Case Study Description of Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth
Hunley, Inc. manufactures rods for the niche sport of fly fishing. It specializes in freshwater rods that are perceived as "middle-market" products, targeted at "avid" fly fishers, In the face of declining revenue and a decreasing price per unit sold, the company's president is considering several growth options, including introducing a rod made from state-of-the-art materials (moving up-market) and expanding distribution into Walmart (down-market). Hunley's president must decide whether either option is feasible and if so, what kind of marketing plan is necessary for each to succeed. If neither option is chosen, he must determine what other ways Hunley might grow. This is a rich marketing mix case that requires students to develop a qualitative and quantitative plan for Hunley's product line under two very different growth options. The discussion can illuminate numerous marketing issues that an instructor might want to emphasize, including: brand extension, product and company market position, positioning statements, market segmentation, introductory marketing programs, new product launches, channel conflict, sales force management of a strategic shift, among others. This case is suitable for an introductory marketing course for undergraduate or MBA students. It can also be used in a section on positioning and increasing consumers' willingness-to-pay within a strategy course. Further, the challenges facing Hunley are relevant to many courses in executive education.
Swot Analysis of "Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth" written by John A. Quelch, James T. Kindley includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Hunley Hunley's facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth casestudy better are - – there is backlash against globalization, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, wage bills are increasing, increasing commodity prices, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
geopolitical disruptions, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Hunley Hunley's, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Hunley Hunley'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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Hunley Hunley'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 Hunley Hunley's
Strengths Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Hunley Hunley's in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth Harvard Business Review case study are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Hunley Hunley'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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth - 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 Hunley Hunley's digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Hunley Hunley'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.
Learning organization
- Hunley Hunley'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 Hunley Hunley's is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Hunley Hunley's is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Hunley Hunley's 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
– Hunley Hunley's has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Hunley Hunley'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.
Analytics focus
– Hunley Hunley'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 John A. Quelch, James T. Kindley 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.
Organizational Resilience of Hunley Hunley's
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Hunley Hunley's does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Hunley Hunley's 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.
Training and development
– Hunley Hunley's has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Hunley Hunley's to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Hunley Hunley's to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Hunley Hunley's is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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.
Weaknesses Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth are -
Need for greater diversity
– Hunley Hunley'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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth, 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Hunley Hunley's is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Sales & Marketing segment. Hunley Hunley's needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Hunley Hunley's to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth, in the dynamic environment Hunley Hunley's has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Hunley Hunley's has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth, it seems that the employees of Hunley Hunley'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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Hunley Hunley's 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Hunley Hunley's, firm in the HBR case study Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Hunley Hunley's 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Hunley Hunley's products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Hunley Hunley's needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth, is just above the industry average. Hunley Hunley'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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Hunley Hunley'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 - Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth | 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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Hunley Hunley's in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Sales & Marketing segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Hunley Hunley's can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Hunley Hunley's operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
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 Hunley Hunley's in the consumer business. Now Hunley Hunley's can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Hunley Hunley'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, Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Hunley Hunley'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 Hunley Hunley's to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Hunley Hunley's can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Hunley Hunley's has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Hunley Hunley's to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth case study. Hunley Hunley's can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Hunley Hunley'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.
Manufacturing automation
– Hunley Hunley's can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Sales & Marketing segment. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Hunley Hunley's can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Hunley Hunley's 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Hunley Hunley'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, Hunley Hunley'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.
Threats Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Hunley Hunley'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.
Increasing wage structure of Hunley Hunley's
– 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 Hunley Hunley's.
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 Hunley Hunley's business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Hunley Hunley's is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Hunley Hunley'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.
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. Hunley Hunley'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.
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Hunley Hunley's with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Hunley Hunley's 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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth .
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Hunley Hunley's has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Hunley Hunley'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.
Environmental challenges
– Hunley Hunley'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. Hunley Hunley's can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
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. Hunley Hunley's 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 Hunley Hunley's in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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 Hunley, Inc.: Casting for Growth 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 Hunley Hunley's needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.