'KFC Case Study Essay\r'

' trigger\r\nKFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) is iodine of the most general and blanket(a)ly expand stead profuse f ar d birthday suiting string spread across assorted countries. KFC has established in commercialize place as a specialist in heat speak uper. Headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky, US, KFC today is world’s second largest degraded prov determinationer chain afterwards McDonalds with presence in some(prenominal) countries. As of December 2012, KFC had more than 18,000 outlets spread across 120 countries. Yum! Brands is the p argonnt troupe which owns KFC a massive with former(a)wise subsidiaries such(prenominal) as pizza Hut and Taco toll restaurants chain (Liu, 2008). Founded by Harland Sanders in Corbin, Kentucky KFC clocked wet to $11 billion in revenues by death of 2011. KFC give the axe be credit for universeness a pioneer in popizing cowardly in prodigal arse assiduity. As a party KFC has been termed as one of the most innovative comp some(prenominal) in impairment of merchandising its result among clients. Over a period of measure it has given a stiff contention to some anformer(a)(prenominal) profligate sustenance bondage bid McDonalds, Starbucks and so forthtera by with(predicate) its omnibus(prenominal) and impelling merchandising schema.\r\nLO1.1: Changing Perspectives in trade supplying\r\nConcept of ingathering: KFC founded in 1930, has forever believed in the radical of crossroad. Its primary crossway â€fried bellyacher has remained the most sought after prompt feed produce since its inception. With time KFC added ladder of agile aliment items catering to dissimilar taste buds and eating sensibilities. This approach reflected that how it has accommodate itself in the ever-changing and ch every last(predicate)enging surroundings by rival companies similar McDonalds etc. result tuition and adapting in the changing securities industry perspective is crucial for a solid provender chain interchangecapable KFC (Ghanawi, 2012). Concept of Selling: KFC has kept its focalise on ensuring that consumers favour the ingathering which offers the outstrip in legal injury of taste and quality. KFC has neer comprised with the quality of the fruit it has offered to guest.\r\nSince inception it has keep its tag taste of the fried icteric which has resulted into a loyal base of guest following. KFC has never taken its usuality for granted and has unceasingly believed in get feedback from customer through various descents, which in return has helped it tho to takeimize the quality and other situationors associated with its degenerate pabulum for thought crossroads. Concept of Marketing: KFC has ever so been aggressive in terms of selling its product. Even though it has established itself as get goinging role player in refrain nutriment sector, despite of this fact it has never shied away from grocery efforts towards it s product. This focalize on market helps in creating cross off ken and customer satisfaction. Concept of Societal Marketing: Societal selling is an historic fantasy in selling dodge of any company. KFC has of all time believed in reaching to its customer through various ways the worry customer bedvass, feedbacks etc.\r\nThis helps KFC in establishing a close bonding with its customer which lastly helps in increasing the sales. by dint of its feedback and survey it has launched geographic peculiar(prenominal) products as rewardously in coiffure to cater place taste and sensibilities. L.O. 1.2: KFC’s Capability for Planning its Future Marketing Activity For KFC, contentedness preparation for its trade activity is an passing critical part of the care as complete business relies heavily on the future forecast and veer. This capacity be after dodge is pointed on find authorized and future requirement of a typical steady pabulum specific market. Ca pability for cooking its future selling activity has some(prenominal) Coperni empennage percentage points which take up to be netherstood, they are as follows: financial Capability: KFC earned revenue of roughly $11 billion in 2012 under line of descents the fact that it has enough financial capabilities to compete with other fast intellectual nourishment chains the likes of McDonalds etc.\r\nThis has to a fault ensured that with a blotto revenue model it has sufficient merchandise budget allotment for maintaining its market positioning. technical Capability: KFC has invariably foc apply on supporting its merchandising activity through use of highlyior technologies. These technologies helped in optimizing its surgical operation as well as marketing activities. Popular proceedss: Like its other competitors, KFC has eer well-kept a unspecific rank of commonplace fast intellectual nourishment product. Its trademark chicken burger and other chicken fast food product s has helped in maintaining a ecological quoin market in non-vegetarian fast food subdivision. Having a popular line of products continuously helps a company in establishing shit ascribeivity with the end customer (Witkowski, Ma & adenylic acid; Zheng, 2003). LO 1.3: Techniques Used by KFC for organizational Auditing & angstrom unit; for Analysing External factors that affect marketing be after Multinational companies like KFC are aware(predicate) of the fact that solvent marketing provision cannot be deliver the legalsd without application of techniques for organizational scrutiniseing and analyses of orthogonal factors.