Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Innovation & Entrepreneurship
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh
In April 2017, a college student in California was graduating with a degree in business administration with a concentration in entrepreneurship. She had been a florist for the past six years and wished to pursue her dream of starting her own flower business. Her vision was to open a flower shop where all the arrangements were uniquely designed for each customer and no two arrangements were the same. Her current employers were trying to sell their shop (Belle Fleur) and offered to sell it to her at a discount price. She had to decide whether to buy the business or start her own shop from scratch. Atul Teckchandani is affiliated with California State University - Fullerton.
Swot Analysis of "Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh" written by Atul Teckchandani, Jana Hammoud includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Fleur Belle facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Fleur Belle, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Fleur Belle 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Fleur Belle
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 Fleur Belle
Strengths Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Fleur Belle in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Fleur Belle is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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.
Analytics focus
– Fleur Belle 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 Atul Teckchandani, Jana Hammoud 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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.
Ability to lead change in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field
– Fleur Belle 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 Fleur Belle in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Fleur Belle in the sector have low bargaining power. Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Fleur Belle to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Fleur Belle has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Fleur Belle is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Fleur Belle 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Fleur Belle 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Fleur Belle 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Fleur Belle digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Fleur Belle 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
- Fleur Belle 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 Fleur Belle is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Fleur Belle 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Fleur Belle 's lucrative customers.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Fleur Belle has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh, 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Fleur Belle is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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, Fleur Belle 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. Fleur Belle 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh HBR case study mentions - Fleur Belle 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh, is just above the industry average. Fleur Belle 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Fleur Belle 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Fleur Belle is planning to shift buying processes online.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Fleur Belle 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 - Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh | 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Fleur Belle 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Fleur Belle 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 Fleur Belle to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Loyalty marketing
– Fleur Belle 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Fleur Belle 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Fleur Belle to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Fleur Belle 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, Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh, 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, Fleur Belle can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Fleur Belle operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Fleur Belle 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Fleur Belle 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Fleur Belle to increase its market reach. Fleur Belle 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Fleur Belle 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 Fleur Belle has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Fleur Belle to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh case study. Fleur Belle can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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. Fleur Belle can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Fleur Belle is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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.
Threats Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Fleur Belle 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Fleur Belle can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Fleur Belle with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Environmental challenges
– Fleur Belle 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. Fleur Belle can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Fleur Belle 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh, Fleur Belle 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 .
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Fleur Belle in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Fleur Belle is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Fleur Belle has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Fleur Belle needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Increasing wage structure of Fleur Belle
– 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 Fleur Belle.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Fleur Belle 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh .
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Fleur Belle 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.
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 Fleur Belle.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Belle Fleur: Buying an Existing Business or Starting Fresh 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 Fleur Belle needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.