M&S Case Study

BRUNEL UNIVERSITY? SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING AND DESIGN LOGISTICS AND GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAIN circumspection M&S Case study Assignment Mark&Spencer As it is well known, the retailer M&S had been a giant in the UK market, crack several products and function that concord had a big giveicipation in the daily life of the population that in some way had been influenced by any(prenominal) branch of this company in any place where they stay selling its goods, whether in the UK or on oerseas places.Marks & Spencer owns no factories and does not make the goods, which argon s doddering in its stores, which represent a different approach to the retailer business and gives some advant eons that M&S enjoy. The key element in furthering its combative advantage has been the development of strong supplier relationships which although have had suffer several changes in the past few years beca engagement of strategies in the market and distinct factors, they exercise as an essential part of the busine ss. Marks and Spencers mission statement is broken into 3 parts which includeVision To be the standard once against which others be measured Mission To make aspirational quality accessible to all and Values Quality value, service, innovation and trust. Representation on M&S general operations * Given that M&S had an persona problem in the past, what change did it make and is making to its clothing business to enhance its competitiveness? The serious problems of image that M&S had in the pass were consequence of several finales and assessments made by its board and especially very often by the chairman and the oldtimer executive.There is one factor that shaped for long time all the decisions made in the company the culture of Marks&Spencer, this way of thinking was the method to use for manage the blind drunk for many years from its get until the changes in the market and in the nodes did not fit with that culture anymore. In lights of these events and in the increasing pr oblems, loathsome changes has to be made, changes that were enough to return the plot to the company in their market that was falling as consequence of this.The quality of the clothes was not the same and the customers make grow realised of that as they begun to claim about it. Moreover, the bad winter season in 1999 coinciding with the retail sales downturn put a offset point in the definitive necessity of changes in M&S. 1999 was a year to forget in the UK clothing sector. Can be said that the beginning of the first change made was the incorporation as chief executive of Peter Salsbury to succeed eventually to Sir Richard Greenbury.The first approach to changes was a series of fundamental culling in the board of the company, which meant a change from the top-down in the structure of the organization and the incorporation of the technology in the communicational way among the board members which it have to be stress, they were not familiarised with pertly technologies, these i nitial changes made by Salsbury were aimed to vanish the old fashion way of manage the company and dismantling symbols of the old regime many people were removed from the administration work to go to dealing with costumers needs.A general reorganization that split the company into UK retail, afield and financial services was made as well. As another remarkable change, was the approach to the re saucyed focus on the client itself and the fulfilment of its necessities, part of the image problems was because of the treatment to the customer from the staff of M&S, as part of the change process, a new department of marketing was created in baffle to enhance the advertisement and to gain customers over from the dynamical market they deal with, new thinking and new minds were ired, and the marketing department would take over many decisions of the buying departments to support in the decision of what the customers wanted. Within this period the board of the firm had realised that some of the overseas business and UK suppliers had become a millstone for M&S rather than a support, and were put up for sale and dismissed respectively.The period of changes that M&S was going trough with the severe culling and reorganization processes, brought a new image problems to the company, as consequence the entire personnel was demoralized and downright, the spirit of the company to its staff and the trust of its suppliers was totally destroyed. Being clear that these methods and managing was not working anymore as a part of a past of revolution in the company, new changes have to come. Although, Peter Salsbury had accomplished the evolution and change of the culture of M&S.After this Luc Vandevelde as a chairman contributed with several changes in the clothes line of M&S, as was the entry of George Davis to the firm to develop and deliver to the public a new brand called Per Una, in aims to revitalize the womens clothing sales as a dodging from the board. New changes are being made in order to enhance the competitiveness in the clothing business, changing the look to the stores with lighter colours, new tills, better lighting.M&S has turn itself in a company that owns a staff full of youth and freshness, consequently, the company has give back the quality to its goods, quality that was a flag in the golden years of M&S, with several new clothing brands fitted to both gender and to every stage in the