Professional Documents
Culture Documents
By (Name)
Table of Contents
Table of Contents..................................................................................................................................2
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................4
Key Primary Research with Results in the Context of Identifying and Exploring Alternatives...........................5
Personalising Marketing..........................................................................................................................10
Diversifying Brands................................................................................................................................15
Risk Assessments........................................................................................................................................16
References..................................................................................................................................................19
Introduction
Shropshire Tea Company offers blended brand of tea and coffee to its esteemed customers
in the United Kingdom. Shropshire is one of the many tea companies operating in the United
Kingdom (UK). Brew Tea Company, Tetley Tea Company and Britannia Tea Company are some
of the major competitors alongside Shropshire Tea Company in the UK (Raynolds & Ngcwangu,
2016, p. 74). Customers have a variety of choice of Tea outlets to choose from. Therefore, there
is a higher need for proper market analysis and understanding among players in the tea
companies in the UK. For instance, Shropshire Tea Company has the mandate to ensure that it
offer services that are competitive to allow it operate properly in the competitive Tea market in
the UK. Specifically, Shropshire Tea Company has tearooms and restaurants where it serves Tea
and associated products to customers in the UK. This company too has a free online tea guide
that provides information on its activities and menu that can allow customers to access and make
adequate decision concerning the company’s services and tea products. Most customers served
directly by Shropshire in its tearooms visit the company in the afternoons. Currently, Shropshire
Tea Company serves English breakfast, Lemon & Ginger, Proper tea bags and loose tea to its
clients. These types of tea products and associated drinks are critical in promoting Shropshire’s
ability to sell its products in the competitive tea market in the UK. This paper will provide a five
year business plan for Shropshire Tea Company showing strategies that the company can adopt
to enhance shareholders’ wealth/ value in the tea industry in the United Kingdom.
UK’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the annual report of 2016 (Khokhar & Magnusdottir,
2016, p. 565). This percentage shows that there is need to sustain tea business to boost the
growth of the economy in the UK. Provision of employment opportunities to job seekers and
Five Year Business Plan 5
investors in the UK can be enhanced through adequate research and protection of tea outlets in
the UK. There are a number of major operators in tea business in the UK. These include Tetley
Co. Ltd, Twining Co. Ltd, Ahmad Tea, Associated British Foods & Britannia Tea Company Ltd.
These companies’ offers wider range of tea products to customers in the UK. Companies in the
tea industry in the UK share the turnovers that are generated in tea industry. Therefore, there is
need to make adequate adjustments among companies operating in the tea industry to maximise
profit levels generated among different companies in tea industry in the UK.
Market analysis for tea in the UK shows a positive trend among the buyers in the UK.
There are a number of factors showing that there is adequate demand for tea and tea products in
the UK. Firstly, tea drinkers adhere to and respect National Tea Day in the UK. April 21 st forms
the dedicated Holiday on which the UK citizens get the opportunity to drink tea as a show of its
acceptance on the national level. Most people are attracted to tea drinking on the national tea day
in the UK. Likewise, the UK nationals; especially Tea Drinkers have the opportunity to drink tea
on the International Tea Day; marked on the 15th of December (Del-Rio et al., 2014, p. 280).
These two tea days are a show of unity and love for tea brands and their associated products.
Thirdly, the UK nationals have a perception that three to five cups of tea should be taken by tea
drinkers on a daily basis. Most health officers presume that adequate tea drinking reduces blood
pressure, risks of stroke & diabetes among tea drinkers. These health messages are available in
the UK; thus promoting tea demands among consumers in the UK.
Key Primary Research with Results in the Context of Identifying and Exploring Alternatives
Primary research was conducted within one week between dates 15th to 22nd November 2017 in
the town of Shrewsbury in the county of Shropshire. Seventy people were randomly selected in the
town and requested to fill in the questionnaires that were pre-planned to contain alternative strategies
Five Year Business Plan 6
for improving Shropshire Tea Company’s financial performance. There were three major questions in
the questionnaires: (1) Do you think that services that you receive from Shropshire Tea Company can
influence your purchasing behaviours? (2) Do you agree that services or products offered at
Shropshire Tea Company can influence your demand patterns? (3) Can you make choices of
Shropshire Tea Company’s products based on its comparison to competitors’ products? Sample
answers appropriate to the questions. This response rate represents 85.71% of the total potential
agreed that services offered can influence their purchasing behaviour, 7 respondents were not sure
while 3 strongly disagreed (See Figure 1 for graph). On the question concerning nature of product or
services; 35-respondents strongly agreed that nature of products or services offered can influence their
purchasing patterns. 5-respondents were not sure on this question while 20- strongly disagreed
concerning the second question. On the last question about the necessity of comparing competitors’
products before making purchases; 10-respondents strongly agreed that it influences their purchasing
behaviour. 20-Respondents were not sure on this question while 30 respondents strongly disagreed
with the need for excessive comparisons as a way of making purchase decision in Tea Industry.
