Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Innovation & Entrepreneurship
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business
In 2010, three friends created Fruits of Sherbrooke as a way to rescue local fruit that would otherwise be wasted. The founders knew their efforts would be beneficial for the environment and for people in need of food. In February 2016, having grown their business into a successful social enterprise entirely through the help of volunteers, they faced important decisions. Realistically, they would not always be able to run the organization, which meant facing issues of succession. Additionally, they needed to decide how to balance growth strategies with their commitment to the social good. Should the organization focus on maximizing profitability or should decisions for growth be based only on providing the greatest benefit possible to the community and environment? The authors Amy Hingston, Cuong Pham, Andrew Phelan, Matthew Townley, David Vetters, and Joel Gehman are affiliated with University of Alberta.
Swot Analysis of "Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business" written by Amy Hingston, Leanne Hedberg Carlson, Cuong Pham, Andrew Phelan includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Sherbrooke Fruits facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Social enterprise, Succession planning, Sustainability and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business casestudy better are - – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , wage bills are increasing, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing energy prices,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sherbrooke Fruits, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sherbrooke Fruits 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sherbrooke Fruits
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field.
4. Making a Innovation & Entrepreneurship topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sherbrooke Fruits
Strengths Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sherbrooke Fruits in Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Sherbrooke Fruits is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Digital Transformation in Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Sherbrooke Fruits digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
High brand equity
– Sherbrooke Fruits has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Sherbrooke Fruits to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management
– Sherbrooke Fruits is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Sherbrooke Fruits is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sherbrooke Fruits in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Sherbrooke Fruits has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry
– Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Sherbrooke Fruits to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Sherbrooke Fruits to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business are -
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Amy Hingston, Leanne Hedberg Carlson, Cuong Pham, Andrew Phelan suggests that, Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business, is just above the industry average. Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Sherbrooke Fruits 's lucrative customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Sherbrooke Fruits is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment. Sherbrooke Fruits needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Sherbrooke Fruits to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business, it seems that the employees of Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Sherbrooke Fruits has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Sherbrooke Fruits 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 - Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Sherbrooke Fruits has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Sherbrooke Fruits 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. Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Sherbrooke Fruits products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Sherbrooke Fruits needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Opportunities Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business | 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Sherbrooke Fruits 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, Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
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 Sherbrooke Fruits in the consumer business. Now Sherbrooke Fruits can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sherbrooke Fruits to increase its market reach. Sherbrooke Fruits will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Developing new processes and practices
– Sherbrooke Fruits can develop new processes and procedures in Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sherbrooke Fruits is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Sherbrooke Fruits 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Sherbrooke Fruits can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Sherbrooke Fruits has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Sherbrooke Fruits to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business case study. Sherbrooke Fruits can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Sherbrooke Fruits 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 Sherbrooke Fruits to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Sherbrooke Fruits has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Sherbrooke Fruits to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Sherbrooke Fruits in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Threats Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business are -
Increasing wage structure of Sherbrooke Fruits
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Sherbrooke Fruits.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business, Sherbrooke Fruits may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Innovation & Entrepreneurship .
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Sherbrooke Fruits business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Sherbrooke Fruits in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Sherbrooke Fruits with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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. Sherbrooke Fruits needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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. Sherbrooke Fruits can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry regulations.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Sherbrooke Fruits can face downward pressure on margins from increasing competition from international players. The international players have stable revenue in their home market and can use those resources to penetrate prominent markets illustrated in HBR case study Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business .
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Sherbrooke Fruits 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. Sherbrooke Fruits 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sherbrooke Fruits is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Fruits of Sherbrooke: Creating a Sustainable Business 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 Sherbrooke Fruits needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
