Answering Question number 1:
In addition to the first post, as well as adding some more information on Amazon's potential success as well as negative impact
Based on the information we have learned and applied in lectures,setting up a headquarter for Amazon in Canada will increase the amount of products offered in the market to consumers as well as increasing the amount of jobs. Amazon as a company, offers services that no other companies can achieve. The main advantage that Amazon will bring to Canada is how it is efficient at both providing and distributing its products. Being a company that's focuses on electronics and book distribution, Amazing also offers consumers products such as video games, household items, furniture and other diversity categories of
…show more content…
The wide variety and efficiency that Amazon provides with its products and services receives critical praise from a global level.
By bringing Amazon into Canada, we are creating more opportunities for global investors as well as partnerships that benefits both Canada's economic status as its development as a more recognized country. The potential increase in global consumers is also one of the biggest positive results it can achieve.
One draw back that Amazon may provide to the Canadian market is that it acts as an obstacle to other businesses, especially retail stores. The success of Amazon and its amazing distribution of products may act as a barrier towards the expansion of other businesses. Consumers may choose Amazon over other companies, and this will result in potential loss of jobs in the other companies.
In the article above, this potential barrier is also shown a bit from the introduction of a brand new Amazon feature, Amazon Go, which makes consumer's shopping experience much more
Departments stores in Canada emerged late compared to Britain, France and the United States however, they grew quickly, and even surpassed large global retail stores in terms of sales and size. The top three department stores: Eaton's, Simpson's and HBC monopolized Canada's retail market, differentiating themselves from international competitors. They were able to capture the market through innovative ideas such as mail-order catalogues and various branch stores. Retailers promoted consumerism as normal and portrayed Canada as a ‘consumer nation’ (58). Department stores attempted to construct themselves as Canadian institutions.
To find its potential, perform a SWOT analysis. Ken Andrews developed the SWOT analysis tool in the 1970 's. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (Flat World Knowledge, Inc., n.d. p.105). Amazon 's strengths include its size, popularity, competitive pricing, customer reach, and ease of access. As for weaknesses, Amazon is an online only retailer. This can be viewed as a great weakness because while much of the world has access to the internet, not all of the world has access. This means Amazon could potentially be missing out on sales from those who might have no other choice than to shop at nearby businesses. Opportunities for Amazon don 't seem to be as apparent as its strengths and weaknesses. However, one big opportunity that Amazon is currently working on is having a selection of its own brand of products. Products sold on Amazon are mainly from global brands rather than Amazon itself. Finally, the major threats to the company are its competitors (Ebay & search engines with "shopping" options) and the ever-increasing concern over online shopping. In the past few years, we have seen and heard about an increasing number of businesses which have been "hacked" and customers ' information (credit card numbers, addresses, personal information, etc.) stolen. As a frequent Amazon shopper, I can only hope that Amazon is never involved in such a threat. Overall, Amazon has huge potential and has been capitalizing on that
The biggest success has been that Amazon.com has become a platform that other businesses can benefit from. Making Amazon.com a general platform for e-commerce operation has been made possible through their advanced technology investments and it has become a major success. Making Amazon.com available through a Web services interface to any developer in the world free of charge has also been a major success because it has driven so much innovation that...
A man named Bezos started amazon.com. He wanted to create a way to use the internet to buy products fast. The company was incorporated in 1994 and the first website was created in July 1995 (Kerin, Hartley 430). The company business sales grew rapidly and they began to expand. Today they don 't just do third-party selling they make their own products. From the amazon fire-stick to the amazon fire TV. This company is now offering a wide range of products for a cheaper price. The goal of the company is “Earth’s customers-centric company, where customers can find and discover virtually anything they might want to buy online” (Kerin, Hartley 430).
