Marketing Analysis of the Eco Store

Question: Describe the Report for Marketing Analysis of the Eco Store. Answer: Introduction Marketing is a way of communication companies product in the market. It is associated with the buying and selling process of a product in the market. Significantly, it includes few major activities such as advertising, selling and distribution of products. The set of the marketing activities is also known as the name of the marketing mix. An effective marketing strategy focuses on the market positioning of the company and its competitors with their marketing strategies in order to achieve the competitive advantage and market share (Helm and Gritsch, 2014). The concept of the marketing or marketing mix can be understood better through this report. It includes marketing analysis of Eco Store. Marketing background of the company The company Eco Store was started by Malcolm Rands with his wife Melanie in the year 1993 in New Zealand. Its the New Zealand Company which is manufacturing its products in Auckland with the motive of the safe environment and healthier people. It used organic and sustainable gardening practices. As a result, Eco Store was formed as it decided to work for the healthier products, without the unnecessary chemicals present in them (Rands, 2016). Its main focus was on health and loyalty towards the customers. Eco Store also made conscious decision in order to become a marketing-led business, for building up the marketing team from one to six people in New Zealand. Its main products are Organic Food, Organic Vegetables, Organic Gardening Supplies, Natural Cosmetics, Handmade jewelry and Art Craft. Eco Store brand is defined as human nature, which acknowledges and celebrates the interdependency of the environment. The market position of Eco Store is that it expanded over range of 100 products throughout New Zealand. Its products are available in over 900 markets of Australia such as Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and New York. Its competitors are such as Omo, Surf, planet ark, earth choice, and Fab. Hence, Eco Store was the first company used to make recycled plastics (Bolotaeva, and Cata, 2010). In Eco Store, sustainability practices are applied for the products manufacture, which includes selection of supplier and packaging, and other aspects of the business such as staff management practices and involvement of the community. For them, sustainability is not about the products effectiveness on the environment but, it ensures about the health of the people. The company uses certain sustainable practices, which are beneficial for the environment as supplying the products that are safe for the childrens as well as for the environment. Further, recycling the products is helpful in reducing pollution from the environment, skin care product; exclude using nasty chemicals, which are healthier and safety for the environment, sustainable sourced plant, minimization of packaging biggest business practices so as to reduce the waste in order to protect the environment. Sustainability is the core for Eco Stores business (Brooks, and Simkin, 2012). The products of Eco Store are made from plant and mineral based ingredients, which are proved to be better for the environment and for humans health. It promotes purpose, belonging and wellbeing of customers and staffs. The product portfolio of Eco Store consists a range of 100 products, which are manufactured in New Zealand with the highest environmental and sustainability standards. It includes laundry, household, kitchen, gardening, personal care, and a baby care products. Its aim is to provide healthier products, which is nourishing for the customers, their family and the environment. Its manufacturing facility has achieved Environ-Mark NZ diamond certification and awarded for the sustainable business of New Zealand in the year 2009. Further, they provide services online or through the retailer and the suppliers of Eco Store can be the manufacturer, retailer, and whole seller (Daymon, and Holloway, 2010). The company should know about their customers desires and should fulfill its desires and targeting the customers. Its unique focus is on following the loyal customer. Marketing Mix The marketing plan of the company shows the vision of the organization with including the goals and objective and strategy and plans for achieving them. Eco Store uses the green marketing strategy to meet the sales. The green marketing strategy refers to the environment-friendly marketing strategy. It enables the company to achieve the sustainability in the business operation. In this type of strategy, the company focuses on the marketing mix to generate the maximum profit by following the sustainability principles (Fan, et. al., 2015). In this, Eco store focuses on the corporate goals, objective, strategy, target market and consumer. Eco store effectively follows the principles of the Sustainable Marketing Mix. It also knows as the 4Ps of the marketing, which is a combination of the product, price, place and promotion. The company develops the strategies on the basis of these areas that help the company to enhance the branding sales and profitability. The sustainability marketing is different from the tradition marketing. It forces the company to follow the principles of the sustainability. It also helps Eco Store to strengthen the brand image, provide creativity, and ensure honestly, truthful communications and radical transparency with stakeholders (Hwang and Thomadsen, 2015). In the context of Eco Store, its products are organic food, organic vegetables, organic gardening products, natural cosmetics items, handmade jewelry and Art Craft. The pricing strategy of Eco Store: Price is monetary value of the product that is payable by the customer against the product. Eco store provides a range of the sustainable products due to this, its marketing strategy faces challenges in the market. The green tends products are more expensive compared to the conventional counterparts because the labor cost and ingredients cost are more costly in Eco Store. It is because organic food grown with natural fertilizers is more expensive compared to those products that have not need to natural fertilizers. Along with this, its products manufacturing and transportation cost is also higher. These are the few reasons, which lead to higher pricing strategy. These factors also create a price gap between the conventional products and organic or sustainable product (Radman and Katavi?, 2013). At the same time, due to growing awareness of using the organic products, the competitors are regular coming in this industry. There is highly completion in the terms of the price, place, product and promotion activities. As concerning these aspects, Eco Store provides the product at the minimum price as the possible. It helps the company to get the competitive advantage as well as enhances the market share in the industry (Chikweche and Fletcher, 2012). It also uses the effective targeting pricing strategy to minimize the gap of green pricing. Promotion strategy of Eco Store: Promotion is a communication tool of the company that enables the company to communicate its products in