Kmart Marketing Plan free essay sample

Kmart Marketing Plan Kmart Department Stores are a leading department chain and one of the top five competitors to Wal-Mart and Target Stores. Kmart Department Stores are brick and mortar merchandise companies, which offer a wide range of services to its customers. Online shopping and in-store merchandise pickup are some of conveniences offered to shoppers. Kmart Department Stores is the company selected for final marketing plan project. They are a leading department chain and one of the top five competitors to Wal-Mart and Target Stores. Kmart Department Stores are brick and mortar merchandise companies, which offer a wide range of services to its customers. Online shopping and in-store merchandise pickup are some of conveniences offered to shoppers. They are a subsidiary of Sears and Roebucks a leading department store chain. Kmart is similar to Wal-Mart in offering household goods, pharmacy, clothes, shoes, electronics, and one stop shopping to its customers. â€Å"The company also sells the products of brands including Jaclyn Smith, Joe Boxer and Martha Stewart Every day†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ Kmart apparel and textile business news, Kmart company (n. . ). Retrieved from https: Kmart apparel and textile business news, Kmart Company. It also sells certain exclusive brands of its parent company such as Kenmore, Craftsman, and Diehard brand products, and services. Kmart sells its products through wholly owned retail stores and its website. The company primarily operates in the US, Puerto Rico and Guam. Kmart is a subsidiary of Sears Holdings Corporation with headquarters in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. â€Å"America is teeming with Wal-Mart, Home Depot and other â€Å"big-box† chain stores — some larger than five football fields. Millions of consumers like the low prices, free parking and one-stop shopping convenience offered by the megastores. Policymakers know the stores create jobs, enable customers to save money for other expenditures and pump much-needed tax dollars into community coffers. † â€Å"Critics also say they create added traffic congestion and suburban sprawl, force U. S. companies to ship high-paying manufacturing jobs overseas and cost more in community services than the taxes they generate. † They are a subsidiary of Sears and Roebucks a leading department store chain. Kmart is similar to Wal-Mart in offering household goods, pharmacy, clothes, shoes, electronics, and one stop shopping to its customers. â€Å"The company also sells the products brands including Jaclyn Smith, Joe Boxer and Martha Stewart Every day†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ Kmart apparel and textile business news, Kmart company (n. d. ). Retrieved from https: Kmart apparel and textile business news, Kmart Company. It also sells certain exclusive brands of its parent company such as Kenmore, Craftsman, and Diehard brand products, and services. Kmart sells its products through wholly owned retail stores and its website. The company primarily operates in the US, Puerto Rico and Guam. Kmart is a subsidiary of Sears Holdings Corporation with headquarters in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. â€Å"America is teeming with Wal-Mart, Home Depot and other â€Å"big-box† chain stores — some larger than five football fields. Millions of consumers like the low prices, free parking and one-stop shopping convenience offered by the megastores. Policymakers say the stores create jobs, enable customers to save money for other expenditures and pump much-needed tax dollars into community coffers. â€Å"Critics also say they create added traffic congestion and suburban sprawl, force U. S. companies to ship high-paying manufacturing jobs overseas and cost more in community services than the taxes they generate. † Place and Price Analysis Kmart is the #3 discount retailer in the US, behind Wal-Mart and Target. It sells name brand and private-label goods (including its Joe Boxer and Jaclyn Smith labels), p rimarily to low- and mid-income families. It runs about 1,300 off-mall stores (including 30 Supercenters) in 49 US states, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands. About 270 Kmart stores sell home appliances (including Sears Kenmore brand) and some 980 locations house in-store pharmacies. The company also operates the Kmart. com Website, which includes merchandise from sister company Sears. Kmart is a subsidiary of Sears Holdings Corp. , formed by the 2005 combination of ailing Sears, Roebuck and Kmart. For more than a quarter-century, Kmart had the upper hand; in large part, because it was spun out of an established retail business, S. S. Kresge Co. , a dime store and downtown department store got its start in 1899. Kresge executives recognized an extraordinary new form of retailing emerging in the 1960s; large stores in suburban strip shopping centers that sold a wide variety of merchandise for discount prices. Seventeen more Kmart stores followed that first one by the end of 1962. By the end of 1963, Kmart had 53 stores, while Walton was just planning his second Wal-Mart. As far back as 1992, the Harvard Business Review pointed to Wal-marts well-honed business processes as the key to its success, with technology as an important enabler. In response, Kmart pointed to the chains own technology prowess—Kmart has aggressively moved from an outmoded technological base to a leadership, twenty-first century position in our industry, wrote a Kmart executive—but the ensuing years proved that such proficiency as Kmart had was not enough to remain competitive. In 1992, Kmart said it wanted to have revenue of $100 billion by 2000, but only reached $37 billion. Everyone has emulated their capabilities, but they are probably five or six years ahead of everyone else, says Dan OConnor, chief executive of analyst firm Management Ventures, Inc. Kmart had the tendency to be penny-wise and pound-foolish. † As chronicled in In Sam We Trust by former Wall Street Journal reporter Bob