“SuperSpeedy Sports” (a fictitious company) is based in Sioux Falls, SD. SuperSpeedy has manufactured sports equipment in South Dakota and sold sports equipment for football, soccer and basketball to various retailers in North and South Dakota including Scheels and Dick’s Sporting Goods. They have been in business for over 50 years and were once the only sports manufacturer of high quality sports equipment in the Midwest region. The company has a good reputation in the Midwest but has struggled with this perception of being not providing enough new, unique and cutting edge options in sports equipment and therefore sales have started to slip. They fired their marketing agency 3 years ago and have not replaced this vendor and have yet to launch any social media strategy. However, when the name “SuperSpeedy Sports” is mentioned in Sioux Falls, residents in the marketplace have fond memories of this brand and the products they created as well as their several philanthropic activities for youth in the community. Their Director of Sales and Marketing, Ms. Paulson, has owned the company since her uncle, previous CEO of the company, passed away in 2014. SuperSpeedy’s company’s mission is the following, “We are a company built on the philosophy that sports help to build character, create community and inspire teamwork.” There is a strong need for hockey equipment that is low cost and grows with the hockey player as they age since hockey is an expensive sport for children to play. The local semi-professional team, Stampede, has expressed interest in partnering with SuperSpeedy through sponsorship or promotions. As a marketing manager for a local marketing agency, you and your team have been hired to help SuperSpeedy Sports to develop a robust, innovative and strategic marketing plan for a new product to help the company’s problem of declining sales. There has been a steady increase of youth hockey players (under age 18) in the Sioux Falls marketplace and SpeedySports believes this could be an interesting new market to enter into and has the capability of increasing sales to help the fledgling company. They hope to increase sales 18% by the 4th quarter 2018. Your product is an expandable glove that is going to grow along with the hockey players. We as a company will take care of the replacement parts as they are needing to be changed out.

What marketing mix and tactics would work best for this case project?