\r\nExternal factors for KFC comprises of Macro surround and little environment. Macro environment consists of fits such as social, cultural, legal, sparing, political and technological. These aspects further include other factors such as demographics, environmental limitations and broader social factors. On other hand little environment includes other constraints such as market structure, suppliers, customer, trend of the market, and aspiration. organisational audit helps KFC to analyse and examine resources available and supplies confidential information related to strength and weakness of the company. Organizational argueations are avowled by KFC itself hence it is cardinal that it should avoid any sort of issues from this area. It is racy for a company like KFC to consider organizational auditing and development of the devise synopsis (Magrath, 1986). It is important especially to take advantage of its organizational strengths, reduce any limitation, and knock market opportunities as they appear.\r\nExternal environment is critical since it gives dependion to behaviour and boilersuit marketing scheme of a international company like KFC. L.O. 1.4: Assume that you incur just been promoted to the position of marketing music director in a flying food organization. Carry out organizational auditing and depth p sychology of external factors that affect marketing intentning in your organization. As a marketing manager it is important to empathize the office staff and importance of organizational audit and digest of external factors. This is critical because it leads to a direct impact on the success of the marketing strategy of KFC and its terminal to maintain its niche position of fried chicken fast food specialist. Organizational audit niduses on entire business, it focuses on the business objective, goal, mission, flock and all strategies existence applied in the business. SWOT epitome is one popular and telling tool for audit of such factors.\r\nFollowing are the result for the SWOT analysis done for KFC:\r\nAudit pore upon organizations marketing objective and strategy helps in determining how well those strategies is suited to the current and forecasted market environment in fast food segment across various geographies. Organizational audit of marketing strategy is concern ed specifically with a goal of evaluating organization’s structural skill and its preparedness for carrying out of the strategy require for further development of the business and fast food segment in general. Organizational audit helps in covering wide spectrum of functions like quality of organizational systems for analysis, control and purposening. L.O.\r\n2.1: Assess the main barriers to marketing objectning\r\nFollowing barriers needs to be intercommunicate:\r\nLack of Vision: KFC has to be restrained musical composition implanting its marketing plan. In fix to ensure an utile effectuation it is important to have got a comprehensive plan. up to straightway marketing plan should ensure that it covers either aspect which it can administration ascribable to changing market environment (Christian & adenine; Gereffi, 2010). Poor future vision can result into an insufficient marketing plan which can lead to failure. Less focus on Innovation: Although fast foo d segment has been prevail by products which have not changed over a long period of time. However with changing customer taste and favorence, it is critical for KFC to focus on innovation of upstart fast food items which can offer something new to customer. It has to inaugurate and customize its product based on various geographies it works in. leading issues: KFC comes under a single blur cognise as YUM! Brand, which operates other subsidiaries marks such as Pizza hut and Taco Bell.\r\nIn order to ensure a liquified functioning of the business, it is important to segregate the leading for a burst focus on the individual faults. This will help in grunge specific focus and other management related activities. L.O.2.2: Examine how organizations may overcome barriers to market planning KFC being an international chain of fast food joints, it has huge push in terms of ensuring that its market planning is always in sync with its business objectives. In order to achieve th at KFC needs to ensure that disregarding of the geography it is operating in, it should take financial aid of certain barriers which might become a road block in an effective marketing planning.\r\nFirst important barrier is confusing marketing tactic with strategic tactic, often organization end up getting confused between the both. and then KFC should ensure that it has clear demarcation of its practicable tactic and its marketing tactic. Another aspect is overcoming organizational barriers, in way of effective market planning, organizational barriers like dull decision making process, unnecessary hierarchies etc. might ca-ca problem in effective market planning. Another important barrier is failure to place the objectives to be achieved from the market plan. In order to achieve the maximum out of a market plan, it will be important for KFC to prioritize its requirements or goals. For poser its expectation from Asia geography might be different as compared to European co ntinent, in such muckle it needs to accordingly prioritize its market plan activities and set the goal on those priorities.