Regarding Luxury Goods in Peter Jones By [Author’s Name] [Faculty Name] [Department or School Name] [Month Year] ACKNOWLEDGEMENT My thanks go out to all who have helped me complete this study and with whom this project may have not been possible. In particular, my gratitude goes out to friends, facilitator and family for extensive and helpful comments on early drafts. I am also deeply indebted to the authors who have shared my interest and preceded me. Their works provided me with a host of information to learn from and build upon, also served as examples to emulate. DECLARATION I, (Your name), would like to declare that all contents included in this thesis/dissertation stand for my individual work without any aid, & this thesis/dissertation has not been submitted for any examination at academic as well as professional level previously. It is also representing my very own views & not essentially which are associated with the university. Signature: Date: ABSTRACT TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES CHAPTER 01: INTRODUCTION 1.1. Outline of the Study Purchasing products and services is common around the world, and almost everyone indulges in shopping. The value of a brand is seen in its brand equity and the brand loyalty that the brand possesses. The way consumers perceive a product or service, and the importance it has in their life is what makes all the difference, watching dogs on the way...
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...Strategic Management and Strategic Competitiveness Name Institution Date General environment A business is impacted by the environment it functions in and the success of the business depends on the way it is able to adjust to its environment. The difficulty of this actuality is made even more complicated by the many diverse business environments. There are situations or events that occur and can either affect a business positively or negatively. These events and situations are known as environmental factors (Hitt & Ireland, 2013). There are two types of environmental factors, internal environment factors and external environment factors. Internal environmental factors are those events that happen within an organization and the company can easily control them than external environmental factors. Some of the internal environmental factors include management changes, employee morale, culture changes and financial changes (Hill & Jones, 2010). External environmental factors are the events that occur without the business and are more challenging to control. These factors are more dangerous to the organization than internal factors and include changes to the economy, competition, political factor and government regulations. Segments that affect the company There are five segments of the general environment, that is the, the macroeconomic, sociocultural, political technological and global segments. The segments with the biggest impact on Wright Medical Technology...
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...Sociological knowledge is scientific. A wide range of topics are investigated including gender, families and the economy. Sociologists test and modify their understanding of how the world works methodically and systematically through scientific analysis. This is done by induction and deduction. Data is gathered and theories are formulated, these are then tested using scientific methods to test validity. Sociologists situate social events in their related environments and try to understand social phenomena by collating and analysing data. It is this scientific objective approach which differs from common sense. Common sense is basic experience and subjective knowledge which everybody shares. Opinions are assumed to be true,...
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...Outline Abstract The global financial crisis in 2007 started in mortgage market then quickly went to the every other corner of the economies. The most well known reason for the collapse of financial system was investor’s confidence. Investors in stock market have taken a huge a mount of money out of stock market and destroyed liquidity of the market. Without the advantage of liquidity, every stock began to fall. The panic of investors came from the anticipation of the future market. This paper will investigate if the stock price correctly reflected the health of business or it was only the fear of investors. I will use the most famous market indicator: Down Jones Index and net profit from incomes statement of 30 stocks in Down Jones Index. Down Jones index uses 30 large value stocks in the market to represent the entire market. We expect to see if the Down Jones Index line shared the trend with the profit of 30 companies in Down Jones index. Introduction Financial Market during the Great Recession “It is well known that the Lehman Brothers’ default severly increased counterparty risk because the failed company had $729 billion of notional derivative contracts” From:STOCK MARKET REACTION TO THE GLOBAL FINANCIAL CRISIS: TESTING FOR THE LEHMAN BROTHERS' EVENT by Leonardo Becchetti and Rocco Ciciretti “Probably, it is the largest crisis after great recession of 1930s that has affected both real and financial sectors (Llanto and Badiola, 2010). This crisis originated...
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...Academic Report on Strategic Management by Diana Romanova 100878 Strategy & Communication EHM3.SC-02 December 10, 2012 Abstract The purpose of the report is to discuss the current strategy of the Carnival Corporation, the world leader in the cruise industry. Based on the external and internal situation analysis the new growth strategy is formulated. The recommendations on the strategy implementation and evaluation are provided by terms of the various strategic theories and models. The projected internationalization strategy may result in the improvement of the financial business situation, by increasing the corporation’s profit margins and shareholder value, and non-financial indicators, for example, brand awareness. Moreover the company can adapt the proposed scenario for entering new markets in the future. 2|Page Table of Contents Abstract ...................................................................................................................................... 2 Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 4 Situation Analysis ...................................................................................................................... 5 Strategic Direction ..................................................................................................................... 6 Formulating a strategy ..............................................
