SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Destination Maternity (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Destination Maternity is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing commodity prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Destination Maternity
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Destination Maternity can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Destination Maternity, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Destination Maternity
2. Improving business portfolio management of Destination Maternity
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Retail (Apparel) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Destination Maternity
Strengths of Destination Maternity | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Destination Maternity are -
Innovation driven organization
– Destination Maternity is one of the most innovative firm in Retail (Apparel) sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Destination Maternity 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.
Analytics focus
– Destination Maternity 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 Retail (Apparel) industry. The technology infrastructure of United States is also helping 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 Destination Maternity
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Destination Maternity does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management in the Retail (Apparel) industry
– Destination Maternity 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
– Destination Maternity has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Destination Maternity has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Destination Maternity 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Destination Maternity is one of the leading players in the Retail (Apparel) 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Destination Maternity comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Retail (Apparel) 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 Retail (Apparel)
– Destination Maternity is one of the leading players in the Retail (Apparel) industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Retail (Apparel) industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Destination Maternity in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Destination Maternity has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Destination Maternity staying ahead in the Retail (Apparel) industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Destination Maternity in Retail (Apparel) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses of Destination Maternity | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Destination Maternity are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Destination Maternity 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 Retail (Apparel) industry using digital technology.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Destination Maternity has some of the most successful models in the Retail (Apparel) industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Destination Maternity should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Destination Maternity, in the dynamic environment of Retail (Apparel) industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Destination Maternity has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Lack of clear differentiation of Destination Maternity products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Destination Maternity needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Destination Maternity is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Retail (Apparel) industry, but Destination Maternity needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Destination Maternity to focus more on services in the Retail (Apparel) industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Destination Maternity 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 (Apparel) industry over the last five years. Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity is one of the leading players in the Retail (Apparel) industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Retail (Apparel) industry in last five years.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Destination Maternity needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Destination Maternity is just above the Retail (Apparel) 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Destination Maternity needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Retail (Apparel) industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Destination Maternity can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Destination Maternity is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on Destination Maternity ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Destination Maternity still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Retail (Apparel) industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Destination Maternity has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Destination Maternity Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Destination Maternity are -
Loyalty marketing
– Destination Maternity 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Retail (Apparel) industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Destination Maternity 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. Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Retail (Apparel) industry. This can help Destination Maternity to build a more holistic ecosystem for Destination Maternity products in the Retail (Apparel) industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Destination Maternity can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Retail (Apparel) sector. 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Destination Maternity has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Retail (Apparel) sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Destination Maternity to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Destination Maternity to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Destination Maternity in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Retail (Apparel) industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
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. Destination Maternity 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, Destination Maternity is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Destination Maternity can utilize new technology in the field of Retail (Apparel) industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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 Destination Maternity 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 Retail (Apparel) industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Destination Maternity in the Retail (Apparel) industry. Now Destination Maternity can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Developing new processes and practices
– Destination Maternity can develop new processes and procedures in Retail (Apparel) 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Destination Maternity can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Retail (Apparel) industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Destination Maternity can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Threats Destination Maternity External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Destination Maternity are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Retail (Apparel) industry are lowering. It can presents Destination Maternity with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Retail (Apparel) sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Destination Maternity may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Retail (Apparel) sector.
Environmental challenges
– Destination Maternity 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. Destination Maternity can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Apparel) 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 Destination Maternity business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Destination Maternity 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 (Apparel) industry and other sectors.
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. Destination Maternity 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Destination Maternity 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 (Apparel) industry regulations.
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.
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 Destination Maternity.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Destination Maternity is facing in Retail (Apparel) sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity prominent markets.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Destination Maternity in Retail (Apparel) industry. The Retail (Apparel) 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.
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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Destination Maternity Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity 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 Destination Maternity needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