Ortega, Kmart let its lead slip away. In the 1970s and early 80s, Kmart lagged Wal-Mart on adoption of several waves of retail technology, including back-end computers for individual stores, electronic cash registers and scanners that coul d read UPC bar codes. By 1973, the growing Wal-Mart chain had computers in 22 of 64 stores. Kmart did not get serious about putting them in every store until 1978. By 1982, it had computers throughout its stores, but the lack of scanning cash registers meant that sales data was not current. As a result, Wal-Mart got a head start on many elements of supply chain management. The scanning cash registers fed updates to store computers, which adjusted sales and inventory records. Store managers could watch the inventory of a fast-moving item drop and electronically file replenishment orders with Wal-Marts distribution centers. Wal-Marts next logical step was into the world of Electronic Data Interchange, using virtual documents to place orders and receive shipping notices. In the late 1980s, it began supplementing those EDI connections with a system called RetailLink that allowed suppliers to access sales data and projections, and help Wal-Mart plot ways to drive up sales. Today, this electronic networking with business partners would be called an extranet. Retail link started as a proprietary dial-up service, but smoothly evolved into a browser-based system. In contrast, according to one former Kmart IT executive from the mid-1990s, Kmarts first experiments in collaboration with supply chain partners came about at the prompting of suppliers who had been involved in similar projects with Wal-Mart, and not because anyone at Kmart took the initiative. Kmart has achieved some success in its attempts to match up with Wal-Mart. By 1992, the 2,000th vendor had joined Kmarts own EDI network. Kmart won a Smithsonian Award from Computerworld magazine for the second generation of its Information Network, for merchandise, planning, tracking and replenishment. Internally, Wal-Mart focused on keeping its distribution systems lean and mean. The combination of better tracking of demand and inventory, plus electronic links with its suppliers, it was able to maximize the flow of hot products through the system and avoid accumulating duds. Kmart wound up with a split distribution network. Because independent companies, and later an organizationally separate subsidiary originally handled its apparel sales, the soft lines group for apparel and related products had a separate distribution network. Soft lines also had different computer systems than those used by the hardlines group that handled products like appliances. As of the mid-1990s, business analysts still could not generate one report that would give a complete picture of supply and demand—they had to run multiple reports, and then bring the results together in a spreadsheet. Former Kmart CIO David Carlson claims that Kmart caught up technologically during his tenure, and even started to get ahead in areas such as the use of data warehousing. In 1985, he was hired to untangle a point of sale technology project that had flopped. Once it got its scanning cash registers working, Kmart began feeding this new wealth of sales data into an NCR Teradata data warehouse. When Joseph Antonini became CEO in 1987, he announced a $1 billion investment in faster technology adoption. Kmart never used the technology it had to its full potential, Carlson says. â€Å"The data warehouse if used more aggressively could forecast demand, but Kmarts merchandizing executives preferred to trust their own judgment. At the very least, historical data should have been used to determine which products ought to be dropped because they were not selling. Merchants tended to keep broadening the variety of products rather than narrowing in on the ones that sold best, Carlson says. Greg Buzek, who studies retail technology as president of IHL Consulting, says the problem Carlson lamented continued long after he was gone. The data warehouse, which Kmart and NCR recently announced plans to expand to 92 terabytes capacity, will churn out all the information you need about whats selling and whats not, he says. Unless management pays attention to the data, it is worthless. Because they didnt believe the system, they had trucks, and trucks, and trucks of inventory just sitting there. Under Chuck Conaway, those truckloads of inventory no longer sit behind Kmart stores. Their absence is a clear sign that the company has made visible progress toward its goals. Whether this is truly the beginning of a new chapter in Kmarts use of technology to meet or beat its competition remains to be seen. With consumer focus on value and customers wanting to drive differentiation, there has never been a bigger opportunity for private label brands. With opportunity come new expectations that most private label manufacturers have never faced. Demand for insights, true innovation, first-to-market product ideas and category leadership from private label manufacturers. We are here to share our experience in helping private label manufacturers get the maximum impact from their marketing and development budgets, increase profitability through innovation, and anticipate and meet consumer needs and demands. Kmart has examined many different aspects of their marketing campaign—both in-store and through paid media. There’s smart, and there’s Kmart smart,† the mass merchandiser has gained a foothold on the competitive market and established itself as a significant player in the mass merchandising category. These campaigns delivered a message with mass appeal that also engaged each ethnic group. Kmart has also taken extraordinary measures to appeal to consumers hit harder by the recession with their extended laya way program. In September of this year, they expanded their program from eight weeks to 10-12 in order to allow more people to purchase big-ticket items. The program is also available for online sales. Kmart has experienced a turnaround in sales after years of declines with their