Jamba Juice Case Study

Jamba Juice Case Study

        Jamba Juice started out as Juice Club which was founded by Kirk Perron.  The first store was opened in San Luis Obispo, California, in April 1990.  A few years later Jamba Juice changed its name from Juice Club to Jamba Juice Company in order to provide differentiation between their product and its competition’s.  Jamba Juice faced heavy changes when in August 2008, James White was named CEO and president, while Berrard continued to be the chairman of the board of directors.  In 2013, Jamba Juice had increased to 788 locations.  They had increased their revenues from a mere $22 million in 2006, to over $228 million in 2012.  

        Jamba Juice began small and strived to differentiate itself from its competition.  They used top-of-mind brand marketing in order to create innovative and desirable ingredients and menu items to provide for its customers.  Jamba Juice was able to use location to an advantage to strategically market and sell their products.  They have traditional and non-traditional stores.  The traditional stores are generally part of strip malls and tend to be the same.  Non-traditional stores are more for creating awareness of their products and offering something different to those areas.   Jamba Juice used living a healthy active lifestyle to its advantage.  Using strategic management they were able to implement a company-wide motto that is easily communicated to the consumer through its products and offerings.  The expense reduction plan enacted by CEO James White was a huge move and strategic management had a large part in how the plan played out.  He was able to reduce store-level costs across all stores.  This allowed him to better manage wages and implement a labor-planning system that was incredibly successful.

        The ultimate question is whether or not “Jamba can grow without losing its ‘healthy alternatives’ brand identity?”  Jamba Juice desires to grow in the same way that Starbucks and McDonalds have, by introducing menu items that do not stem from their original ways of juice.  By doing this they are able to provide other options for customers that would like something to go with their juices.  This helps to increase revenues, but at the cost of losing sight of what the company valued from the beginning.  Jamba Juice must maintain their image of a healthy active lifestyle while still offering nutritious options aside from juices.  They will benefit greatly by introducing items to complement its already existing products.