Seven-Eleven Japan Case Study

Seven-Eleven Japan

1- in order to a convenience store chain attempts to be responsive and provide customers what they need, at a specific time at the right place, many characteristic and features are in need. First of all, there must be proximity between products and consumers. Consumers prefer that these stores are close by there houses, rather than spending lots of time and money to reach the destined place. But once a convenience store is nearby the way of consumers, more needs and in products and services are created which maybe cannot be satisfied immediately. Secondly, Seven-Eleven offered a wide variety of services to its customers including the ski lift voucher pass, payment of electricity and water bills, payment of mail order purchases, Internet shopping, installation of ATMs, and delivery service. On the other hand, this variety might result in some shortage in the information system, and this will need a massive training for the employees.

Third, Seven-Eleven offers its customers a flexible operating hours accordingly with their needs; e.g. offering breakfast in the early mornings.

Fourth, this company is following the consumer's demand trends in a given area. It has established a stock information to each store so that they can order items easily when it comes to a consumer request of a certain product. Consumers demands are always changing, and sometimes needs might be impossible in terms of cost, size etc...

Fifth, the 7dream.com which is an e-commerce website is adopted in order to make the Seven-Eleven company accessible to the whole Japanese population, therefore it will make it easy for the consumers to buy from home, and it will be profitable for the company itself because more orders will be taken. The problem is that not all consumers are Internet wise, there might be some mistakes which will result in bigger problems.

Sixth, Seven-Eleven is using a very efficient distribution system which it has linked the whole network in supply chain, using a distribution center for every 50 or 60 store to avoid mistakes and postponements. There is a risk of a failure of this distribution system where it may be misused or misunderstanded by the employees.

Seventh, there is a very effective and fast communication system at Seven-Eleven because it elaborated an integrated information system that linked the headquarters with all it's divisions such as the suppliers, distribution centers and it's customers. The only disadvantage of this system is its high cost.

Finally, as read in the case, it is keeping of every unit a 3000 inventory unit. This will require bigger warehouse which means extra costs.

2- the risks associated with the choice of attempting to micro-match supply and demand using rapid replenishment are:

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