Introduction
The top management of the company usually develops a corporate-level strategy. It includes assessing the business environment and business opportunities of the enterprise (Corporate-level strategy, n.d.). On a practical level, a corporate-level strategy is a basis for subsequent business steps; it also reveals hidden strategic goals. This strategy takes into account such details as business units, product lines, customer groups. Business plans related to procurement, optimal resource allocation, and business unit coordination are then developed based on the strategy. TruQuest is the market leader in mouthwashes and rinses in the Australian and South Pacific markets. The company has plants near Sydney and on the west coast of Australia and plans to build new facilities. This paper aims to develop a corporate-level strategy for TruQuest company, considering its capabilities and potential.
Current Markets and Export Options
At the moment, TruQuest sells on Australian and South Pacific markets with an actual market share of 42.85% and 37.88%, respectively. Brand awareness and accessibility are highest for these markets – approximately 96% awareness and 89% accessibility for Australia, and 89% awareness and 83.5% accessibility for South Pacific. However, the company also has a high market share in Indian – 36.23%, Chinese – 37.51%, Malaysian – 40.29%, Philippines’ – 29.01%, and South American – 14.41% markets. Brand awareness and accessibility indicators are high for these markets: 53% and 49% for China, 56% and 47% for India, 53% and 49% for Philippines, and 42.7% and 35.7% for South America. Since brand awareness is generally higher than brand accessibility on all markets, with an average gap of 6-7%, this will be corrected to increase sales.
The company has several factories in Australia, but its manufacturing capacity is insufficient to expand into new markets of South Africa and North America. Therefore, it makes sense to focus on retaining existing markets at this stage, paying attention to increasing accessibility. Besides, given the Chinese market’s interest in baby products, it makes sense to conduct an inexpensive marketing campaign for the Chinese market to increase Quest Kids sales.
Cost-Benefit of Diving into new Markets
When performing a cost-benefit analysis, it is necessary to add up the benefits of the actions taken and subtract the associated costs (Kenton, 2020). In general, there is no need for TruQuest to enter new markets yet, as the company’s products sell well in existing markets, and entering the South African and North American markets may require additional marketing and transportation costs. Marketing costs may not be worth it as there are already strong competitors Dexnum, P&G, and COL operating in these markets. P&G’s and COL’s market shares in other regions are also higher than TruQuest’s, so a scattered effort could lead to competitors pushing TruQuest out of existing markets.
The most optimal would be to increase awareness and accessibility for the Quest Kids on the Chinese market, as this market is known for its high demand for baby products. Consumers of the Chinese market are already familiar with the TruQuest brand, so the marketing campaign will not be too expensive and will be covered by increased sales. Besides, since TruQuest plans to optimize equipment to increase production, the increased capacity will meet the increased demand for the Quest Kids line and the increased general demand. The anticipated costs will be associated with establishing new points of sale in markets with the largest gap between awareness and accessibility, such as Indian and South American markets.
Current Customers
Even though TruQuest was aiming to sell goods to Australian and South Pacific markets and has the highest market share here, success in China, India, South America, Malaysia, and the Philippines came as a surprise. Given the vast Chinese and Indian markets, 36.23% and 37.51% market share is an astonishingly high amount of products being sold. TruQuest cannot ignore Malaysian, Philippine’s, and South American markets as well since millions of customers buy the company’s products there. In this respect, the Malaysian market deserves special attention since it has the second-largest market share in percentage expression.
TruQuest is open to new horizons; therefore, the company is pleased to welcome all consumers’ interest. However, there is a possibility that the TruQuest will have to build several new plants to meet the growing demand. Besides, to understand which markets deserve priority attention, it will be necessary to translate the market share percentage into absolute indicators of the number of buyers.