new sales tactic. Finally, Kmart recently changed the name of their private label line to â€Å"Smart Sense† to support their â€Å"There’s smart, and there’s Kmart smart,† marketing campaign. The line contains everyday household items such as snacks, household cleaners, and beverages. The switch in product name supports the fact that Kmart shoppers are always looking for sale items first. However, they are not always looking for the cheaper item—instead the focus is on quality. By aligning private label messaging with that of value, Kmart has created an appealing synergy between value and savings. Kmart’s new success stems from their efforts in taking a closer look at the products and services their consumers need. With their implementation of private label products for everyday needs, appeal to bargain shoppers and their layaway program to help consumers afford big-ticket items their marketing campaign appeals to the masses and is relatable to the many segments of the Kmart shoppers. ?. Product Analysis Women’s Plus Size Apparel is now in high demand†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. The brand names they carry are†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ Features of this fashion merchandise†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ How do the package these items for sale†¦. What are some of the store brand and private label lines and what is their quality. Place and Price Kmart is the #3-discount retailer in the US, behind Wal-Mart and Target. It sells name brand and private-label goods (including its Joe Boxer and Jaclyn Smith labels), primarily to low- and mid-income families. It runs about 1,300 off-mall stores (including 30 Supercenters) in 49 US states, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands. About 270 Kmart stores sell home appliances (including Sears Kenmore brand) and some 980 locations house in-store pharmacies. The company also operates the Kmart. com Website, which includes merchandise from sister company Sears. Kmart is a subsidiary of Sears Holdings Corp. , formed by the 2005 combination of ailing Sears, Roebuck and Kmart. Kmart Outerwear Merchandise The women’s wear in any department store is usually about the same except for brand names and prices. Kmart is famous for coats for the family, and the average family of four could get coats and jackets for less than $30 per person. Through its alliance with Sears, they have established a market in most family households due to Sears over 100 years of customer service and satisfaction ratings. Kmart coats and jackets are rugged and give many years of service with proper cleaning and warm weather storage of coats or jackets. Although Kmart coats and jackets may not be high-end name brands, their brands such as Levi and Timberland keep their customers returning to shop for quality merchandise at a low price. This is especially true of their women customers who may want several styles and weights for difference seasonal changes. For more than a quarter-century, Kmart had the upper hand; in large part, because it was spun out of an established retail business, S. S. Kresge Co. , a dime store and downtown department store got its start in 1899. Kresge executives recognized an extraordinary new form of retailing emerging in the 1960s; large stores in suburban strip shopping centers that sold a wide variety of merchandise for discount prices. Seventeen more Kmart stores followed that first one by the end of 1962. By the end of 1963, Kmart had 53 stores, while Walton was just planning his second Wal-Mart. As far back as 1992, the Harvard Business Review pointed to Wal-marts well-honed business processes as the key to its success, with technology as an important enabler. In response, Kmart pointed to the chains own technology prowess—Kmart has aggressively moved from an outmoded technological base to a leadership, twenty-first century position in our industry, wrote a Kmart executive—but the ensuing years proved that such proficiency as Kmart had was not enough to remain competitive. In 1992, Kmart said it wanted to have revenue of $100 billion by 2000, but only reached $37 billion. Everyone has emulated their capabilities, but they are probably five or six years ahead of everyone else, says Dan OConnor, chief executive of analyst firm Management Ventures, Inc. ‘Kmart had the tendency to be penny-wise and pound-foolish. † As chronicled in In Sam We Trust by former Wall Street Journal reporter Bob Ortega, Kmart let its lead slip away. In the 1970s and early 80s , Kmart lagged Wal-Mart on adoption of several waves of retail technology, including back-end computers for individual stores, electronic cash registers and scanners that could read UPC bar codes. By 1973, the growing Wal-Mart chain had computers in 22 of 64 stores. Kmart did not get serious about putting them in every store until 1978. By 1982, it had computers throughout its stores, but the lack of scanning cash registers meant that sales data was not current. As a result, Wal-Mart got a head start on many elements of supply chain management. The scanning cash registers fed updates to store computers, which adjusted sales and inventory records. Store managers could watch the inventory of a fast-moving item drop and electronically file replenishment orders with Wal-Marts distribution centers. Wal-Marts next logical step was into the world of Electronic Data Interchange, using virtual documents to place orders and receive shipping notices. In the late 1980s, it began supplementing those EDI connections with a system called Retail Link that allowed suppliers to access sales data and projections, and help Wal-Mart plot ways to drive up sales. Today, this electronic networking with business partners would be called an extranet. Retail link started as a proprietary dial-up service, but smoothly evolved into a browser-based system. In contrast, according to one former Kmart IT executive from the mid-1990s, Kmarts first experiments in collaboration with supply chain partners came about at the prompting of suppliers