From the figure above (Figure 1); it’s evident that 83% of the respondents seem to have agreed
with the fact that the level of services offered can determine their purchasing power. Only a small
percentage (5%) of the respondents disagreed with the need for services as a deciding factor in choice
of products or services that a company provides. From this primary research; it can be argued that
Shropshire Company should involve in promoting level of their services to their esteemed customers
1. To carryout research on challenges that Shropshire encounters in managing its customers and
provide alternative strategies for offering customer satisfaction for the company’s success in
Tea Industry.
2. To promote customer loyalty to Shropshire’s brands by identifying the best alternative actions
that the company can undertake to promote its brand image and achieve sufficient financial
flows.
Five Year Business Plan 8
wealth (Godfrey, 2015, p.777). Moreover, the expected future value for the shareholders’ stock as
traded in the market place also represents shareholders’ value. Earnings per share (EPS) also represent
shareholders’ value given to shareholders by the end of a trading period. The Board of Directors have
the mandate to declare EPS and dividends earned per share. Declaration of dividends by the board of
directors of a company shows that a company is finically stable as reflected in the increase in the stock
degree to which shareholders’ value is being enhanced. KPIs for measuring degree of shareholders
value after investing in various activities by Shropshire Tea Company include: Net Profit Percentages,
Debt ratios, sales turnover and Inventory turnovers. Therefore, increase in Net Profit margins by 10%
would indicate that the strategies undertaken by the management of Shropshire Tea Co. are viable for
the business’ success. The management should have at least a target of 10% improvement on Net
Profits to counter for any incremental expenses that might be incurred in promoting profit levels.
Secondly, the Debt ratio should be lowered within three years in a five year strategic improvement
plans. A lower debt ratio would indicate improved asset levels and reduced leverage of the company
(Parmenter, 2015, p. 4). Financial stability would render higher value for shareholders since the
demand for a financially stable company’s shares are relatively high in the stock market. Sales
turnover should be more than one (1) to indicate higher rate of liquidation of the company’s stock to
finances. Consequently, inventory turnovers should be higher to indicate higher sales and demands for
years period. Therefore, from the figure above (all figures in £) the company will make losses for the
first two years as represented by (£10 million) and (£3 million) losses for the first two years. However,
from the third year, Shropshire Tea Co. is expected to make its first major profits of £15 million for the
first time. The steady increase in sales levels and stabilisation of recurrent expenses would lead to
increase in profits for the three subsequent financial years within a five year business plan.
Industry has a higher customer propensity since most customers can switch to different brands without
many losses. Therefore, there is need to ensure that the company makes proper strategies that can
promotes its financial status in the competitive Tea Industry in the United Kingdom (UK). Key
strategies to be undertaken must lead to customer satisfaction and improve demand among customers.
Increased demands would lead to increased sales volumes that represent a proper financial flow for
sufficient growth and development of the Shropshire Tea Company. There are a number of strategic
Five Year Business Plan 10
activities and undertakings that can allow Shropshire Tea Co. to enhance its operations. Ten major
internally and externally. Dissemination of accurate pieces of information allows the management to
control activities undertaken in an organisation in a prompt manner (Baker, Day & Salas, 2016, p.
157). Therefore, Shropshire Tea Company should ensure that information sharing is enhanced
between the management and employees. Currently, there is inadequate information sharing
techniques in the company since fewer intranets are available within the restaurants and tearooms
where the company offers its services to clients. For this reason, the management cannot sufficiently
monitor activities that are undertaken in different points where the junior employees offers services to
customers on behalf of the company’s management. Installation of proper intranets and Wi-Fi
networks would be critical strategy that can promote timely information sharing between the
management and the employees in Shropshire Tea Company. Moreover, upwards and downwards
communication trends should be promoted to ensure that any individual is free to communicate their
ideas for consideration within the company. This freedom of expression would allow the employees to
spot potential challenges and inform the management for earlier consideration.
