Problem: Companies large and small, new and old are all participants in the market, and as such, they are all subject to the forces that act on each entity in the marketplace. The same is true of method. As you've already seen in the Company Clips from chapters 2 & 3, method has been attentive to the customer, analyzed the competition, focused on social change, and identified economic factors that have affected how it does and will do business. Review the Company Clips from chapters 2 and 3 to hear founders Adam Lowry and Eric Ryan and CEO Alastair describe several factors in the external environment that have influenced how method entered the market and the success the company has experienced.

Questions: 1. Method's founders and CEO repeatedly reference the role of competition and consumers in their assessments of their external environment. Is there a hierarchy to the environmental factors discussed in this chapter? Explain.

2. Should other companies imitate the emphasis method gives to certain factors in its external environment? Why or why not?

3. Does method's assessment of its external environment seem to be lacking anything? What?