You have been working for some time at Unique Shoes, a local shoe store that specializes in unusual shoe designs and custom fitting. Currently, customers come to the store to select their shoe designs and have their measurements taken for the custom fitting. The shoes are then manufactured by a supplier in another state and shipped to the store for pickup by the customer. The owner, Bill, is very interested in expanding his successful business. He has just bought Sassy Shoes, a shoe store in a good location across town, and has hired a store manager. He plans to continue selling the brands of shoes that the Sassy Shoes has been selling, but he wants to add his unique shoes to that store’s offerings. Bill’s research shows that, in addition to all of the online sources for shoes, there are many other local stores that sell shoes: outlets for major shoe store chains, mall stores that carry popular brands, small outlets and specialty shops, and department stores. While Bill has been keeping all his records of orders and sales on paper, the records at Sassy Shoes are located on the manager’s PC in Excel files. Bill realizes that he must treat the two stores as a single business, with one set of accounts, one billing system, etc. He thinks this is also a good time to stop using paper records for his orders and sales. Bill really hopes to continue to expand his business by buying other shoe stores, but he will need good information about his current businesses to know when he should make his next acquisition. He has asked you to help him develop the business strategy and IT Plan to accomplish his goals. You know that there are methodologies for analyzing the business environment and that there are multiple ways to expand the business. You also recognize that IT is an important component for achieving that goal.
1. Explain Porter’s Five Forces Model and how Bill can use it to analyze his current business and his expansion. Be sure to address each of the 5 forces and explain to Bill what they mean for his business.
2. Based on your analysis in question #1, select one of the five forces and explain how Bill can incorporate his analysis of that force into his Strategic Business Plan (SBP).
3. List three business areas and/or processes that could be supported by an IT solution.
a.
b.
c.
4. List and describe (in two or three sentences each) three IT projects that should be a part of Bill’s IT Plan to support the area and/or processes identified in question #3 above.
a.
b.
c.
5. Explain how each IT project listed above specifically improves and/or supports the business.
a.
b.
c.
6. If Bill decides to enter the world of eCommerce, which of the eCommerce models (B2B, C2B, B2C or C2C) would you recommend to him as a best fit for his business and how would it benefit his business?
7. How could Bill’s business benefit from implementing an SCM solution?
8. How could Bill’s business benefit from implementing an ERP solution?
9. What benefits would Bill get for his business from implementing a relational database? Your response must be tied directly to Bill’s shoe stores.
10. Make a list of five ways that Bill could protect the data and systems that he is going to put in place. Consider the type of data and systems that would be relevant to Bill’s shoe store.
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.