Personalising Marketing
Marketing is essential for promotion of the image of a product or service that a company offers
to its esteemed clients (Kim & Jun, 2008, p. 129). However, marketing should be designed in a
manner that attracts potential and actual customers in a manner that is universally accepted within the
market segment under consideration. For instance, the management of Shropshire Tea Company
should involve in marketing that has characteristics of personalising the products and associating it
Five Year Business Plan 11
with clients. Marketing campaign slogan like, ‘Tea is Part and Parcel of You’’ containing images of
healthy people who drink tea can enhance the process of personalising marketing campaigns.
Currently, Shropshire Tea Co has a marketing campaign that is product and service oriented in nature.
The company describes its products to customers and services that they offer alongside Tea drinking
activities. However, there is inadequate attractiveness in Shropshire’s marketing process since the
company fails to personalise marketing messages. Therefore, there is a need to reverse the attitude of
designing marketing needs that should involve proper analysis and development of people centred
messages that allow customers to make appropriate judgments on purchasing products or services
trading period. Customers can make preference to purchase products or services from a particular
company if that company offers loyalty programs. Coupons, financial rewards and gift cards are
examples of potential loyalty programs that can encourage customers to make purchases (McCall &
Voorhees, 2010, p. 35). Shropshire Tea Company current lacks a sufficient and outstanding loyalty
program that can enhance loyalty of its customers to its services and products. Therefore, the company
should ensure that it employs loyalty cards as a program to enable its customers to continue making
purchases. The loyalty card should allow customers to make purchases after one week and present it
to the counter for free cups of tea on Saturday and Sunday in the afternoon. Most customers would
have a positive perception of the program and switch their loyalty from other companies such as
Tetley Ltd and Ahmad Tea Co to Shropshire Tea Company within a period of six months. The cards
designed by the management should have unique features and attractive colours that can prompt many
company and its products (Baker et al., 2016, p. 159). SLQ involves the rate of timing for provision of
services to individual customers. An issue such as queuing should be avoided in a company that
desires to make positive impacts on customers’ perception of their products. Secondly, after sales
services should be sufficient enough to enable customers make positive impression of the company
and its associated products. Shropshire Co. seems to have a relatively insufficient SLQ in that most
customers make long queues when jostling for services and products from the company’s restaurants
and tearooms. These hindrances reduce the company’s ability to attract new customers and make
appropriate sales that can enhance positive returns. The company should automate 90% of order
processing services to facilitate SLQ and enhance customer satisfaction with its products. The 10%
orders can be made manually to assist customers who cannot access automated order processing
services in all service points for Shropshire Co. These changes would enhance incomes from the sales
potential incomes within a particular financial year (McCall & Voorhees, 2010, p. 52). Customers’
e-mails, direct phone numbers and physical address are critical in developing a stable relationship
between the business and its customers. Shropshire currently lacks adequate personal relationship
activities that can enable the company to engage its actual customers. For this reason, the company
depends on customers who visit its sales outlets by chance. Predicting potential incomes is a serious
challenge under this condition. Therefore, Shropshire Co. should involve in persuading customers to
continue making purchases from the company by contacting them through their personal phone
numbers and e-mails. These platforms are critical in delivering actual and urgent messages to clients
Five Year Business Plan 13
in a manner that allows them to keep abreast with the services that the company offers. Reception of
urgent and important updates from the company’s management would alert the customers on changes
and improvements available within the company. This activity would be critical in enabling
customers to promote their view of the company and feel that the company cares about them. Feeling
of a caring attitude from customers is critical since it promotes positive attitude that customers have
own goals and strive to achieve them. The overall aim of MBO is to allow employees to evaluate their
ability and set priorities that they are sure of achieving. Overall objectives of the management must be
understood by the employees. Likewise, senior management has the responsibility to assist and guide
junior employees in setting objectives and targets that they should achieve within a specified trading
period. Senior management’s involvement in setting targets for different employees is essential since
overall objectives are under the control of the senior management (Andrews & Chompusri, 2011, p.
