Assignment: Marketing Plan
1. Executive summary (3-5 paragraphs)
Our company TrueTree will revolutionize the way that young Americans view their favorite Christmas holiday decoration. The goal of our products is to provide a cost effective and environmentally friendly Christmas tree. It is targeted towards a younger demographic as this is where we feel the product would flourish the most. The tree itself is made out of 100% recycled materials thus bringing it into the artificial tree market. It would feature an easy to use setup and come in a variety of sizes.
One of the
2. Company description (1 paragraph)
3. Strategic Focus & Plan
a. Mission (1 paragraph)
b.Goals - 3 to 5 non financial (SMART) goals
c. Core competency & Sustainable Competitive Advantage (2-3 paragraphs)
4.Situation Analysis
a. SWOT analysis
Strengths- One of the strengths of our business and our product is that we are entering in a market that ever year has a high demand for our types of products. This means that every holiday season we can see sales rise by a significant amount. Another strength of our products our that our christmas trees are made out of 100% recycled material and come pre-lit. Using recycled material allows us to undercut much of the market and offer up lower prices than our competitors, this also allows us to be much more creative with our products and offer up something different that isn't on the market yet. Our product also has a environmental draw to it as we use recycled material, this is our main selling point to customers as well as our lower prices and this is what we hope makes our customers switch to our product.
Weaknesses- A main weakness that people may see with our products is the lack of realistic appeal in our trees. Because our trees are made out of recycled material they will not have the same aesthetic that a real christmas tree or other fake trees will have. This could push some people away from buying our product as they may want a traditional looking tree. This could be a factor that could lose us sales but i think it's important in the way we market our product and who we market it to, this will mainly be marketed to younger people who are looking for something different then the traditional christmas tree.
Opportunities- Some opportunities that we can spot for our product in this market is that there is a new trend of new christmas trees to look different then the traditional big green tree and trees now are now colored and multicolored and we can continue to move this trend into our product. Also because we are going to use recycled material for our trees there really is no end as to what designs we can come up with for our trees making our products always new and innovative which new to this type of market. And with people now being more environmentally friendly and even more with the younger generations, we believe that our product will appeal well to our target audience.
Threats- Serious threats that could harm our product and business is the fact that were a new product in a market that has been widely unchanged and there could be no appeal or demand for our product. Another possible threat to our product is it may be hard to get the right materials to be able to keep up the supply of our product.
b. Industry analysis(2-3 paragraphs)
The christmas tree market in the United States is a relatively stable industry growing at a rate of 35% over the past 4 years. In 2012, 35% of real Christmas trees sold were from chain stores or garden centers/nursery, 24% from cut and harvest farms, 15% from retail tree lots, and 15% from non-profit groups. And about 15,000 christmas tree farms is responsible for all the trees sold in the U.S. This is a market that is in demand every year and regardless of whether people buy fake trees or real trees there is a growing market for it with high demand. In 2017 there was a total of 49 million christmas trees sold in the U.S, 27 million being real trees and 22 million being fake trees.
The new trend in this industry is the rising popularity of fake christmas trees which shows a opportunity for our product in this market. The amount of fake christmas trees sold in the U.S rose from 11 million in 2012 to a record setting 22 million in 2017. In total the real market value of all the christmas trees sold in the U.S in 2017 was just over $2 billion with the average price being around $40. This is a very stable industry with a lot of room for growth and innovation and is expected to grow 3.24% between 2018-2022.
c. Competitor analysis (2-3 paragraphs)
The companies that own the large share of the artificial tree market are the National Tree Company and Balsam Hill. These two companies offer a wide variety of products and trees focusing mainly on making their products look as realistic as possible. They do sell other non-traditional trees that appeal to a market that we're trying to target. These companies sell their products online on their own websites as well as amazon and also at christmas store retailers where we are also trying to sell our products. The products these two companies sell are high end expensive items and don't offer the same creative variety that we will offer, this is an advantage that we think we have over them by being able to offer customers a lower cost alternative while being able to provide them a product that is different then our competitors.
Other competitors that we will face are real christmas tree suppliers, these suppliers are usually small businesses and are not very big businesses. Some retailers such as walmart do offer real christmas trees for sale that are usually bought from local farms. Real christmas tree sales take up about half of all the christmas tree market with artificial trees trending more and more each year. These products aren't as expensive as our other competitors and could be seen as a cheaper alternatives along with our products when compared to these new expensive artificial trees.
d. Customer analysis (2-3 paragraphs)
The customers for this industry covers a very wide demographic of all ages and races. The main age demographic that buys christmas trees is between 30-40 and this makes sense because this is the age where people are starting families and have kids and that's when people really start to get into christmas more. But we can see that people of all ages excluding children are in the market every holiday season to buy christmas trees. These customers are willing to spend money on these products as well with the average price of a fake tree being $110 and the the average cost of a real tree being around $70. People are also buying more than one tree a year, it's very rare nowadays to only have one christmas tree in a household with different size trees being put on the market and people wanting to have different decorations for each tree. Customers also aren't just buying trees during the holiday season, with year round christmas stores now becoming more popular sales throughout the year are rising and becoming more steady instead of trees just being bought in the month of december.
The main decision consumers must make when deciding what type of tree to buy is whether they want to buy a real tree or a fake tree. With the sale of fake trees rising year after year we see a growing market for our product. Once they decide that they're going to purchase a fake christmas tree they then have to decide if they want a realistic tree or a themed tree. With the growing popularity of themed christmas trees we see that people aren't always going for the traditional christmas tree look and that is the growing trend that we hope our product captures.
5. Market Product Focus
a. Target markets (2-3 paragraphs)
b.Points of difference -
c. Positioning (1-2 paragraphs)
6. Marketing Strategy
This is your marketing program, and is the centerpiece of your marketing plan.
a. Product Strategy (3-4 paragraphs)
i. For example, what are the points of parity & points of difference for the brand
ii. Relate the product to the benefit/need of your mission statement
iii. What services are a part of the product
iv. If this is primarily a service, address the four I's of service
b. Price Strategy (3-4 paragraphs)
i. Will you be more oriented toward skimming or penetration,
ii. How did you utilize the three C's of pricing
iii. What type of discounts will be used
c. Promotion Strategy (3-4 paragraphs)
i. Outline your promotional plan including target audience and what promotional vehicles will be used
ii. How does your promotion strategy move a buyer through the hierarchy of effects
iii. Develop a sample print ad for your organization
iv. Describe your website: promotional or transactional, synchronous or asynchronous
d. Place/channel Strategy (3-4 paragraphs)
i. Outline your marketing channel to the ultimate consumer
ii. How does your channel add value among the four utilities channels provide
7. Financial Data - 3 years of projections
a. include revenues (to be arrived at by units sold and price per unit)
b. Include marketing expenditures - how much and for what
Format your assignment according to the following formatting requirements:
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