Ying Kee Tea House Gr (8241) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Retail (Grocery)
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ying Kee Tea House Gr (Hong Kong)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ying Kee Tea House Gr is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
increasing commodity prices, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ying Kee Tea House Gr
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ying Kee Tea House Gr can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ying Kee Tea House Gr, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ying Kee Tea House Gr
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ying Kee Tea House Gr
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Retail (Grocery) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Ying Kee Tea House Gr
Strengths of Ying Kee Tea House Gr | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ying Kee Tea House Gr are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Ying Kee Tea House Gr staying ahead in the Retail (Grocery) industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Ying Kee Tea House Gr in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Ying Kee Tea House Gr has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ying Kee Tea House Gr to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr has one of the best training and development program in Services industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr is one of the leading players in the Retail (Grocery) industry in Hong Kong. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Hong Kong. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Ying Kee Tea House Gr has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Strong track record of project management in the Retail (Grocery) industry
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Ying Kee Tea House Gr does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Retail (Grocery) industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Ying Kee Tea House Gr have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Ying Kee Tea House Gr in Retail (Grocery) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to lead change in Retail (Grocery)
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr is one of the leading players in the Retail (Grocery) industry in Hong Kong. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Retail (Grocery) industry in Hong Kong but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Ying Kee Tea House Gr in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Ying Kee Tea House Gr to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses of Ying Kee Tea House Gr | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Ying Kee Tea House Gr are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Retail (Grocery) industry, Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Ying Kee Tea House Gr supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Ying Kee Tea House Gr is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Ying Kee Tea House Gr vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Hong Kong, Ying Kee Tea House Gr needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Skills based hiring in Retail (Grocery) industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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, Ying Kee Tea House Gr has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Retail (Grocery) industry over the last five years. Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Ying Kee Tea House Gr is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Retail (Grocery) industry, but Ying Kee Tea House Gr needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Ying Kee Tea House Gr to focus more on services in the Retail (Grocery) industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Ying Kee Tea House Gr is just above the Retail (Grocery) industry average. It 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Ying Kee Tea House Gr products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Ying Kee Tea House Gr needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Ying Kee Tea House Gr, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Retail (Grocery) industry. 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 strategic competitive environment developments
– As Ying Kee Tea House Gr is one of the leading players in the Retail (Grocery) industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Retail (Grocery) industry in last five years.
Ying Kee Tea House Gr Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Ying Kee Tea House Gr are -
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. Ying Kee Tea House Gr can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Ying Kee Tea House Gr has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Retail (Grocery) industry. This can help Ying Kee Tea House Gr to build a more holistic ecosystem for Ying Kee Tea House Gr products in the Retail (Grocery) industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Retail (Grocery) industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. It 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Retail (Grocery) industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Ying Kee Tea House Gr can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ying Kee Tea House Gr can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ying Kee Tea House Gr operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Retail (Grocery) sector.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Retail (Grocery) industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Ying Kee Tea House Gr can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Ying Kee Tea House Gr can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Retail (Grocery) industry.
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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Ying Kee Tea House Gr are -
Environmental challenges
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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. Ying Kee Tea House Gr can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Grocery) industry.
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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Ying Kee Tea House Gr
– 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Retail (Grocery) industry are lowering. It can presents Ying Kee Tea House Gr with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Retail (Grocery) 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. Ying Kee Tea House Gr needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Retail (Grocery) industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Retail (Grocery) industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Ying Kee Tea House Gr needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Retail (Grocery) 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.
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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr in the Retail (Grocery) sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr prominent markets.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Retail (Grocery) industry and other sectors.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Retail (Grocery) industry regulations.
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. Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ying Kee Tea House Gr Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr 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 Ying Kee Tea House Gr needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.