Case Study Description of Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?
Rideau Artisanal Chandlery (RAC) manufactures and sells a large range of artisanal candles through a variety of specialty retailers in Canada and parts of the United States. It has gained market leadership by constantly adding innovative scents to its product line. The recent addition of its own online store is causing conflicts within RAC between the head of the sales operation in charge of servicing RAC's distributors and the head of RAC's online operation. The lower prices charged by the online store are seen as a threat to the traditional channel, but the online store has shown rapid growth and yields higher margins.
Swot Analysis of "Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?" written by Markus Christen, David A. Soberman includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Artisanal Chandlery facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Pricing, Strategy and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? casestudy better are - – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing commodity prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, wage bills are increasing, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Artisanal Chandlery, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Artisanal Chandlery 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Artisanal Chandlery
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 Artisanal Chandlery
Strengths Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Artisanal Chandlery in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? Harvard Business Review case study are -
Strong track record of project management
– Artisanal Chandlery 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 Artisanal Chandlery
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Artisanal Chandlery does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Artisanal Chandlery has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive segment. Secondly the value chain collaborators of the firm in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Artisanal Chandlery 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 Markus Christen, David A. Soberman 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Artisanal Chandlery is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? case study a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Artisanal Chandlery are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Artisanal Chandlery 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 Artisanal Chandlery is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Artisanal Chandlery 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Artisanal Chandlery is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Artisanal Chandlery digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Artisanal Chandlery 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Artisanal Chandlery is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Training and development
– Artisanal Chandlery has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? 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.
Weaknesses Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? are -
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Sales & Marketing strategy. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Artisanal Chandlery 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 - Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?, in the dynamic environment Artisanal Chandlery has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Artisanal Chandlery has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Artisanal Chandlery is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Artisanal Chandlery 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Markus Christen, David A. Soberman suggests that, Artisanal Chandlery is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Artisanal Chandlery has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? HBR case study still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Artisanal Chandlery has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Lack of clear differentiation of Artisanal Chandlery products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Artisanal Chandlery needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?, it seems that the employees of Artisanal Chandlery 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Artisanal Chandlery needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Opportunities Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? | 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? are -
Buying journey improvements
– Artisanal Chandlery can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Developing new processes and practices
– Artisanal Chandlery 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.
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 Artisanal Chandlery in the consumer business. Now Artisanal Chandlery can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Artisanal Chandlery can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Artisanal Chandlery 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 Artisanal Chandlery to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Artisanal Chandlery to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Loyalty marketing
– Artisanal Chandlery 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Artisanal Chandlery can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Artisanal Chandlery 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.
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. Artisanal Chandlery can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Artisanal Chandlery to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Artisanal Chandlery 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, Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust?, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Artisanal Chandlery can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Artisanal Chandlery operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Threats Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? are -
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Artisanal Chandlery demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Artisanal Chandlery 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.
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. Artisanal Chandlery 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.
Environmental challenges
– Artisanal Chandlery 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. Artisanal Chandlery can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Artisanal Chandlery 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 Artisanal Chandlery.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Artisanal Chandlery has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Artisanal Chandlery 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.
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. Artisanal Chandlery can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Artisanal Chandlery 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.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Artisanal Chandlery needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Artisanal Chandlery in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? 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 Rideau Artisanal Chandlery: Online, Offline or Bust? 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 Artisanal Chandlery needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.