77). Moreover, ultra-vires involvements of employees can be reduced when senior managers assist
them in setting achievable targets given the resources and time at the disposal of the management.
Therefore, determining the contributions that different employees have on the success of the firm is an
uphill task. Instituting MBO would be an improvement for establishing a system for target setting and
(Andrews & Chompusri, 2011, p. 93). Once a company foresees losses that occur due to reduced
Five Year Business Plan 14
demands in the market; marketing failure would be one of the probable issues alongside active
competitors’ activities. An active marketing staff can sustain positive demands of a product despite
severe competition in a particular market segment. Shropshire Tea Co. currently faces a crisis in its
marketing department as evidenced by 10% reduction in incomes that this company reported in 2017
as compared to 2016. Therefore, the management of the company should ensure that marketing
department is reorganised and re-evaluated to identify gaps that exist in the knowledge or skills
required for marketers. In case marketers in Shropshire’s marketing department lacks marketing
skills; then they should be trained under internship programs for a period of three months in similar
fields before reinstating them to their current positions. However, if the team has skilled and
knowledgeable employees then resources should be given to them to enhance their work and attain
positive results. Staff at the marketing department should involve in creative designing of adverts and
marketing tools that can allow them to choose the best alternative to present to the consumers.
appropriate for customers. Restaurants and tearooms have menus that show the types of meals served
to clients per unit time. The presence of an inclusive menu is appropriate for a Tea Company since its
customers can access the right Tea at the right place and time. Shropshire Tea Co. lacks appropriate
online menus that can provide guidelines to customers. For this reason, some customers lack crucial
pieces of information that pertains to services that Shropshire offers to its customers. There is need for
the company to produce and sustain an online menu hosted on its website to enhance customer access
to its menu guide. The contexts and content of the online menu should be simple and appropriate to
understand by potential and actual customers. Simple repetitive commands should be used to ensure
that any literate person can access and scrutinise data from the site concerning the company’s menu
Five Year Business Plan 15
guides. Moreover, the company should use social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook to
in an appropriate manner. In the case of tearooms and restaurants; waiters and ushers are potential sale
persons. These employees have impacts on clients since they have direct contact with customers on
behalf of the management. The manner in which sales persons handle customers in terms of
welcoming words and solving problems that customers might raise determines customers’ ability to
make repeat purchases from a restaurant or a tearoom. Currently, Shropshire has waiters and
waitresses who serve tea to customers in the tearooms and restaurants where the company operates.
Most of waiters employed by Shropshire don’t have courtesy when handling clients as evidenced by
reviews posted by clients concerning Tea companies in the UK in 2017. Therefore, Shropshire Tea
Company should employ waiters and waitresses who have adequate potential to handle customers
using different psychological approaches. Involving waiters in further learning in psychology can be
Diversifying Brands
Brand diversification enables companies to provide a variety of options to customers (Baker et
al., 2016, p158). Once customers have a range of options to choose from; they can promote shopping
needs from the company since they can chose to purchase different products or services available
from the listed range. One brand might have negative reviews from customers from a particular
market segment; such reviews might derail and indent the image of the company’s brand. However,
customers can switch brands within the company thus maintaining incomes to the company under
consideration. Shropshire Tea Company has a range of products that it sells to customer including
Five Year Business Plan 16
English breakfast, Chai, and Proper Tea bags. However, the company needs to improve and increase
the range of its products and services to capture more customers. French tea and dishes too should be
included in Shropshire’s menu to attract new customers who wish to taste different brands of dishes
from the company. Once customers receive news of addition of new products or services to
Shropshire’s menu; they can promote demand and record positive purchases for the company.
Risk Assessments
Shropshire has ten key strategic options that are critical in promoting its business operations
within the volatile Tea Industry in the UK as discussed in the sections above. However, there are many
problems/ risks that this company might encounter when implementing different programs/ strategies
on staff (Makawatsakul & Kleiner, 2013, p. 52). For instance, in the attempt to improve SLQ; the
company has an option of automating some of its operations such as order processing and ushering in
customers. Once these processes are automated; the staffs who were involved in manual order
processing must be retrenched. Thus, reception of the need to automate activities undertaken by many
employees manually is a clear pointer that escalates staffs’ resentment of the organisation. Strikes and
sit-ins might characterise some staff whose actions might hinder adequate progress of the strategies
that the company wishes to introduce to promote its success levels in the Tea industry.
customers might be received differently by different market segments. For instance, some customers
might have a perception that their personal details are personal and should be treated as personal
Five Year Business Plan 17
information. As such, they might refuse to share their details with the company. Others might feel that
sharing their details might lead to security breaches on their critical data such as credit and debit cards.
