Brannigan Foods Strategic Marketing Planning

1. How would you analyze the process Clark is using to determine his best “investment bets” for allocating resources?

R/. The process developed by Clark is under my point of view, a strategic assessment (and back testing) for Branningan Foods Mid Term Plan, given the insights and perspectives published at the Annual Report “State of the Soup Industry”.

For this strategic assessment, first he analyzes the situation, focusing in two major consumer trends highlighted in the Report: 1) Consumer shifting preferences toward healthy foods, especially for the targeted clients that grow with the company (Baby Boomers), 2) Consumer segmentation preferences, especially among working mothers for fast simple meals.

Second, he shares with C-Level Officers his analysis to get different feedbacks according to the different perspectives of each one. He shares the analysis with the Director of Simple Meals Unit, Director of Finance and Planning, the CIO and the Director of Sales and Marketing.

The main focus is to review their opinions and remarks of the situation addressed at the Report and his analysis, anchored in the financial reality of the company, focused in strengthen the position of the company to maintain dominance in the market, under a budget and financial constrain to fulfill the current forecasted targets of sales, revenues, returns and profits.

After receiving each opinion, he analyses under the framework he establishes (see last paragraph), the upsides and downsides of each proposal. He also compares each proposal to the current financial goals and past strategic decisions (i.e Acquisition of Annabelle), to better assess each one under a fair perspective.

2. Which of four managers´proposals should Clark favor? Absent any resource constraints, which of the four departmental directions do you think is the most viable? Which is the second best strategy? Which is the least viable? (In considering Mackey´s proposal to acquire a company, do the quantitative analysis on Red Dragon Foods only).

R/. Under a resource constrain, I believe that he would foster the Sales and Marketing Director´s ideas. Under the current situation, and compared with the others, is the one with the lesser financial side effects, given the others required large investment in plans that could back fire easily. Instead, Bob´s idea invest in the modernization of the company and his idea is also share by the Senior Management.

Without any resource constraints, in my opinion, CIO´s plan addresses better the issues regarding consumer shifting preferences, but I will complement the plan, with a consumer and demand analysis of new product placement in other generations such as Generation X and Millenials (specially the latter, given the size it represents in the US surpassing the Baby Boomer´s).

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