Costco And Best Buy Supply Chain Analysis

In her essay, “In Praise of Chain Stores”, Virginia Postrel hails the progressiveness of chain stores and counters arguments made against them. As a frequent shopper in my city, I have experienced the benefits of chain stores and how they affect the locals that shop in them. I believe that chain stores have not turned Augusta into a boring city because they are familiar even to those new to the area, they have a high standard of quality and service, and provide fair fixed prices. First, Postrel quotes Thomas Friedman in her essay, stating that “…America is mind numbingly monotonous- the most boring country to tour; because ‘everywhere looks like everwhere else…’ the familiarity of a Walmart to someone new to Augusta may be a relief,

The entire supply chain management depends on the local retailers. Any disagreement with the same may sabotage the entire sales. 4. Marketing strategies are focused on the print media only which results in limited visibility to a target segment. 5.

(Douglass, 2013, para. 9). Today, J.C. Penney continues to struggle. Tremendous revenue loss, employee layoffs, and store closings continues to beleaguer the once department store

Publix is known as a retail or merchandising industry. Publix is known as one of the most productive food merchant in America. Admirably well tell, Publix is the most beneficial basic supply chain in the country: Its net edges, 5.6% in 2012, beat out Wal-Mart, Kroger, and Whole Foods. Publix has become the seventh-biggest privately owned business in the U.S. with over $28 billion in sales.

This industry is very competitive with as many as thirty-seven firms and total estimated annual revenues of $125,904,840,000 (http://bi.galegroup.com/essentials/industry/448140?u=bentley_main). Retail giants like TJX, H&M and Gap are the top players of this industry with Nordstrom vying for the fourth largest market share and Dillard’s further down on the list. The success of Nordstrom Inc with respect to

The company already carries name brand items, such as Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, and Ralph Lauren, and that puts

Key Trends – Globalisation One of the main opportunities Costco has is more global expansion to specific targeted countries. Although operating in many countries, Costco is heavily dependent on the U.S. and Canadian markets. It still has the opportunity to expand into the Asian and Australian markets where it has a limited presence. Costco has the capability to operate about 100 stores in Taiwan, Korea and Japan combined and about 20 stores in Australia. It currently has 41 stores in Taiwan, Korea and Japan combined and 6 stores in Australia.

Kmart’s supply chain includes organizations, resources, people, activities and information or moving products from supplier to end customer. It involves ordering to suppliers, transportation of products, storage of products in warehouse, moving products to Kmart stores and finally providing products to customers. Kmart supply chain takes care of entire flow from manufacturing to warehouse till stores. General merchandise and apparel products for Kmart are produced directly by factories located in Bangladesh, China, India, Cambodia and Indonesia. Illustration of Kmart using Porter’s Model:

What are the two types of core competencies that drive a firm’s competitive advantage? Which firms demonstrate a clear competitive advantage because of (a) major value-creating skills/core capabilities and/or (b) superior assets or resources? Which firms have demonstrated sustainable sources of competitive advantage? The two core competencies that drive a firm’s competitive advantage are cost leadership and differentiation.

The Value Chain 4 4. Operations Strategy Implications (Store level) 5 5. Inventory Management and Demand Forecasting 9 6. Supply Chain Management 9 7. Quality Management 11 8.

Q. 2. Recent development in Technology has enabled huge global organizations to avail information easily in their premises for smooth functioning of various departments within an organization. Much of a company's success comes down to its Supply Chain Management and logistics. The development of Information Systems in SCM helps in cost reductions, customer satisfaction and productivity.

This also shows how the competition among the retailers is constantly getting very tough. If a retailer does not have a competitive advantage over the other it makes is hard for them to survive in the cut throat retail industry. And while these companies compete, many customers are getting snatched up by the internet marketers, where the operating and other cost are much lesser. Furthermore, even though the retail industry has been recovering from the recessions in 2008 for it to make a full turn around it will need the economy to become even stronger especially in terms of job growth and interest rates. The economy in general will have to become healthy again and recover more before the retail sector can rebound fully.

Executive summary This report depicts the various stages of IKEA’s supply chain flow, providing an elaboration of processes that take place at each stage. It also shows the dependency of the stages and how information flows through the supply chain. After illustrating the supply chain flow process of IKEA, the report then moves on to analyze the company’s global supply chain strategies.

Thus if we analyse the value chain is almost the same for Walmart, Amazon and eBay. Condiering the comeptetive forces anlaysis ofr all three : • Rivalry in the industry: This is fairly weaker; however Wal-Mart enjoys the topmost slot because of lowest cost, prices and more profits and market share as compared to Amazon and eBay. Because of no entry barriers the market is full of competitors. • Threat of

2.0 Porter’s five forces of Levi’s Strauss Threat of new entrants – low • Entry into a market where the production volume is so high already is not really a threat because the cost of production goes down. • Levi’s can produce more at a lower price and possibly sell for more. Bargaining power of supplier – low • Competition within manufacturer is high since it is mass – produced. • Manufacturer is located in many third world countries: Central America, China, Cambodia therefore Levi’s can switch to other manufacturer easily.