Strategic Marketing of Giordano

University of La Verne quite a little 567 Service Sector Marketing Giordano Positioning for International Expansion Sheng-I, Chang (Becky)Chang-Ta, Yang(Frank)Chieg-Chiung, subgenus Chen (Jeff)September , 15th, 2011 Introduction Giordano established in 1981 by Jimmy Lai. It is a Hong Kong- establish retailer of episodic clothes targeted at men, women and children via its four participation dishonors, Giordano, Giordano Ladies, Giordano secondary and Blue Exchange (Bitner & Zeithaml, 2011).Giordano is one of the trump forth known and established attire retailers in the Asia Pacific region, employing over 8,000 friendly staff with over 2,400 shops operate in 30 territories worldwide ( rough Giordano, 2011). They argon swearted to enkindlet overing fibre harvests and usefulness to their clients in the worldwide food grocery storeplace. Their vision is to be the best and the biggest world reproach in equip retailing with the mission of earn people feeling good & look great. This paper starts with a corporate compose of Giordano.The principal(prenominal) part of the case is patching the international expansion of Giordano and a detailed analysis of its militant environment and alternative solutions. Further more than(prenominal), the familys growth strategies atomic number 18 discussed with recommendations provided to conclude the case. Company Profile The Giordano Group is a leading international retailer of mens, womens and childrens apparel and accessories. Giordanos achievement is measured by the ships companys severe focus on its five corporate melodic phrase values of gauge, knowledge, innovation, rest and disher.The company has its own apparel manufacturing division where few(prenominal) of its own robes styles are produced. Giordano is in addition renowned for its basic and practical mens, womens, and childrens T-shirts and trousers, especially denims. In comparison, Giordano is very similar to the American based common retailer The Gap. Responding to the slow barters in the past, Giordano changed its set outline in 1987 which the company decided to shift its focus to maximizing sales kind of of maximizing price margin via a value-for-money policy with shell outing discounted casual androgynous apparel, and increased trueness to client service.The shift in schema was fortunate. The management values and style leads Giordano to be successful, which including a entrustingness to try stark naked and unconventional ways of doing disdain and to learn from past mistakes, and considering front-line workers to be its customer service heroes. Giordanos commitment to service began with its major client Service charge up in 1989. There are three tenets in this campaign which is we find measureless try-ons we exchange no questions asked and we serve with a smile.Giordanos ism of quality service could be observed not only in Hong Kong, but also in its oversea outlets. There are many c ompanies in the market selling casual apparel. The way in which Giordano distinctiates itself from early(a) companies to collide with warlike advantage is critical to its success. Giordanos Strategies Giordano distinguishes itself from the some other(a)wises through with(predicate) its high-quality service and hypernym customer value. However, Giordano is still a long way off from organism well known speck compared to other international brand.Giordano is a grade that doesnt shape opinion, After 2005, when the garment quota is abolished, imports into the Asia region volition become more competitive. This change could discover Giordanos position and growth potential. Philosophy And entertain outline Regarding to Giordanos philosophy and value system, they believe that mistakes are unavoid able because of the rapid changes in the market. The critical thing is to learn from the mistakes. Giordano has made his employees comfortable about making mistakes.They believe in e mpowering people through providing a supportive, participative environment in which employees feel safe when mistakes are made. In Giordano philosophy, they feel that with contribution and fraternity of all employees, mistakes will be minimized. People only make mistakes when they carry determination-making ability. Employees As An Asset Training is an important part of Giordanos schema. It is provided on a continuous basis in order to support Giordano philosophy that employees are key to the companys success.However, even the most sophisticated rearing program will not guarantee the best customer services and gratification. It is the people who deliver that gives it from and meaning. Giordano has plastered recruitment and selection procedures to match its value and service requirements which detains to take hold top-level service to customers. Performance Evaluations Performance evaluations are conducted frequently at the install level, as well as for individual employees. Stores are evaluated for customer satisfaction twice all(prenominal) month, while individual employees are evaluated once every two months.Internal competitions are designed to motivate their employees and stores intend to do their best in serving their customers. Product Strategy & Quality Services Giordano is able to incorporate a high level of customer service as part of its yields through a concerted effort, which involved every employee of the company. The company focuses on the concept of value-for money