Agenda

MEMORANDUM

DATE: April 1, 2011

TO: B2B Marketing Students

FROM: Tom Mahaffey

SUBJECT: Agenda for Soren Chemical discussion on Tuesday, April 5

1. What does Exhibit 1 tell you about the financial performance of Soren Chemical? How does the financial performance of the Water Treatment Group compare to the overall company’s financial performance?

2. Why does Soren sell Kailan MW primarily through formulators? Why does Soren allow these formulators to market MW under private brand names?

3. What provided the motivation for Soren to develop Coracle? What are the implications?

4. Why is a different distribution channel needed for Coracle? Be specific in identifying your reasons. What challenges must be faced in establishing a new channel? Again, be specific in identifying the most significant challenges that must be addressed by Soren (or, more specifically, Jen Moritz).

5. Most of the work is done for you in Table A. Your job is to interpret the numbers. What does this table say about the economic value of Coracle, relative to competitors? What are the significant points of difference, of parity, and of contention? Do you think there will be a significant gap between objective and perceived value? What significant value element is not addressed in this table?

6. What are the possible (probable?) implications of Coracle’s “resonating focus value proposition”?

7. Why did Soren make the decision to market Coracle under its own brand name? What are the most significant issues associated with this decision?

8. What is the underlying rationale for the margin structure shown in Exhibit 2? Are these really “margins” or “markups”? If Soren’s price is $14.88, how was the distributor price of $21.25 calculated? How was the retail price calculated? What is Soren’s cost of goods sold per container? Do these margins seem adequate, all things considered?

9. What communication strategy was used to...