True Competitors of the Company
True competitors of TruQuest are P&G, and COL, who have high market shares and stable positions, and Dexnum, who is planning to enter new markets. It is unlikely that P&G and COL will resort to innovative or aggressive strategies to reach more customers. Most likely, P&G and COL’s goals are focused on maintaining existing positions. At the same time, Dexnum, which is not represented in India, China, South America, Philippines, and Malaysia, may anticipate conquering these markets. According to insider information, Dexnum is completing a new plant in Perth and focuses heavily on diversifying product lines by developing new items based on customer surveys, prototype testing, and customer feedback loop. So far, Dexnum sells three brands of toothpaste, flavored lip balms, and two brands of floss. They also recently stated that the next diversification should be a mouth rinse.
TruQuest Pricing
At this stage, P&G and COL are producing and selling more products, so their COGS is lower than TruQuest, and prices are approximately equal. However, given the unexpected success of TruQuest in the Chinese, Indian, South American, Malaysian, and Philippines’ markets, the COGS gap is not significant (Hayes, 2020). But that doesn’t mean TruQuest will be willing to cut the price if Dexnum enters the market with a new cheaper offering. TruQuest will need to endure this blow, as it is quite common for new brands to set lower prices for the product to attract new customers and then raise prices to the competitors’ level. This step is usually successful because, although the lower price may last no longer than a quarter, the new brand becomes preferable in the consumer’s mind.
It is highly likely that Dexnum will take this step, as this is their only opportunity to enter the market. Therefore, during the temporary price dumping by Dexnum, TruQuest must create its value proposition to maintain customer loyalty (Twin, 2020). Another adequate step would be to bring a new line of products to the market. Dexnum is trying to take a competitive advantage over TruQuest, so we can take a series of mirror steps to balance that advantage.
TruQuest Distribution Channels: Competitors
A distribution channel is a chain of intermediaries through which a product passes on its way to the final consumer (Kenton, 2020). Typical distribution channels are wholesalers, retailers, distributors, and online sales. TruQuest is currently selling through retailers, wholesalers, and distributors. However, the company does not use direct sales and online sales channels. At the same time, competitors Dexnum and Rexturn use direct sales. Noteworthy, an increase in sales channels does not always lead to a rise in profits. Sometimes too long sales-chains or too many options can even hurt a business (Kenton, 2020). TruQuest does not use direct sales, and it is a natural consequence of large sales volumes, which are three times less than that of P&G and COL, but 4-6 times higher than that of other market participants. On the other hand, it might be convenient for some buyers to order goods on the company’s website directly.
TruQuest Distribution Channels: Boosting Accessibility
TruQuest can combine online and direct sales to boost sales. Since there is a need to introduce new product lines, a marketing campaign will be launched to familiarize buyers. This marketing campaign may contain information about new products and new accessibility opportunities. New opportunities will include new stores in the regions of unmet demand and online sales through the company’s website. Besides, analytical data estimating the unmet demand in regional markets will be necessary to decide which markets need increased accessibility.
TruQuest Distribution Channels: Online Sales
TruQuest is going to open new retail outlets in India and Malaysia, and then in South America, Australia, South Pacific, the Philippines, and China. Such a solution can increase customer loyalty to the brand, as opposed to online sales. It is noteworthy that the main competitor Dexnum will probably rely on online sales since it does not yet have a sufficiently vast network of retailers, wholesalers, and distributors. On the other hand, opening new points of sale in remote regions may involve additional transportation costs, and in the long term, these costs may exceed sales revenues. Therefore, TruQuest will try to meet demand through online sales before opening new sales points.
New Product Line: TruQuest Toothpaste Tablets
Dexnum’s main competitive advantage over TruQuest is that Dexnum offers a broader range of products. Dexnum produces three toothpaste brands, flavored lip balms, two brands of floss, and will create a brand new mouth rinse. Therefore TruQuest has to develop new product lines and lease new equipment that will be located in the existing factories’ territory. Since the value proposition of TruQuest’s primary good, the mouth rinse is health, speed, and convenience, toothpaste tablets may become the first line of new products.