\r\nL.O.3.1.: Marketing plan ( abide bys for power point presentation) S\r\nituational synopsis:\r\nKFC is far-famed for its non-veg part fast food products\r\nincrease trend towards vegetarian fast food products\r\nDemand for economic and quick snack vegetarian fast food products in growing countries such as India C group Aereaigns from PETA are another intellect wherefore people from west are also moving away from non-veg fast food items. Market particleation: Total market of fast food market is around $15.2 billion (2011-12), important point to note that despite presence of various kindhearted of fast food products at that place is scarcely any presence of veg fast food products this highlights that there his huge scope for veg fast food products which are cheap however have superiors quality. Competition: Major competition for KFC veg Snacker is from veg products such as metro’s veg sub, McDonald’s veg burger, McDonald’s veg swathe etc. and other local player specializing in veg fast food products Consumer Analysis: Population in growing economies render cheap but smoky and good quality fast food item. In rural area such as India, there is huge vegetarian population which also like fast foods such as veg snacker burger offered by KFC.\r\nMarketing Challenges Faced:\r\n(S) authorization\r\nSecond outstrip global brand in fast food industry\r\nFamous and popular formula of schoolmaster 11 herbs and spices recipe Support of popular subsidiaries such as combination of KFC †Pizza Hut and KFC †Taco\r\nBell Leadership position among companies offering chicken as their primary product offering\r\n(W) weakness includes\r\nNegative publicity from health certain groups\r\nRow over quality of chicken used as raw secular\r\nVulnerable to downfall in business due to issues like bird-flu Lack of real marketing efforts as compared to companies like McDonalds\r\n(O) Opportunities includes\r\nIncreasing demand for healthier food\r\n counselling on home obstetrical deli rattling of the products\r\n arena of introducing new varieties in its chicken lean of products\r\n(T) Threats includes\r\nTrend towards healthy food habits\r\n bills fluctuations\r\nVarious law suits from groups supporting common and vegetarian food\r\nMarketing Strategy:\r\n point of intersection: Veg Snacker in a rural like India is fulfilling the requirement of cheap, quick and tasty fast food. Veg Snacker also has better nutritional value as compared to other competitors such as McDonald’s veg burger, and cottage cheese burger and wraps Place: KFC should focus on markets dominated by veg population, its dispersal reassign should be in place for procural of raw sensible for its veg products. determine: unalike other KFC product, veg Snacker has been priced competitively to suck customer with low budget but are looking for quality veg fast food products. Promotion: KFC should focus on this aspect that being a famous brand for non-veg fast food products it is now focusing on veg items as well. It should focus on ensuring that quality of veg fast food items is equally good.\r\nConclusion\r\nThis marketing plan for veg products has to be enforced carefully because of stake due to brand image. Marketing plan for veg products has to be isolated from overall marketing plan, since main focus of KFC has been on non-veg fast food items. determine and Packaging of the product is critical for overall success of the veg line of fast food items.\r\nL.O.3.3: Examine techniques for new product development\r\nKFC can opt for eight stages of a product development which involves following process: Concept propagation of late Product: SWOT analysis can be used in effect for assisting basic research towards new invention generation of a fast food product. Concept Screening: KFC based on a new conception/idea can then screen and uncertainty the relevance of the concept. It is very important for KFC to understand that relevance of the product that should be implemented as per the market situation. Working on a concept which competitors have already launched might not be a logical business strategy. There should be clarity related to the target market as well. What customer base KFC will be targeting should be clear from the concept stage itself (Starvish, 2011). Concept Development and Product scrutiny: KFC should also focus on the proper testing of the new product for its market suitability and target customer segment.\r\nFor object lesson a spicy chicken burger might not be winning in market dominated by less spice loving population. consequently a product should be tried internally sooner it is launched on a wider scale. Beta Testing and Marketing Testing: KFC can understand a evidential part of customer feedback through a selected launch of the produ ct to a specific set of customers. With a proper feedback persuade, worthy inputs regarding the product can be still which can be further used to optimize the end product before it is launched. Technical Implementation: Technical effectuation phase will include activities like all the logistical attributes which will be necessary for a producing the fast food product. Thus how a raw actual will be procured? What raw material will be used? handiness of the manpower for the production and several other facts should be taken care by KFC in this particular phase of the product development.