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...Portland State University School of Business Administration FIN 565: Cases in Corporate Finance Case Descriptions and Suggestions Fall 2010 As you review the case descriptions and read the cases, develop a plan for your analysis. The case report and presentation should include, but not be limited to, the suggested questions I have provided. Do not submit or present the case a simply a numbered series of answers to the questions. The case analysis must be a narrative report that includes the information needed to answer the questions. Financial Statement Analysis Identify the Industry – 2007 Substantive Issues This case provides financial statement data for 10 companies from 10 different industries from Thomson Banker One – Analytics. Using knowledge of the industries’ financial characteristics and financial rations, you are asked to match each of the 10 financial statement data sets to an appropriate industry. You are provided with common-sized income statements (all items scaled by revenues), common-sized balance sheets (all items scaled by total assets) and selected financial ratios. All data are averaged over three years – 2004 – 2006 – to smooth out one-time items. Pedagogical Objectives This case illustrates the difficulty of identifying a company in an industry since do few companies operate in a single homogeneous industry. It also serves to get each class member engaged with team members in an effort to determine the strengths of each member...
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...Barclays bank is to satisfy people’s needs and offer them the best service. According to Jones and George (2008:308), the SWOT analysis is “A planning exercise in which managers identify organizational strengths (s) and weaknesses (W) and environmental opportunities (O) and threats (T)”. Strengths might include adequate financial resources, economies of scale, and proprietary technology. Weaknesses include lack of strategic direction, obsolete facilities, and lack of managerial depth and talent. Whereas, Opportunities might include the possibility of serving additional customers in the face of weakening competition, or the chance to enter foreign markets due to falling trade barriers. Threats might include the likely entry of new lower-cost foreign competitors, rising sales substitute products, and slowing market growth (Dessler, 2004). Four important features that lead to the success of Barclays bank are: High quality products, team spirit between the bank’s employees, wide spread global presence and strong management with well educated managers. Although Barclays bank is a highly qualified bank, it still lacks important services and offers like Islamic banking and Drive through ATM. The banks products are not well advertised and so many people aren’t aware of the retail banking offers. The marketing team should promote and advertise more about the products so it could be known by everyone. The banks location is not suitable for such banking environment, and if customers...
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...Strategic Management Analysis Tools BUSI/600 – Business Research Methods October 14th, 2011 Abstract In this paper the author has decided to conduct an in-depth analysis on the strategic management analysis tools. In this paper the author will speak on several types of analysis tools and distinguish how each has a distinguishing role in the organizations planning process. In this literature review, the author will cover the SWOT Analysis, the PEST Analysis, the Value Chain Analysis, Porter’ Five Model, Four Corner’s Analysis, Boston Consulting Group Growth-Share Matrix, General Electric Matrix, and the Strategic Early Warning Systems. Hopefully, after the completion of this review the readers will have a clear understanding of how each of the analysis operate and can be applied to any organization or group. SWOT Analysis The SWOT Analysis is a technique that was developed by Albert Humphrey, who was in charge of a research project in the 1960’s and 1970’s at Stanford University using data from many organizations over the world. The ultimate goal of the study was to reveal why corporate planning was failing. After the results were formulated, Humphrey could identify many areas of concern and the tools Humphrey needed to investigate each of these areas were called a SOFT analysis (Ghazinoory, Zadeh & Memariani, 2007). Humphrey and the team used the categories “What is good in the present is Satisfactory, good in the future is...
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...STRATEGY ANALYSIS OF DAVID JONES – JUNE 2014 INTRODUCTION The purpose of this report is to identify and evaluate the strategy of DJs. Analysing the external environment, looking at what resources and capabilities give the organisation its completive position, assessing the organisations strengths and weakness and looking at DJs long term sustainability plan to see what recommendations can be advised and considered in the coming years as the organisation faces new challenges in the ever changing retail and financial sector. ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS The Business environment is ever changing for DJs. The Business focus is its department stores and financial services. The business environment is anything that affects strategies, performance and decision-making in the business. It is vital that an external and internal business environment study and investigation is carried out before formulating the company’s position and direction to remain sustainable long term. Reviewing the Macro environment, this consists of issues at work that will directly affect DJs activities and markets in which DJs competes in. The PESTEL model will be used to analysis the macro environment effects DJs is currently facing; this will allow the company to predict situations and unforeseen circumstances that may occur in the future. (please refer to Appendix A for diagram) Economic Factors The most important economic factor in the retail industry that affects DJs is interest rates. The...
