Blue Skies: Connecting African Farmers to Global Markets Case Solution And Analysis, HBR Case Study Solution & Analysis of Harvard Case Studies

Blue Skies, founded in 1998, was a fruit processing company headquartered in the U.K. The main production plant of the company was situated in Ghana, Africa, where it had cut its fruits and packaged, to sell primarily to retailers in Europe. In the year 2014, the founder and chairman of the company, Anthony Pile, discuss the company’s growth and development plans in a board meeting. The consumer had become more price sensitive, after the crisis in Europe, which created a significant impact on revenue and derived the need to explore new markets. The company used air-freight transportation facility and it shipped produce within 48 hours of harvesting. However, it transformed herself into a multinational corporation having widespread production operations in three continents, but yet the major part of its revenue was from the European markets.

The primary focus of Blue Skies was the U.K., whose retail sector was highly competitive in the world, but still the company compete due to its innovative expertise, it got a leading position in transforming the future of the fresh-cut fruit industry. The case traces the routes of development of Blue Skies since its inception as a small fruit processing business exporting fresh-cut pineapple to Europe. The case also provides a broad view of its value creating strategies through vertical integration in order to minimize the supply costs and to enhance the quality of its product. It demonstrates that how the balance of power gets shaped in the fresh-cut market within the Agri-food value chain, and how the company retained its competitive advantage through product quality, market diversification, and production efficiency.