the market. A company can use more than one channel for promoting its product in the market. The promotion activities develop the brand image in the customer mind. Eco Store uses the sustainable brand that helps the company to develop a positive impact on people and the environment (Pomering, et. al., 2014). Eco store focuses on the environment aspect when it is conducting promotion activities. The company works based on the CP certificate or is ISO 14000 certified. It is effective to improve the public image of the company. Eco Store also uses the Advertising, public relations, personal selling, consumer and trade promotion activities to get reach a large number of customers. Now, the company is also focusing on the modern marketing strategy. In this, the company is increasing its involvement in the social media marketing, digital marketing, and mobile marketing is all marketing modern promotion tools (Du and Sen, 2016). It enables the company to attract more and more customers. Distribution strategy of the Eco Store: Distribution channel is a way through the goods and services travel from the producer to the user or consumer. It plays a significant role for both producer and consumer in the context of meeting their different needs. It also includes different places from where a consumer can get the products of Eco Store. The company uses effective distribution strategy, which enables a consumer easily get the product in the market. Eco store uses the Store strategy in the many countries (Astuti, et. al., 2015). The Stores of the company can be found easily in the market. The consumers can also get their favorite products through the online shopping. The company also provides the facilities of the free home delivery. It enables the company to get the loyalty of the customers. The distribution strategy of the company provides a completive advantage to Eco Store because managing the both online and store distribution strategies provides the benefit of the acce ss to the large customers. Competitor analysis The competitor analysis is a technique of measuring the strengths and weakness of the potential competitor in the market. It enables the company to use the offensive and defensive strategies for identifying the opportunities and threats. There some direct competitors of the Eco Store that are OMO, Surf, Fab, Planet Ark and Earth Choice. These all the competitors give significant competition to Eco Store in terms of customer satisfaction, value of money, product quality and environmental friendliness (Irfan, et. al., 2014). In this, OMO focuses on the family orientated products and effectively involved in the green marketing. Companies name Satisfaction level Value for money Product quality Environmental friendliness Eco Store **** ***** ***** ***** OMO **** *** **** ***** Surf **** *** **** **** Fab ***** **** **** ***** Planet Art **** *** **** **** Earth Choice *** **** **** ***** Surf provides significant completion to Eco Store. It offers some home based products to the customers which are able to provide customer satisfaction. Earth Choice is good in the context of the environmental friendliness. It also works in the education and animal protection. But, the strategy of the Eco Store keeps its top in the context of environmental friendliness. Its competitors also provide the product at the affordable price with focusing on the both traditional and modern promotion strategy. These also use the store, online sales, direct selling and personal selling strategies to meet the sales goals and objective (Singh, 2012). The rapidly growing the number its follower and customer demands are positive aspect for the company. It will provide a good competitive advantage to Eco Store. Through its competitor analysis, it is found that the company is serious about the problem of the global warming. For this, the company is planning to provide a business solution in order to minimize the negative effects of climate change. Recommendations The marketing mix is the combination of 4 Ps i.e. product, price, promotion, and place. Ethical concerns can arise for these elements and Eco Store should improve the ethical concerns by identifying the needs of the customers in the context of the product as what kind of products the customers desire to purchase. Further, the product which is offered by them does not always satisfy the needs but it can generate new needs of the customers (Leonidou et al., 2013). So, the company should launch innovative products so as to fulfill the needs of the customers. The packaging of the product is also the source for ethical concerns so; it should improve the packaging part of the product. The company should provide clear information about the product. For this, it can provide useful and clear information on the packing of the products. Moreover, pre-tests of the product should be conducted so as to ensure the products to safety standards. In the context of promotion part of the marketing mix, it should improve advertising practices by giving the clear information about the product quality and quantity so that customers may not get confused and avoid misunderstanding from the advertising when they reach in the shop for purchasing the product. It will help the company to earn a maximum profit and enhance the market share (Sheth, 2011). Along with this, in the context of price strategy, the company should improve its pricing strategy by taking care of every type of customer in the society so that consumers may afford Eco Stores product (Kotler et al., 2015). Moreover, in the context of place the company should choose the area where fewer shops are available for the cosmetic products and at this kind of place the demand will be more for the product and it will help in earning maximum profit. The making of a good relationship with the customers may also helpful in improving the marketing mix. These skills will be helpful in improving the competitive skills of the company. Further, sustainability of the company should be improved by fulfilling the requirements of the customers whatever they need for them. It should also improve the knowledge of launching the innovative products in order to compete in the market. It should improve safety measures for the product, which should be relevant for using by the customers and for the environment. Sustainable use of the marketing mix products is mandatory in order to protect the people from harmful products (Singh, 2012). It should aware the customers about the harmful products in order to protect the environment. Recycling should be used in order to avoid the wastage of the products. Conclusions From the above discussion, it is concluded that marketing mix is a significant tool for Eco Store to improve its competitive position in the market. It uses effective marketing mix strategy to achieve the competitive advantage and market share. That is why Eco Store is successful in opening 900 stores in the Australian market. Along with this, the company is recommended that it should improve its pricing strategy and advertising strategy for enhancing the customer base. References Astuti, R., Silalahi, R.L.R. and Wijaya, G.D.P. 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