which constantly improves the value of the yields and what the products mean to their customers.However, it is also inseparable to recognize the importance of the management and leaderships commitment to be customer-oriented and to provide high quality service. Product strategy is to sell a small number of core products in its stores. Giordanos limited product line is seen as a strength. It has no more than 100 items and no more than 17 core items in the store while other retailers defend 200-300 items. Because the company believes that merchandising a wide race of products will affect retailers to take a long-range time to response to the market changes.Simplicity, flexibility and speed as values at Giordano is reflected in some(prenominal) ways which allowing company to react rapidly to the market changes, and quick decision making and well communication through its prone organisational structure. emulous Advantage The competitive advantages those worked as key success factors for Giordano to achieve a distinct position in the competitive markets are as succeeding(a) * Computerization The POS terminals that are utilize to record and transmit feed ins of stocks to a mainframe computer computer which then aids in controlling stock flow of inventory. A tightly controlled menu It mainly focus on a few items whose demand and desirability can be closely monitored. * frugalness Curbed useing on advertising and tight inventory control * Val ue pricing Value for money apparel. * A dedicated workforce in all outlets that provides quality service In order to maintain this Giordano follows stringent selection procedures to ensure only desired employees are chosen, conduct workshops on attitude training, follows rotational on the job training manner and exploit related pay systems on the basis of periodic performance evaluations. Simplicity and speed of operations Giordano kept up(p) a flat giving medicational structure and this facilitated easy communication between people indoors the organization, helped to make speedy decision and to manage the project efficiently. * A recognized brand Giordano has received awards such as The American Service Excellence face, ISO 9002 Award and People Developer Award which helped Giordano to establish their brand as a beaten(prenominal) one in over 30 countries.All these competitive advantages and sources should be maintained by Giordano in order to keep its current competitive p osition and there are some other competitive advantages that should be developed by Giordano in future. The future competitive advantages can be gained through investment into the organic evolution of employees and continued development of a learning organization which may not be gained by the other competitors. (Giordano K-10, 2010) Giordanos Problems We have indicated some problems and considerations regarding to the position for international expansion.If at all, Should Giordano careen itself against its competitors in its current and fresh-sprung(prenominal) markets, and should it have varied pose strategies for oppo station geographic markets? Does the company submit to apply contrastive HR strategies to suit different countries? Analysis & Solutions I. Should Giordano reposition itself against its competitors in its breathing and bran-new markets, and should it have different positioning strategies for different geographic markets?Regarding to the Giordanos position ing of international expansion, should Giordano reposition itself against its competitors in its existing and new markets, and should it have different positioning strategies for different geographic markets? According to Osama Taha- A positioning strategy results in the calculate you want to draw in the wit of your customers, the picture you want him/her to visualize of what you offer, in relation to the market situation, and any competition you may have Giordanos current positioning strategy is based on providing value-for-money or quality merchandise of discounted casual unisex appeal.The company also emphasized on the merchandise that is relatively mid-priced which heart and soul inexpensive yet contemporary and trendy, and offers quality, value and excellent customer services. The reasons for Giordanos success in market place are filling a gap in the market for trendy with reasonable price and quality unisex apparel, and the delivery of quality customer service. Now the fac t is whether or not Giordano should reposition itself against its competitors in its current and new markets.Moreover, after 30 years of operation, Giordanos brand name and value have been in the customers mind clearly. If Giordano changes its positioning strategy, it will be very problematical to obtain high-end customers comeion in this intensive global apparel competition, and may lose the existing low-end customers at the very(prenominal) time. Therefore, we believe that Giordano should not change its existing positioning strategy. Repositioning is not necessary for the entire company because Giordanos relatively mid-priced positioning worked well in the past decades. The Inexpensive Yet stylish clothing appealed to Asias frugal customers in the Asia market. However, Giordano could alter their brand image into a more high-value, high-quality, and high-end market. This could mean primarily repositioning Giordano as a higher priced and higher value brand in item markets in the world. The price may can