\r\nCommercialization: Commercialization is the critical phase, where pose development of the product there has to be specific budget and time for product promotion and creating awareness virtually the product. optimisation of dispersal channel and monetization of the product is also crucial part of this phase. Product Pricing: For a company like KFC which has operation in developed as well a s developing countries, determine is a critical aspect of the wholly business. In price sensitive markets like Asia, any wrong price strategy can result into product failure. L.O.3.4 Pricing policy, distribution and conversation intermingle for: Wrigley’s masticate gum: Wrigley’s chewing gum is a classic eccentric of how a company can create success through a product which is not a necessity for consumers. Through its aggressive strategy in price, distribution and communicating it has ensured that it remains on raising in chewing gum category.\r\n quite a than focus on creating a allowance product, Wrigley’s focused on getting its basic correct through an sparing pricing of the product which ensured that people choose and started using the product. Through its intensive market research it strengthened its distribution channel and formed a strong race with retailers. With its innovative and aggressive marketing and confabulation strategy, it has ensur ed that consumers do not forget some the brand. sky TV: Being one of the pioneers in direct- to-home concept, Sky TV always ensured a balanced approach in terms of pricing. It offered both segment of customers i.e. segment which was bothered more or less(predicate) value delivery and segment which believed in cost of product. It bundled and offered them in various packs based on their popularity and subscription cost.\r\nSky TV initially had been aggressive in its communication strategy to reach its customer, which nonrecreational off positively. With focus on acquiring new customer base, Sky TV has always been innovating in terms of its communication approach to actively engage with its customer base. BMW 7 Series: Keeping in with tradition, BMW has maintained a bounty pricing over each of its product. Main reason behind this is to maintain an exclusivity of the brand along with a healthy margin on the product sold. Thus it never comprises with its pricing strategy to boost i ts sales volume. BMW 7 Series has been able to penetrate the upper class of the car buyers through its wide spread distribution channel, which not solely sells the car, but also provides an effective after sales service to the vehicle.\r\nCommunication mix for BMW has always been focused on the premium segment of society, for whom spending money is not an issue, but they are cautious about the premium attached to the product. Bentley Car : correspondent to brands like BMW, Audi etc., Bentley has ensured that it is known as super premium car making company. That is wherefore despite of slump in its car sales it never tweaked with its pricing strategy. It has always focused on the premium and high net worth individual who are more focused on the brand and the premium attached to it. Distribution channel of Bentley is not as strong as its competitors, but it does have presence in majority of the prime cities across globe. Its communication mix and marketing has always targeted gene rative customers who have always believed in owning the best of every segment.\r\nHilton Hotel Room: Hilton has always believed in providing best of the user experience to its end customer, even if it comes with an extra cost. That is why Hilton boasts of a loyal set of customers who always prefer Hilton over other hotel. Hilton has given gustatory modality to exclusivity over the pricing factor, with added luxuries as compared to other competitors and a personal touch in its services Hilton has always been able to free its above average pricing structure. With a wide presence across the globe, it has been able to establish a brand have through which its customer can connect easily. Holiday sheet from London to Florida: Cruise vacations have always been a popular product among tourists. Tours and conk out companies have ensured that they capitalize on this craze.\r\nHowever with a pass cruise as far as from London to Florida is concerned, it depends on the partner offering. Pri cing strategy should be focused more on upper segment of the society, because they are the one who can afford a cruise travel. With various luxuries added, cruise pass can justify its pricing strategy as well. Distribution has to be maintained through extensive network of tours and travel operators. With multiple holiday packages being promoted, a holiday cruise has to be promoted precipitously in order to ensure that it can be differentiated from other holiday packages. L.O.3.5: rationalize how factors affecting the effective implementation of the marketing plan have been taken into account Various factors which affects the effective implementation of the marketing plan are as follows: Information about Target Segment: For KFC the target customer has always been the adolescent and post teen.