Kathy Judder, the founder of Judder, had a vision in mind f achieving high customer satisfaction when the business was first put into place. This paper is going to address the companies strategic plan, market overview, how they compete in the market, strengths, weaknesses, and last what would be recommended to change in their strategy. Market Overview and Strategies Kathy had a taste for gourmet foods and found it very difficult to come across the food she wanted. There was no store In the area who sold specifically gourmet foods that allowed Kathy easy entry into the market.
The only form of competition was the coal food stores In the area that sold normal produce which Is a cheaper substitute for the gourmet foods she wanted to sell. Because of the area this store was opened in there was not much competition in the market of gourmet foods. The best market structure to describe this area market would be a competitive monopolistic market. If it were a normal produce store I would have said it was closer to a perfect competitive market but due to a restricted number of organic farmers it lowers the amount of sellers.
In this case it was very easy for other businesses to start in the raked, products are slightly different between the other produce stores due to the quality and the lack of chemicals (organic). In this case the competitors to Judder Fine Foods would be all the local produce stores. Judder does offer a better quality produce that the others offer limited supply but the only difference in the product Is quality It Is still the same product description.
Also Judder buys all Its produce from organic farmers and resells that means the product Is priced by the market to reach maximum profit. To this day Judder Fine Foods continues to attract new customers ND has changed and adapted their marketing strategies over the years to keep attracting new customers and increase their customer base and ensure that they do not go back to their competitors.. The company has found that their main source of customers are middle to upper income and prefer the gourmet foods.
They market to these customers by ensuring the quality and freshness of their food. So far the recently initiated three new strategies to attempt to increase loyalty and profitability of the consumers. First they started by expanding their services, offering parties in he store to show customers how to prepare their specialty foods from world- renowned chefs, local celebrities, other food experts, and even Kathy herself. Next program they added was a frequent shopper program that tracks purchase behavior and gives high value incentive for continued purchases.
The last thing implemented was to increase efficiency internal to the stores to better benefit the customers. They are developing training programs and integrating new software and technology to help make their day-to-day process more efficient. Surveys/Results The company released a survey asking multiple questions of what people like or dislike such as store hours, atmosphere, Selection of product, value, attractive displays, satisfaction of the merchandise itself, employee satisfaction and overall store satisfaction.
The survey got a fair amount of responses with mixed results but looking at these results we can tell where the companies strengths and weaknesses lye. Strengths The first strength was the appeal and the atmosphere of the store. There were very few negative responses about the physical appearance or the atmosphere of the tore. There were also very few negative responses of the displays and the look of the product. This tells us that the physical appearance of the store is meeting what is expected and allowing for the store to visual look appealing.
The next strength would be the store hours and convenience, there were also very few negative responses in this category as well. Next strength would be the merchandise quality, there were also very few negative results of dissatisfaction of the merchandise. Last, most of the customers were also happy with the staffs knowledge of the product. Weaknesses Despite the many good results we got there were a few results that show the company what they need to work on. Despite the good result for the knowledge the staff knows, they did not get as good a result for their courtesy to the customer.
In this case our staff is very knowledgeable but their customer service and attitude toward the customers needs to improve. Customer satisfaction is one of the main company strategies and even having half bad results on this question would make me want to address this situation. The only other negative responses came on the alee of the product and the selection. This was a little surprising due to the company striving to have a large range of merchandise and very good quality product.
Recommendations They main things that need to be addressed in this case are the weaknesses. To ensure that Judder stays the best quality of produce market in the area and stays competitive they must address these weaknesses of value, selection and customer service. Fortunately Just like stated earlier they have initiated three new programs that will help turn these weaknesses into strengths. The Loyalty program will help with the value of the product and the expense and the training implemented will involve customer service training.
I live in the Dallas Texas area and there is a local food market called whole foods one town over that comes to mind when I think of quality foods. Whole foods has made a name for themselves in the area for having the best quality food. They are the most expensive in the area but the demand for would recommend for Judder company strategy would be to initiate more of a branding strategy. They have already improved technology and efficiency of their internal processes but they still can increase the value of their product through branding.
They are the only business in town with this high of quality food and that should be stressed through more marketing and the brand to help raise the value of product. If the consumers individual value of the quality food increases the demand will rise with the value that will increase business and maximize marginal profits Conclusion Judder has a superior history of proportioning customer satisfaction and by implementing better training for customer service and increase their brand marketing strategy they will increase the demand curves for their product and keep maximizing profits.