increase in spite of appearance 5 10 %, but not too high. According to the statistics, ad skillful the middle range of clothing prices within 5 10% will not affect the consumers sensitivity of the price. Giordano must continue to be creative in their promotions.Perhaps they should spend more on traditional advertising, as they spend less on advertising and promotion than close competitors. However, compared to other international brands, Giordano still doesnt shape opinion. One of the Giordanos competitors is Esprit who are seen as more up-market than Giordano, while organism stylish and trendy. Besides, Esprit promoted a lifestyle image, even though it is positioned similarly to Giordano. Therefore, Giordano could re-launch its image, to be more stylish and thus promoting a lifestyle and not just a brand.It is not necessary for Giordano to follow same positioning strategies for different market but it will depend on the market physique of a particul ar whether to follow standardized or customized strategy. The company can go after with standardized positioning strategies value-for-money merchandise for different markets within the same region like South East Asian countries. barely before implementing this standardized positioning strategy Giordano needs to understand the particular market on the basis of consumers tastes and preferences about the products and promotional activities.On the other hand, the other successful strategies of Giordano in proving excellent quality customer services, data system and efficient logistics and human resource policies and practices should be implemented tactically for different markets. It means customized strategies should be developed for different countries even within Asia because there are some variations between countries in terms of their economic, pagan and social factors. II. What are Giordanos key success factors and sources of competitive advantage?Are its competitive advantage s sustainable, and how would they develop in the future? The company is establishing a good key success factors. They serve their clients with good quality service and having other company as a reference for bench mark. The company emphasizes the service and the value-for-money which has a big impact to the company source of success. When they are selling their products, they are selling service which is half the price and the other half goes to the drudgery cost. They are not only for goods but they also sell services.Moreover, Giordano have other key success factors like little product development cycle and fast market-driven new product development, truth in managements swift cost-control strategies, good in market and strong brand positioning, excellence service with no questions asked exchange and unlimited try-on policy, good location primarily in good grade areas, drawing high-volume traffic and facilitating shopping, browsing, and impulse buying. By all of these key su ccessful factors, they have strong competitiveness in the clothing retail market.However, in the long run, sustainability of key success factors of Giordano highly depend on creative thinking and innovative of the organization. Some competitive advantages can be Giordano key success factors now, but it may not be in future. For example, information was disseminated to production facilities in real time by IT system but if Giordanos competitor installed the similar system as Giordano did, it will no longer Giordanos competitive advantages and cannot become the key success factor of Giordano.Giordano should never satisfy itself in such rapid changing current market situation. As the results, Giordano should look into new ways of improving and strengthening its competitive advantages. Creativity and innovative play an important role in continue to gain competitive advantages as people are the key to gain value to organization or so called organization culture which is difficult to ado pt by its competitors in market.Although Giordano might lose some of competitive advantages in future, investment in human resources will help Giordano to make up new competitive advantages to contribute in the key success factors of Giordano and impediment ahead in future market. Besides this, Giordano should keep on commit to its excellent customer service orientation philosophy and well observe with their market competition. These key success factors would develop in certain training and more research about the service and the products the target market wants to have.Innovation of product and service is a must for a company to develop and gain profit in a long period of time. Also, Giordano should rapidly development in mesh and Intranet technologies, solutions such as MS Office, point of sale (POS) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) packet, and supporting telecommunications service (e. g. broadband Internet access), Giordanos competitor could acquire integrated IT and l ogistics technology more good and more cost- in force(p)ly than ever before. III. A third issue to be considered was Giordanos growth strategy in Asia as well as crossways continent.Would Giordanos competitive strengths be transferable to other markets ? Would strategic version to IT strategy and marketing mingle be required or would tactical moves suffice? Giordano Companys main competitive strengths which can be transferred to other market are the experience of the employees, inventory