Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions
In 2012, Graham's Pharmacy opened to offer more traditional pharmacy services and counselling in contrast to franchise pharmacies. The business was the brainchild of a pharmacist and entrepreneur with a strong commitment to the pharmacist profession. Located in the heart of the historic business sector of Kingston, Ontario, Graham's Pharmacy had taken over a historic building that formerly housed a bank. The pharmacy was intended to improve the quality of life of its clients through prevention and active engagement, rather than merely through the passive and mundane role of a pill dispensary. However, the pharmacy needed to be profitable if the vision was to be fully realized. Although the founder was confident in the capabilities of his team, and that a market existed for a pharmacy that provided personalized service and advice, he wondered how to market the business in light of competition from much larger rivals. Nicole BA?rubA? is affiliated with Royal Military College of Canada.
Swot Analysis of "Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions" written by Nicole Berube, R. Frank Delanghe includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Pharmacy Graham's facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions casestudy better are - – technology disruption, geopolitical disruptions, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Pharmacy Graham's, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Pharmacy Graham's operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Pharmacy Graham's
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Sales & Marketing field.
4. Making a Sales & Marketing topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Pharmacy Graham's
Strengths Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Pharmacy Graham's in Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions Harvard Business Review case study are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Pharmacy Graham's in the sector have low bargaining power. Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Pharmacy Graham's to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Strong track record of project management
– Pharmacy Graham's is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Organizational Resilience of Pharmacy Graham's
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Pharmacy Graham's does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Pharmacy Graham's has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Pharmacy Graham's has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Learning organization
- Pharmacy Graham's is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Pharmacy Graham's is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Pharmacy Graham's in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Pharmacy Graham's is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Pharmacy Graham's in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Pharmacy Graham's has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in, as mentioned in case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Pharmacy Graham's digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Pharmacy Graham's has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Training and development
– Pharmacy Graham's has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Analytics focus
– Pharmacy Graham's is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the industry. The technology infrastructure suggested by Nicole Berube, R. Frank Delanghe can also help it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Weaknesses Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions are -
Need for greater diversity
– Pharmacy Graham's has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions, is just above the industry average. Pharmacy Graham's needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions, it seems that the employees of Pharmacy Graham's don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Lack of clear differentiation of Pharmacy Graham's products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Pharmacy Graham's needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions HBR case study mentions - Pharmacy Graham's takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Pharmacy Graham's 's lucrative customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions, in the dynamic environment Pharmacy Graham's has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Pharmacy Graham's has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Pharmacy Graham's has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Pharmacy Graham's is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Pharmacy Graham's has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Pharmacy Graham's even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Pharmacy Graham's has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions are -
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Pharmacy Graham's can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Pharmacy Graham's can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Pharmacy Graham's can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Sales & Marketing segment.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Sales & Marketing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Pharmacy Graham's can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Loyalty marketing
– Pharmacy Graham's has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Pharmacy Graham's can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Pharmacy Graham's has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Pharmacy Graham's to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions case study. Pharmacy Graham's can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Pharmacy Graham's is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Pharmacy Graham's can develop new processes and procedures in Sales & Marketing industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Pharmacy Graham's can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Pharmacy Graham's can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Pharmacy Graham's to expand its talent hiring zone. According to McKinsey Global Institute, 20% of the high end workforce in fields such as finance, information technology, can continously work from remote local post Covid-19. This presents a really great opportunity for Pharmacy Graham's to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Pharmacy Graham's can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Pharmacy Graham's in the consumer business. Now Pharmacy Graham's can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Pharmacy Graham's is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Sales & Marketing field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Pharmacy Graham's can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Environmental challenges
– Pharmacy Graham's needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Pharmacy Graham's can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Pharmacy Graham's with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Pharmacy Graham's will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Regulatory challenges
– Pharmacy Graham's needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Sales & Marketing industry regulations.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Pharmacy Graham's.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Pharmacy Graham's can face lack of demand in the market place because of Fed actions to reduce inflation. This can lead to sluggish growth in the economy, lower demands, lower investments, higher borrowing costs, and consolidation in the field.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Pharmacy Graham's in the Sales & Marketing industry. The Sales & Marketing industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Pharmacy Graham's has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Pharmacy Graham's needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Sales & Marketing sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Pharmacy Graham's high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Graham's Pharmacy: Traditional Care, Modern Solutions is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Pharmacy Graham's needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
