Brunswick (BC) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Recreational Products
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Brunswick (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Brunswick is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, there is backlash against globalization, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Brunswick can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Brunswick, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Brunswick 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 Brunswick can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Brunswick
2. Improving business portfolio management of Brunswick
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Recreational Products sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Brunswick
Strengths of Brunswick | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Brunswick are -
Digital Transformation in Recreational Products industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Brunswick digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Brunswick 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Brunswick 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Recreational Products industry
– Brunswick is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Brunswick has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Brunswick 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Brunswick in Recreational Products industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Brunswick in the Consumer Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Brunswick has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Brunswick to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Brunswick is one of the leading players in the Recreational Products industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Brunswick
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Brunswick does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Learning organization
- Brunswick 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 Brunswick is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Brunswick emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Brunswick is one of the most innovative firm in Recreational Products sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Brunswick 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Brunswick is present in almost all the verticals within the Recreational Products industry. This has provided Brunswick 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 of Brunswick | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Brunswick are -
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Brunswick is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Brunswick to provide better information regarding Recreational Products products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Brunswick has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Recreational Products industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Brunswick is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Recreational Products industry, but Brunswick needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Brunswick to focus more on services in the Recreational Products industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Brunswick has some of the most successful models in the Recreational Products industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Brunswick should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Brunswick is one of the leading players in the Recreational Products industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Recreational Products industry in last five years.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Brunswick 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 Recreational Products industry using digital technology.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Brunswick needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Need for greater diversity
– Brunswick has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
High dependence on Brunswick ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Brunswick still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Recreational Products industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Brunswick has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Brunswick is just above the Recreational Products 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.
Skills based hiring in Recreational Products industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Brunswick 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.
Brunswick Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Brunswick are -
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Recreational Products industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Brunswick 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. Brunswick 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Brunswick has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Recreational Products industry. This can help Brunswick to build a more holistic ecosystem for Brunswick products in the Recreational Products industry by providing – 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 Brunswick 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 Brunswick to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Brunswick 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Brunswick in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Recreational Products industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Loyalty marketing
– Brunswick 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Brunswick can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Brunswick operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Recreational Products sector.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Brunswick has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Recreational Products sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Brunswick to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Brunswick to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Brunswick can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Recreational Products 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.
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. Brunswick can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Brunswick 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.
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 Brunswick 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Recreational Products industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Brunswick in the Recreational Products industry. Now Brunswick can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Brunswick External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Brunswick are -
Regulatory challenges
– Brunswick 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 Recreational Products industry regulations.
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 Brunswick 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 Brunswick in the Recreational Products sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Brunswick 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 Recreational Products industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Brunswick in Recreational Products industry. The Recreational Products 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.
Environmental challenges
– Brunswick 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. Brunswick can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Recreational Products industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Brunswick has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Recreational Products industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Brunswick needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Recreational Products 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 Brunswick
– 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 Brunswick.
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. Brunswick needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Recreational Products industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Brunswick 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 Brunswick prominent markets.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Brunswick 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 Recreational Products industry and other sectors.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Recreational Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Brunswick can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Brunswick Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Brunswick 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 Brunswick 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 Brunswick 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 Brunswick 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 Brunswick needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.