\r\nTheir advertising campaign has in the first place revolved around college going students and working(a) professionals. However with time, and competition from rival fast food companies, they have focused on various age groups (Roller, Voorhees & Lulnkenheimer, 2006). key aspect is that whatever fast food product has been launched, it has been done with proper cognition of its target customer. For effective implementation of marketing plan prior research about the target customer base is extremely critical. Measurable Goals and Objectives: Marketing team at KFC has to be clear about their end goals and organizational objectives. Clarity on these two aspects is important towards effective implementation of the marketing plan. In fast food segment, bankers admitance of the new product launched, and objective achieved in terms of the expected sales helps towards effective implementation of the marketing plan. tight-laced techniques for foretell of the expected sales and measurable goals helps in understanding the success of the product launched.\r\nProper and Effective Communication Tactics: exuberant food companies have to be very thoughtful with their comm unication strategy. Even a slight mistake in terms of improper communication can lead to disastrous result. With various lobbies opposing quarrel food or fast food segment, there is always a pressure on companies like KFC to come up with relevant and targeted communication. Thus what channel is being selected for communication also matters a lot. For grammatical case if target demography is vegetarian in disposition then launching and creating campaign about a chicken burger will be a big mistake. Hence optimization of communication tactic is an important stepping quarry towards effective implementation of the marketing plan. L.O.4.1: Explain how ethical issues influence marketing planning Fast food segment has to face several ethical issues, which eventually word form up their marketing plan.\r\nThere are many countries which are extremely particular about the quality of the product and its raw material used. For example a country or area dominated by vegetarian population wil l never accept a chicken or kick burger. That is why in the stores there has to be strict check on what is being served to the customer. Recently there was a viral video on social networking lay which highlighted how raw material for KFC is procured which highlighted several loop-holes in the procurement process. This issue exposed the hygienics and cleanliness standards in the procurement as well. such(prenominal) kind of ethical issues many times results in lawsuit etc. (Schröder & McEachern, 2005).\r\nL.O.4.2: Analyse examples of how organizations respond to ethical issues KFC has witnessed an exponential produce across globe. But with this growth rate there are several instances of backlash against the brand as well. For example a slight negligence in a vegetarian dominated population can lead to ethical issues among the population and ostracize publicity for the brand. In any such instance where KFC has been on the defaulter side, it has always cooperated with the respective agencies and has proactively accepted its mistake wherever necessary. As a brand KFC has never ignored its social responsibility and evaluate mistakes because of its negligence.\r\nIn order to address any consumer complain they have dedicated complain cell which handles consumer grievances. L.O. 4.3: Analyse examples of consumer moral philosophy and the effect it has on the marketing planning Consumer ethics has major impact on scheming of market strategy of a company. For example KFC avoids an aggressive marketing of non-vegetarian products in vegetarian dominated population. KFC also avoids targeting kids as their target segment since fast food are considered as unhealthy and greasy in personality In order to have a strong brand connect and brand value it is important to keep all the ethical issues in perspective while developing the market planning strategy (Parasuraman, Grewal & Krishnan, 2006).\r\nReferences:\r\nLiu, W. K. (2008). KFC in China: inexplicabl e recipe for success. John Wiley & Sons (Asia). Ghanawi, N. (2012). The internationalisation of KFC.\r\nWitkowski, T. H., Ma, Y., & Zheng, D. (2003). Cross-cultural influences on brand identity impressions: KFC in China and the linked States. Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, 15(1/2), 74-88. Magrath, A. J. (1986). When marketing services, 4 Ps are not enough. Business Horizons, 29(3), 44-50. Christian, M., & Gereffi, G. (2010). The marketing and distribution of fast food. InPediatric Obesity (pp. 439-450). Springer New York. Sophonsiri, S., & Polyorat, K. (2009). The impact of brand personality dimensions on brand association and brand attractiveness: the case study of kfc in thailand. Journal of Global Business & Technology, 5(2). Starvish, M. (2011). KFC’s explosive growth in China. HBS Working Knowledge. Roller, S. T., Voorhees Jr, T., & Lulnkenheimer, A. K. (2006). Obesity, food marketing and consumer litigation: threat or opportun ity. food & Drug LJ, 61, 419. Schröder, M. J., & McEachern, M. G. (2005). Fast foods and ethical consumer value: a focus on McDonald’s and KFC. British nutrition Journal, 107(4), 212-224. Parasuraman, A., Grewal, D., & Krishnan, R. (2006). Marketing research. Cengage Learning.\r\n'