Marketing analysis and planning are significant activities for the majority of firms. The purpose of this series of assignments is for you, to apply the concepts you learn in your coursework to marketing analysis and planning for a real good or service.

Each student chooses one of the consumer goods companies from the list below:

Abercrombie & Fitch

Air Canada

Amazon

Apple Inc.

Aritzia

BCLC

Bell

Best Buy

Caffe Artigiano

Citigroup

Club Penguin

Coastal Contacts

Coca-Cola

Electronic Arts

Fedex

Greater Van. Food Bank

Groupon

Kraft

Lululemon

Mars

Mountain Equip. Co-op

OpenRoad Auto Group

PepsiCo

Research In Motion

Rocky Mountaineer

Rogers

Shell Canada

Southwest Airlines

Starbucks

Sun-Rype

SureFit

Target

Tata Motors

TD Bank

Telus

Thisfish

Tourism Vancouver

Toyota Motor

Unilever

WestJet

Zara

ASSIGNMENT 1: Situation Analysis (Marketing Environment) and SWOT

Effective marketing strategies can only be created after a thorough situation analysis of the current and future internal and external conditions under which a company will compete.

Part A: Research and analyze the immediate and macro environments of your chosen company/product. Maximum 2 pages single-spaced, either point-form or brief paragraphs. Cite all sources using in-text citations or footnotes.

§  Customers/Consumers: Who are the current customers? What is the estimated size of the market? How do customers buy and use the product? What factors do they consider when choosing between competitors? How loyal are customers? What products do customers consider to be competitive (direct, indirect, marketplace competitors)?  etc.

§  Company & Corporate Partners: Summarize the company's relevant history and background, mission/vision, culture, resources, key success factors, etc. How has the company been successful so far? What types of partners (e.g. suppliers, service providers, consultants, etc.) help it succeed, and what are their strengths/weaknesses? What types of partners is it missing? etc.

§  Competitors: How intense is the competitio1n in this category? Is the category growing or shrinking? Are there many small competitors, or is the industry dominated by several large players? Are there substitutes/indirect competitors? How easy/hard is it for new entrants to start up? etc.

§  CDSTEP: Describe the characteristics of the macroenvironment in which the company competes, using CDSTEP to cover all main points. What cultural, demographic, social, technological, economic, and political-legal factors influence the industry, the company, and consumers?

Part B: Based on your analysis from Part A, summarize in a SWOT table the company's key Strengths and Weaknesses (internal) and the key Opportunities and Threats (external) it faces. You should have at least 6 items listed under each SWOT category in your table. Maximum .5 page single-spaced, either point-form or brief paragraphs.

Part C: Highlight the most important point(s) under each of S, W, O, and T and explain if/how they all relate to each other and should shape the company's marketing strategies. Maximum .5 page single-spaced.