Toothpaste tablets is a new type of dental care products that have recently entered the market. The tablets are available in packs of 62 as they provide a monthly supply of toothpaste for one person. The application method is to put the tablet in mouth, chew it, and then use a toothbrush to brush teeth. There are already white tablets on the market, so TruQuest tablets come in various colors to differentiate them from the competition. These are eco-friendly herbaceous light green tablets containing herbs for deep cleaning, light gray tablets containing herbs and activated charcoal to strengthen enamel, and blue tablets for teeth whitening. The line will also include tablets for kids covered with drawings of green, black, and blue animated plants, similar to tablets for adults.
New Product Line: TruQuest Lip Balms
A particular Dexnum’s competitive advantage is the production of flavored lip balms. Lip balms are a group of products that increase loyalty among female customers, who shop for healthcare more often than males. Therefore TruQuest will release a new line of flavored lip balms. The value proposition of these new balms will be a natural composition that is quite rare among modern manufacturers. Most competitors produce lib balms for the mass market segment using cheap ingredients such as glycerin or palm oil.
But the main components of TruQuest lip balms will be beeswax and cocoa butter, as these ingredients have incredible healing properties. Lip balms using palm oil and glycerin have an inconsiderable healing effect, and consumers will immediately feel the difference. Besides, cocoa butter has a naturally pleasant aroma, and beeswax has a lovely consistency. Variations will be lip balms with cocoa, coffee, mint, raspberry, and melon aromas.
New Packaging Design
New product lines will have a new eco-friendly packaging design that will highlight the value of the natural ingredients included in toothpaste tablets and flavored lip balms. Moreover, new product lines can be distinguished into separate business segments since their manufacturing will require new equipment and raw materials. In this regard, new product groups will receive additional names, for example, Quest FreshTabs and Quest Beeswax Lip-balms. The FreshTabs name will emphasize that eco-friendly goods can be modern and emotionally tie toothpaste tabs with mouth rinses. The name Beeswax Lip-balms draws attention to the main advantage of the product. The packaging for the toothpaste tabs will be made of colored recycled cardboard. Beeswax Lip-balms will be sold without cardboard boxes, in the form of lip-sticks, wrapped in a plastic protective film. Tubes will have images of cocoa, coffee, mint, raspberry, and melon, depending on flavor.
Manufacturing
It will be necessary to purchase new equipment on lease to produce new lines of goods. Besides, as the company needs to meet the growing demand in existing markets, new equipment will be procured to produce mouth rinses. Since TruQuest already has customers loyal to the existing mouth rinses, changes in composition and packaging design will be implemented gradually not to lose the high level of brand awareness. However, as the company plans to introduce more and more natural ingredients into mouth rinses gradually, business plans will be drawn up to consider the procurement of new raw materials. The company will also need to order laboratory tests to effectively change the composition of the existing mouth rinses and determine the composition for new product lines.
Conclusion
Thus, a corporate level strategy for TruQuest company was developed, taking into account its capabilities and potential. In particular, the assessment of current markets, export options, and cost-benefits was made, and the true competitors of the company were defined. Further, the analysis of the company’s prices was carried out compared to the prices of competitors, and new options of distribution channels were proposed.
Finally, it was decided to introduce new product lines – Quest FreshTabs toothpaste tabs and Quest Beeswax Lip-balms. Basic ideas for a new design were also proposed, and the main steps associated with the expansion of production were identified. Together, these elements constitute a new corporate-level strategy for TruQuest company, based on which business plans will be developed to produce and sell Quest FreshTabs, Quest Beeswax Lip-Balms, and Quest mouth-rinses.
References
Corporate-level strategy (n.d.). Web.
Hayes, A. (2020). Cost of goods sold – COGS. Web.
Kenton, W. (2020). Cost-benefit analysis. Web.
Kenton, W. (2020). Distribution channel. Web.
Twin, A. (2020). Value proposition. Web.