life of people, this wide vomit of goods cleverly design on age and occasions are the product of selected designers and their teems pushing to deliver nothing but the very best to all the M&Ss customers, this fact is a sample of a great change that the company has made managing to recover the trust of the customers and the treatment of excellence to the clients that the current business and the market require.As part of the new times and challenges, the board of the company nowadays effectively had set clear points in the taking-decision process as is to deba te and agree the best strategy for the high society and hold the executive team accountable for its execution, this permit a very dynamic way to involve anyone to the final decision in order to warrantee a wise decision that push to the continue enhancement and development of the current business plan and finally, to set the tone of doing the right thing, supported by the right governance structures and their effective implementation. * Specifically and in detail, what changes were made to the M&S add up chain strategy in the light of these changes?Evidently as the culture of M&S was created and leaded by several men with the same way of thinking, the most remarkable characteristics of this culture was the relationship with the suppliers of M&S, that was found on an close and unique relationship that have been prevailed by several decades in some cases. This supply chain based on trust from the firm to its suppliers gave shape to the UK retail market for many years. The board p lanned the new strategy implemented to the supply chain by the end of the year 2000 this strategy consisted on the change of suppliers from the UK to other overseas instead. Amid the changes on reorganization of M&S in general, the board had realised that the hearty link with the traditional suppliers in the UK was no longer affordable enough and represent a millstone for the company.The first place to be pointed as an overseas supply branch was in Portugal owing to the mix positive factors of cheaper manufacturing costs and the short distance to the UK that would not affect the supplement of goods in the stores for time reasons as start happening with others overseas supplier that because they were so far from UK the time of delivery influenced in the schedules and logistics of M&S. Nevertheless, some UK suppliers that closed their factories repositioned themselves in North Africa, Indonesia, Thailand and China Looking for cheap workhand and curtain raising in this way an overseas market of suppliers for the company and at the same time a beneficial reduction of cost for M&S scorn the exportation activities involve in this operations, demonstrating this way that the strategy implemented in lights of the changes has just paid off.Another important change was specially related to the clothing range Per Una leaded by the designer George Davis which consist in the direct delivery of the clothe and accessories from nothing more but his organisation to M&S, as part of a agreement maid at the beginning of his business relationship whit the company, this represent a self-sufficient branch in the supply chain of the firm. Some other changes were made on M&S regarding to its branches in Europe, specifically to the supply chain that maintain the European branch of the company in countries as Spain, Holland, France and Germany. They have to concentrate the efforts in the UK market so they decided to finish the overseas branches, representing a culling on the supply cha in to those countries and leaving the supply chain operations directly to UK. * What are the different supply chain performance objectives for the different product groups? Classic Autograph Per Una Indigo Blue hold in Product Range Short Mature Customers keen-sighted Wide Range Customers Short Fashion Woman 25-35 years old Short women with busy lives Long Mens casual clothes for weekends Design Changes No frequent Trend Frequent Seasonal Seasonal Price Expensive value-for-money prices Competitive eminent Street Pricing Good Value Average Expensive value-for-money prices Quality High Aspirational Quality High Aspirational Quality High Sales Volume High humbled Limited Low Limited High seasonal High seasonal Order Winners Smart, Elegant & quality clothes Fashion ability Exclusivity Fashionable for casual use Casually smart clothes Order Qualifiers Quality and value on the clothes Clothing wide range and high street prices inexpensive price Everyday-workday casualwea r Smart casual menswear for weekends occasion subprogram Priorities Reliability aimed to mature costumers Cost Sharpen pricing great value Flexibility Very unbendable response Speed high fluency on the selling of this clothes Quality unique menswear brand References The rise & fall of Marks & Spencer And how it rose again by Judi Bevan, edition revised and updated in 2007. Bookmarque, Croydon, Surrey. ISBN-10 1 86197 898 7. * Logistics and supply chain management by Martin Christopher, Fourth Edition, FT Prentice Hall Financial times. * Operation Management by Nigel Slack, Stuart Chambers and Robert Johnston, Sixth Edition, FT Prentice Hall Financial times. * Marks & Spencer Annual state and Financial Statements 2000 * Marks & Spencer Annual Report and Financial Statements 2006 * Issues of Marks & Spencer by OxbridgeWriters. com * Marks & Spencer by Nardine Collier and Gerry Johnson, Case Teaching Notes, Pearson Education Limited 2005.