who had been involved in similar projects with Wal-Mart, and not because anyone at Kmart took the initiative. Kmart has achieved some success in its attempts to match up with Wal-Mart. By 1992, the 2,000th vendor had joined Kmarts own EDI network. Kmart won a Smithsonian Award from Computerworld magazine for the second generation of its Information Network, for merchandise, planning, tracking and replenishment. Internally, Wal-Mart focused on keeping its distribution systems lean and mean. The combination of better tracking of demand and inventory, plus electronic links with its suppliers, it was able to maximize the flow of hot products through the system and avoid accumulating duds. Kmart wound up with a split distribution network. Because independent companies, and later an organizationally separate subsidiary originally handled its apparel sales, the soft lines group for apparel and related products had a separate distribution network. Soft lines also had different computer systems than those used by the hardlines group that handled products like appliances. As of the mid-1990s, business analysts still could not produce one report that would provide a complete picture of supply and demand—they had to run multiple reports, and then bring the results together in a spreadsheet. Former Kmart CIO David Carlson claims that Kmart caught up technologically during his tenure, and even started to get ahead in areas such as the use of data warehousing. In 1985, he was hired to resolve a point of sale technology project that had flopped. Once it got its scanning cash registers working, Kmart began feeding this new wealth of sales data into an NCR Teradata data warehouse. When Joseph Antonini became CEO in 1987, he announced a $1 billion investment in faster technology adoption. Kmart never used the technology it had to its full potential, Carlson says. â€Å"The data warehouse if used more aggressively could forecast demand, but Kmarts merchandizing executives preferred to trust their own judgment. At the very least, historical data should have been used to determine which products ought to be dropped because they were not selling. Merchants tended to keep broadening the variety of products rather than narrowing in on the ones that sold best, Carlson says. Greg Buzek, who studies retail technology as president of IHL Consulting, says the problem Carlson lamented continued long after he was gone. The data warehouse, which Kmart and NCR recently announced plans to expand to 92 terabytes capacity, will churn out all the information you need about whats selling and whats not, he says. Unless management pays attention to the data, it is worthless. Because they didnt believe the system, they had trucks, and trucks, and trucks of inventory just sitting there. Under Chuck Conaway, those truckloads of inventory no longer sit behind Kmart stores. Their absence is a sure sign that the company has made noticeable progress toward its goals. Whether this is actually the beginning of a new era in Kmarts use of technology to meet or exceed its competition remains to be seen. With consumer focus on value and customers wanting to drive differentiation, there has never been a bigger opportunity for private label brands. With opportunity meets new expectations that most private label manufacturers have never faced. Demand for insights, true innovation, first-to-market product ideas and category leadership from private label manufacturers. We are here to share our experience in helping private label manufacturers get the maximum impact from their marketing and development budgets, increase profitability through innovation, and anticipate and meet customer needs and demands. Kmart has examined several different aspects of their marketing campaign—both in-store and through paid media. There’s smart, and there’s Kmart smart,† the mass merchandiser has gained a foothold on the competitive market and established itself as a significant player in the mass merchandising category. These campaigns delivered a message with mass appeal that also engaged each ethnic group. Kmart has also taken extraordinary measures to appeal to consumers hit harder by the recession with their extended layaway program. In September of this year, they expanded their program from eight weeks to 10-12 in order to allow more people to purchase big-ticket items. The program is also available for online sales. Kmart will experience a turnaround in sales after years of declines with their new sales tactic. Finally, Kmart recently changed the name of their private label to â€Å"Smart Sense† to support their â€Å"There’s smart, and there’s Kmart smart,† marketing campaign. The line contains everyday household items such as snacks, household cleaners, and beverages. The switch in product name supports the fact that Kmart shoppers are always looking for sale items first. However, they are not always looking for the cheaper item—instead the focus is on quality. Overall Marketing Strategy Analysis section with a discussion of the companys global marketing strategy, and your analysis of how that will affect their business success. Integrated Marketing Program Analysis section with a discussion of how well integrated their marketing program is, and your analysis of how that will affect their economic success. Recommendations and Management Implications section, with your key recommendations related to the above areas. This should include the impact your recommendations will have on management, such as when and how your recommendations should be implemented. References http://www. baselinemag. com/c/a/Projects-Supply-Chain/How-Kmart-Fell-Behind/ http://research.easybib.com/research/index/search?search=%22By+The+Company%22page=326 http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/document.php?id=cqresrre2004091000 http://www.globalcompanyintelligence.com/ http://library. cqpress. com/cqresearcher/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synovate http://www.euromonitor.com/india http://www.researchandmarkets.com/ http://www.kmart.com/