Mem Case Study

Which of the options to improve the sales growth of MEM’s line of men’s toiletries do you recommend?

* Explain why and how you reach your conclusion

I recommend MEM executives to expend to food stores. To do so, they should launch a low-priced brand in order to penetrate them and to increase MEM’s sales. We know that distribution through this channel accounts for less than 2% of sales, which means that it is almost unexplored. Indeed, if we look at the market shares of major men’s toiletries brands for three classes of trade, we can see that MEM is clearly absent in the food stores when its competitors have 63,6% of the market shares. Moreover, we note there is an increasing number this type of store and inquiries coming from food chains about bringing a limited selection of their MEM’s items are rising too. Consequently, we can suppose food stores represent a really good opportunity for MEM to increase its sales and market shares.

I do not recommend launching Cambridge, another medium-price range product. Here are the reasons for why I think it is not a good idea:

* MEM should focus on Racquet club, the last product they launched, since its potential had not yet been exhausted and another new product in the medium-price range would be wasteful.

* Many retailers do not want to provide additional shelf facing for MEM products. Therefore, implementing Cambridge in retail stores would mean renouncing to expose other products.

* The launch would be too late: Shulton, a competitor, wants to launch a similar product accompanied by a huge communication budget in March while Cambridge would be available in April.

* Detail the implementation of your proposition

As said before, MEM should launch a low-priced brand destined to the mass group. This brand will be distributed through food stores and to reach them, the price of this product will have to be below $4.

Moreover, since MEM has always been absent in this channel, the company has to be...