EQUAL EXCHANGE: DOING WELL BY DOING GOOD Case Solution And Analysis, HBR Case Study Solution & Analysis of Harvard Case Studies

Equal Exchange: Doing well by doing good Case Solution

Equal Exchange: Doing well by doing good

Introduction

The company was founded in 1983 by Rink Dickenson, Jonathan Rosenthal and Michael Rozyne, when they all were recent college graduates. However, they were not intended to form a company as they were working in a warehouse and few questions arose such as what if the poor and small farmers will be treated equally as of large farmers orwhatif the small farmers would be empowered and what if the crops would be grown in an organic way.

Afterwards, they presented their idea to their warehouse BODs however,half of the board supported while the other rejected the idea therefore, they started a small business as coffee makers and named it as Equal Exchange. Now the company is one of the largest coffee makers in the United States like Starbucks. Moreover, the company has numerous similar products like coffee, chocolates, tea and etc.Furthermore, the company is investing a lot in sustainability and earning suitable profits by promoting the initial idea. Lastly,the company is working on free trade products in the United States and also trying to enter other regions through its strategic alliances.

Pre-mortem Analysis

There are some problems which are leading the company to face many strategic and competitive threats. The first problem is that the company is facing intense competition and due to this,the profitability is declining since the competition is based onprice and the company iscommitted to give the best quality possible. On the other hand, there are several companies which are working on trade free product and entering the same industry.

According to the Pre-mortem analysis, the analyst is assuming that the issues have ledthe company towards failure and therefore, all the things will be discussed in a manner in which the company will be able to revive from the situation.

1 General Environment

There are numerous factors which are affecting the company in general external environment. These factors include economic trends, socio cultural environment, political environment and technological factors. However, all these factors have a combined effect on the business.

1.1 Economic Trends

Economic trends are reflecting high inflation, low saving, and low real interest rates. However, all these factors are affecting the business negatively as, the company has to increase prices for its goods as the inflation and increased prices ultimately affect the sales of the firm.

1.2 Socio cultural Factors

The main socio factor in the region is sustainability as, people are willing to purchase a socially responsible company’s products, where as there is a lot of uncertainty in the industry due to several economic factors and evolving industrialization.

1.3 Technological Factors

The region is facing a technological era and due to this, the pace of technological change is vigorous. In addition, the threat of obsolesce is high in the industry. Furthermore, the main key success factor in the region and especially in this industry is the fast adoption of latest technology.

1.4 Demographic Factors

According to the demographic factors,it can be seen that the majority of the region’s population consists on elders and youngster are very low in the demographic segmentation. However, it has been noted that coffee is a favorite choice of majority of the population.

1.5 Comparison of coffee players today and 25 years ago

It can be seen that there are numerous players in the coffee industry such as Starbucks, EE and other giants. However,before 25 years if we talk only about a single player assumingly Starbucks, then it can be said that at that time there were no competitive pressures and strategic threats for the player due to low competition and low presence of competitor in the market as, the only player had monopoly in the industry and due to this, he was able to adjust customers as per their needs...............

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