These perceptions are founding reasons that are paramount in reducing the level of customers’ ability
to freely provide their personal details for outreach at the right time. Moreover, some customers might
feel that personalised marketing trends are a show of potential negative associations. Such a
perception might hinder customers from making adequate purchases of the company’s products and
would enhance its success in five year-time. For instance, personalising marketing would require
employment of marketing staff who can design appropriate adverts that can attract more customers.
Also, promoting information sharing would involve the use of extra resources to install intranets and
Wi-Fi within the company. These activities require financial outlay that might enforce the senior
management to opt for loans from commercial banking institutions. Debt to Asset ratio might be
higher thus reducing the overall effects on stock prices in the common market (Collin‐Dufresne &
Goldstein, 2011, p.192). Therefore, the company can reduce cost of capital by opting for retained
earnings and Equity financing to sustain the level of investments made on new strategic options.
and sustain its success in the competitive tea industry in the UK. However, there are two specific
strategies that the senior management should give due consideration. Firstly, the management
should promote intra-communication within the organisation. In this case; upward and
downward communication should be properly developed in the company. Employees would feel
Five Year Business Plan 18
free to contact their managers and inform them of their views on what should be done for the
success of the company. Likewise, the managers would be free to contact the employees and
inform them of the required actions that can stir the company to success in the tea industry in the
UK. Exchange of information between senior management and employees is a critical synergy
that enables the company to make adequate decisions that support congruent development and
successful operations (Morsing & Schultz, 2016, p.323). Moreover, the management would have
a free space that allows their juniors to feel respected in the organisational decision making
process. Such a feeling is critical for promoting level of service delivery among esteemed
Second best option that Shropshire should adopt is to restructure marketing department.
This process would involve re-evaluation of marketing skills that employees in this department
have including involving them in further training activities for promotion of their marketing
skills. The need for this strategy is that marketing is the best tool for promoting a company’s
product or service image to the targeted market segment. Once marketers have appropriate
command of the consumers’ psychology; they can design and develop appropriate marketing
information for many customers in the market (Verhoef & Leeflang, 2009, p.14). Therefore,
there should be adequate command among marketers in the field of marketing concerning
References
Andrews, T. G., & Chompusri, N. (2011) ‘Lesson in ‘cross-vergence’: Restructuring the UK’s
Baker, D. P., Day, R., & Salas, E. (2016) ‘Teamwork is an essential component of high‐reliability
Collin‐Dufresne, P., & Goldstein, R. S. (2011) ‘Do credit spread reflect stationary leverage
Del-Rio, D., Stewart, A. J., Mullen, W., Burns, J., Lean, M. E., Brighenti, F., & Crozier, A.
(2014) ‘HPLC-MSn analyses of phenolic compound and purine alkaloid in green and
wealth: The risk management perspectives.’ Management Reviews, 30(4), pp. 777-798.
Khokhar, S., & Magnusdottir, S. G. M. (2012) ‘Total phenol and caffeine contents of teas
commonly consumed in the United Kingdom.’ Food Chemistry, 50(3), pp. 565-570.
Kim, M. J., & Jun, J. W. (2008) ‘The case study of mobile advertising in the UK: Personalisation
and digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB).’ Analysis for Marketing, 16(2), pp. 129-138.
Makawatsakul, N., & Kleiner, B. H. (2013) ‘The effects of downsising on morale and attritions.’
McCall, M., & Voorhees, C. (2010) ‘The drivers of loyalty program successes: An organising
Morsing, M., & Schultz, M. (2016) ‘Corporate social responsibility communications: stakeholder
information, response and involvement strategy.’ Business Ethics Reviews, 15(4), p. 323-
338.
Five Year Business Plan 20
Raynolds, L. T., & Ngcwangu, S. U. (2016) ‘Fair trade rooibos tea: Connecting producers and
Verhoef, P. C., & Leeflang, P. S. (2009) ‘Understanding the marketing department's influence
purchasing behaviour?
2. Do you agree that the type of services and
to competitors’ products?