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.../deliverables from that stage to be used as input in the next (Marakas, p246). Hayes-Roth (1983) as referenced by Marakas (2003) and by De Kock (2003) views knowledge acquisition as consisting of five stages, having the output from one stage becoming the input for the next consecutive stage. The five stage model is a reiterative process of constant improvement and fine tuning to ensure the systems correctness and make certain the entirety of the knowledge domain is captured. (Marakas, p246). Figure 1 Five general Stages of Knowledge Acquisition (Marakas, p246) Identification Identification or definition of the problem – identifying the problem characteristics objectives, resources available, costs and the time frame for the project to occur (Jones & Barrett, 1989).The first step...
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...Innovation- L’Oreal. INTRODUCTION In this essay I will propose an innovation audit for the cosmetic company L’Oreal. I will be acting as an innovation consultant and develop a proposal for conducting an innovation audit for the company. I will focus on the SWOT analysis of the company and analyse L’Oreal’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Then I will design a framework for conducting the innovation audit. My framework will relate to the company’s business activities and vision. The framework will also address the SWOT analysis that I have presented. I will then provide a description of my proposed research strategy , such as what type of data I will collect and how I will go about doing so. Then I will provide an outline of the key outputs that would arise from the innovation audit in the context of the proposed framework that I have provided. DESCRIPTION OF THE COMPANY For more than a century, L’Oreal has devoted itself solely to one business: beauty. L’Oreal(2012) The L’Oreal Group is the world's largest cosmetics and beauty company.(Jones, David 2010) L’Oreal has developed activities in the field of cosmetics. Concentrating on hair colour, skin care, sun protection, make-up, perfumes and hair care, the company is active in the dermatological, tissue engineering and pharmaceutical fields.L’Oreal has set itself the mission of offering all women and men worldwide the best of cosmetics innovation in terms of quality, efficacy and safety. It pursues this...
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...Southwest Airlines The mission of Southwest Airlines is dedication to the highest quality of Customer Service delivered with a sense of warmth, friendliness, individual pride, and Company Spirit ("The mission of," 2012). Southwest’s Strengths Southwest started out as a small airline only servicing three cities, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio, but my, how times have changed for this company. Southwest has flourished mainly because they have been able to get such a tight reign over their costs and by marketing low domestic fares, becoming well known in the industry for being a low cost carrier ("History of southwest," ) ("Marketing mix," 2012). With almost 3100 flights carried per day, according to the number of passengers, Southwest has been termed the largest airline in the world. Southwest offers a diverse fleet of 547 Boeing 737 aircrafts, which has made Southwest the third largest fleet for carrying passengers in the world ("Marketing mix," 2012) Southwest also maximizes its bookings through web site services. It also gives customers the option to change reservations without paying any additional costs. Giving options to passengers is a strength that will play out well for them in the future as the demand for customer options increase ("Marketing mix," 2012). Overall, Southwest Airlines has an abundance of strengths. They have a very good safety record, employees are encouraged to use their sense of humor, their flights convey a sense of fun and they have the...
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...Freud was born to Jewish Galician parents in the Moravian town of Příbor (German: Freiberg in Mähren), Austrian Empire, now part of the Czech Republic, the first of their eight children.[10] His father, Jakob Freud (1815–1896), a wool merchant, had two sons, Emanuel (1833–1914) and Philipp (1836–1911), from his first marriage. Jakob's family were Hasidic Jews, and though Jakob himself had moved away from the tradition, he came to be known for his Torah study. He and Freud's mother, Amalia (née Nathansohn), 20 years her husband's junior and his third wife, were married by Rabbi Isaac Noah Mannheimer on 29 July 1855. They were struggling financially and living in a rented room, in a locksmith's house at Schlossergasse 117 when their son Sigmund was born.[11] He was born with a caul, which his mother saw as a positive omen for the boy's future.[12] In 1859 the Freud family left Freiberg. Freud’s half brothers immigrated to Manchester, England, parting him from the “inseparable” playmate of his early childhood, Emanuel’s son, John.[13] Jacob Freud took his wife and two children (Freud's sister, Anna, was born in 1858; a brother, Julius, had died in infancy) firstly to Leipzig and then in 1860 to Vienna where four sisters (Rosa, Marie, Adolfine and Paula) and a brother (Alexander) were born. In 1865, the nine-year-old Freud entered the Leopoldstädter Kommunal-Realgymnasium, a prominent high school. He proved an outstanding pupil and graduated from the Matura in 1873 with honors...
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