controlled system, HRM practices but the policies should be different for each country and can use the established distribution, marketing and inbound channels members in order to market their product international the home country.IT strategy which is currently used by Giordano, it should not adopt the same strategy for other countries where they are planning to expand their bank line. Because the IT groundwork for each country in Asia and other continents may not be the same and the current IT strategy of Giordano may not be support by that particular countrys technological structure. Giordano needs more efficient, cost effective, and secure internal communication platform which will come to its many sites in Hong Kong and other host countries.As the cross border business of Giordano is increasing, the company indispensable a comprehensive communications tool that would help Giordano employees conduct multisite management meetings, share documents and collaborate for fast business decisions and quality customer service. In such scenario Giordano can go for partnership with the IT company (Like Microsoft), through which they can install such a server and software through which they can equipped their staff with real time teamwork and posture capabilities that dramatically increased productivity.At the same time they can decrease its multi-national address dialing and travel cost, as well as IT management costs. The marketing mix strategies that are followed by the Giordano for the existing market should not be the same for new markets where the company is willing to enter. The marketing mix strategies mainly mint candy with arrangements of the 4 Ps. So the strategies regarding product price, price, place and promotion should not be the same for all target countries as the market differs in terms of their economic, cultural, social and political environment.But the successful strategies which are currently used for other market can be used by Giordano as guidelines and can develop tactical strategies for different market according to the market situation and customers requirements. Recommendation In the past, Giordano has relied on a consistent strategy across retail outlets in the Asian countries that it transacts with. The success strategies include the companys positioning and quality service, recruitment and selection policy, training and development, above-market reward and compensation system, flat structure, quick decision making.We be lieve that the same brand in different regions should not apply different positioning strategy, which should keep the same business strategy consistency. Due to the intensive competitions in the global market, same brand name with different positioning strategy will cause the mix-up of customers worldwide. Customers in these markets may become confused as to what Giordano stands for, and this inconsistency makes effective service strategy implementation difficult, particularly as consumers are fitting increasingly mobile and travel more frequently between Giordanos core markets.Moreover, Giordano might can develop a new high-end brands in order to satisfy the demands of high end markets. From the above analysis we have some recommendation for expansion in the international market for Giordano. First, it is essential to start promotions to increase brand awareness when starting businesses in new market. Second, the location and site selection for establishing Giordanos outlet in di fferent country will be critical. The company should carefully select the site to position their stores which will be convenient for the customers. Third, customer is the key and main factor for differentiation is customer care.The company needs to follow customized customer service strategy for each market segment. Fourth, Giordano needs to find out possibility of outsourcing to maintain low costs. Fifth, extensive market research is needed to investigate designs and fabrics required by the target customers. Giordano has perfectly focused in the value-for-money concept and everything they do is managed at a world-class standard. The management conducted their business in such an excellent and professional manner which helped this brand to dig from Asia to the Middle East and India, Australia, Eastern Europe, and now in North America.Reference Giordano (2011). About Giordano. Accessed Sep 15 , 2011 from http//www. giordano. com. hk/web/HK/ourCompany. html Giordano (2011). Giordano International Limited yearbook Report 2010. Kowloon, Hong Kong. Accessed Sep 15 , 2011 Bitner, Zeithaml, Gremler (2011). Service Marketing Integrating Customer Focus Across the File 5th edition. McGraw Hill. Accessed Sep. 15, 2011. Tam, F. Y. , Chan, T. S. , Chu, P. W. , Lai, T. C. , Wang, L. L. (2005). Opportunities and challenges Hong Kong as Asias personal manner hub. J.Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management, 9(2), 221-231. Accessed Sep. 15, 2011 Tyler, D. , Heeley, J. , Bharma, T. (2006). Supply chain influences on new product development in fashion clothing. Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management, 10(3), 316-328. Accessed Sep. 15, 2011 Taha, O. (2000). How to endeavor Your Positioning Strategy. Retrieved Sep. 23, 2011, from http//www. dime-co. com/marketing/positioning. htm Giordano International Limited (Hong Kong). (2011). Retrieved Sep. 25, 2011, from http//www. giordano. com. hk/web/HK/index. html