Holey Soles

Increase the frequency of purchases by your customers. No matter how poor your current product or service, you must have some customers or clients. One key strategic dimension that you should be thinking about is how to augment and reposition your product in order to sell more to this group.

The background of this paper we need to mention is that West Coast Fashions, Inc. (WCF), a large designer and marketer of branded apparel announced a strategic reorganization calling for a divestiture of certain assets, and one of the divisions it intended to shed was Mercury Athletic, its wholly owned footwear subsidiary. John Liedtke, the head of business development for Active Gear, Inc. (AGI), a privately held athletic and casual footwear company, contemplated an acquisition opportunity of Mercury that would significantly improve his business. So, he wanted to evaluate this opportunity.

The foot is usually smaller than an average foot, but this may affect the heel more. This deformity is most often present at birth, meaning that it is congenital. It can be unilateral or bilateral. This deformity affects tendons, blood vessels, muscles, and bones. It causes the heel to point downwards and the front half of the foot to turn inward. This causes the feet to be short and wide and usually causes a tight Achilles tendon. The tarsal bones make up the heel and the middle of the foot, which connect to the metatarsals and the phalanges. Clubfoot predominantly affects the calcaneus, talus, and navicular bones. It could possibly affect more bones than this depending on the severity of the case. The ligaments of the foot are constricted and the joints do not move the way they should. The actual bones themselves are twisted into unusual forms, so it is not simply their position in the foot that is deformed. The foot is unusually stiff and almost sitting sideways. This makes it impossible for a child to put their foot flat on the ground to walk or properly fit their foot into a shoe (Orthopediatrics.com,

They broke the most basic rule in business "Never let your personal feelings interfere with your business "A customer may not always be right but, they are still a customer"

ONE thing that doesn't shrink when people get older are feet: They enlarge. More specifically, they flatten. The feet's tendons and ligaments lose some of their elasticity and don't hold the bones and joints together as tidily. When combined with other aging-related changes, the feet can encounter limits to how much use - or abuse - they can take. Dr. Steven Pribut, a podiatrist at George Washington University Medical Center in Washington, D.C., estimates that some people over the age of 40 can gain half a shoe size every 10

More and more Americans are facing typical foot difficulties and many more significant foot conditions every day. The American Podiatric Medical Association fairly recently performed a report with startling results - it revealed that some 75% of Americans will undergo some type of foot condition in their lives. Most of the foot-related problems stem from misuse, and many come from hereditary malformations and disabilities.

The main thing that I am after is shelf space. I need to have my shoes in stores for customers to buy on hand. The three major shoe manufacturers (Nike, Adidas, and Under Armour) control that shelf space. Selling shoes online only is not optimal in this industry as many customers still rely on getting a new pair of shoes at the store. But why would any of these companies give up valuable real estate to promote a product they don’t even own? Simply my shoes are the best. People will want to wear these shoes. The amount of buzz surrounding these shoes will make people flock to them and they can either get on board and make some money off

I would expand Zappos by extending the supply web to current retailers such as Target or Macy’s. Take Target for example. On Target.com they have an extensive shoe selection which the inventory needs to be stored in a Target distribution center. Zappos could hold this inventory and make the shipments when someone orders shoes on Target.com. This would benefit both Target and Zappos. Target would be able to reduce their shoe inventory in their distribution centers. They would also be able to offer wider selection of shoes on Target.com. Zappos would benefit by gaining a large portion of new customers who are regular Target guests.

The purpose of this report is to evaluate the reasons behind the success of Crocs through its core competencies and the analysis of our recommendations. Crocs has been a phenomenal success and there are two reasons that can be attributed to this—our Croslite technology and supply chain. By using different marketing theories such as Porter’s 5 forces and the marketing mix theories, we have uncovered the reasons why Crocs have decided to invest in these strategies. The recommendations raised in this report are aimed to utilise the core competency raised above and exploit them for the future. These includes engaging professional organizations with podiatric experts to approve Crocs as a health benefitting footwear and

Crocs’ value chain management system allowed it tremendous advantage in meeting customer needs (Business Pundit, 2008). By controlling all aspects along the value chain, Crocs could quickly adjust to customer demand, building additional shoes and fulfilling extra orders within a single selling season (von Briesen, 2009). This allowed retailers to order smaller

Introduction Blake MyCoskie established TOMS Shoes in May of 2006. (Fortune, 2008) MyCoskie competed on the second season of the hit show The Amazing Race, where he traveled to Argentina. There he met many children and adults who could not afford to buy shoes, he was troubled by this fact and wanted to do something about it. He traveled back to Argentina for vacation and it was then that he decided he would start a shoe business, but not an ordinary shoe business. He decided that for every shoe that was sold another shoe would be donated to a child in need. It was then that MyCoskie’s “One for One” marketing plan was created. (Time, 2007)

1) Deepening its relationship with customers. There are some obvious ways of having a “deep relationship” with customers such as taking into consideration results of various enquiries or following current trends like many companies do. Nike does that, too. But apart from that it really has tight relations with its customers. For example, Nike was one of the first companies that introduced the opportunity to customize its products according to every client’s individual

Under Armour will be able to take advantage of this large population of buyers by creating a shoe that appeals to them. The ability to attract and retain at least half of this generation will increase their profits. Under Armour must understand the shopping habits of this group of buyers. They desire brand name products that are unique and stylish. Also, being socially accepted is very important to them but they must also be different. This generation is used to relying on their parents to select and purchase their shoes now they are the decision makers and the purchasers. Under Armour has the opportunity to attract a generation of buyers who are new to the athletic shoe market. Successfully attracting this group of buyers to Under Armour will

South America: - Same issue was expanding business in South America. Things were much difficult here as some of the fastest growing consumer markets already had their imprints in this area. Finally they decided to enter into South America market with some new designs than to the existing ones. In the early phase, sales were very low, but once they recruit the right distributor and retailer, Sales could be more aggressive in that area.

They should focus on entering in big markets. This can be done by increasing their product line and providing extra services to their customers like “home