Canada’s stable economic environment has reduced the threat for foreign companies to invest in the Canadian marketplace. Companies like TJX, who have been struggling in the U.S. economy have to come to Canada to find stability. Others, such as Target, have seen little growth in America and are expanding into Canada due to the economy. In addition, Canada’s culture and societal structure is extremely similar to America, thus reducing the risk of failure for retailers. Companies do not have to translate or change their brands to fit into the Canadian culture. Numerous brands are already known and embraced by Canadians like Target and Victoria Secret. Finally, entering the Canadian Marketplace is simple, as there are no tariff barriers due to NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement. Wal-Mart was the first American retailer to take advantage of NAFTA in 1994, when it opened its first stores in Canada. The same year that NAFTA was established. All of these factors make Canada very appealing to American retailers who want to test the international market for further expansion. Canada offers a much friendlier and more familiar market to American retailers, making it ideal for companies to start their expansions north of the border. Canada’s economic environment, culture and lack of barriers have significantly reduced the risk for American companies to venture into
Amazon’s macro-environment is made up of six external factors: political, economic, environmental, technological, social, and legal conditions. These factors are important because they shape how the company operates and you must know each piece to be able to compete within the retail and eCommerce industry. An evolving political factor are the efforts the government has made toward punishing offenders of cyber-crime. This kind of thief wasn’t walking into your store, but hacking into your computer. This type of crime wasn’t possible before the internet. The government has started to take these crimes more serious as technology evolves. Technology is a factor that Amazon.com must invest heavily in. They are reliant on having top of the line technology to survive against cyber-crime and to stay relevant in the tech world. ECommerce is everywhere now and competition is very high. This brings in legal conditions; Amazon must know what laws exist in which countries because they are a
Although a lot of people, including myself prior to all this research, may assume that Canada is just like the United States, there are many differences that must be acknowledged and accepted between the two countries to conduct successful business together. The cultural differences, political, legal, and economic differences between Canada and the United States each play important roles in understanding how to go about doing business together. Much like here in The United States, the Canadian culture has been shaped by the European cultures. In Canada’s case, it was mostly the British and the French cultures that have been the influence for culture in the past.
Although Amazon has been active trying to find the perfect strategy to make profits, the numbers in its financial statements had not shown the most optimal results. We have discuss that even though its strategies have been right according to supply chain and logistics methodologies and theory, something had been missing to represent this successful strategies into financial results. It is seen that Amazon had spent too long time finding the right strategy which the last might be the one because in the financial statements profits started to come up. Amazon still have a long way to go to mature its strategy and represents it into profits for its shareholders.
From the consumer side, Amazon provides services like Amazon Prime, which delivers free two-day shipping on retail purchases, on-demand video streaming and a free access to the Kindle library, everything for an annual
Amazon has been able to maintain sustainable competitive advantage based on three operational strategies. These are low cost-leadership, customer differentiation and focus strategies. Low cost-leadership is pursued by Amazon by differentiating itself primarily on the basis of price. By offering low prices to customers Amazon ensures its future success. Partially modifying the costs of lowering prices over time through achieving higher sales volumes, negotiating better terms with suppliers, and achieving better operating efficiencies. Amazon makes sure that it offers the same quality products as other companies at a considerably cheaper price. Another strategy that Amazon has is its fast delivery service and there are many delivery services that one can choose from. With Amazon Prime, there are certain, but many products that have free two-day shipping. Also, with Amazon Prime, there are many offers specifically for people that have Amazon Prime. For example,
When Amazon.com first began in 1995, as strictly a book retailer, Bezos knew he had discovered an excellent company. After all, a physical bookstore cannot stock anywhere close to the number of books Amazon can offer online. Within a year, the company had a customer base of approximately 340,000 consumers and daily site visits were huge as well. But Bezos wanted to expand the company to offer music and DVDs, because he realized there was little or no barrier of entry. In the next years Amazon would emerge as a marketplace, expanding the company globally offering products from toys to kitchenware. Because of the relatively cheap prices Amazon was offering and also the growing number of online shoppers, the company was doing tremendous amounts of sales and creating profits.
Amazon.com creates value for its customers by offering customers broad array of products to select from through their website and ensuring timely delivery of products to exhibit high level of commitment towards their business and customers
In conclusion, Amazon has embraced innovation. The company has not had worries with the use of innovation. They use innovations as measurements and end up with flourishing business ideas. They experiment, learn through outcomes and try new ways of doing things. They have put the customer as their first priority. Everything that the company does gears towards attracting customers through quality of services, availability of products, assurance of delivery and addressing customer feedbacks. These factors have helped the company become a multinational and a multimillion company where customers flock everyday.
Technological factors. This is very important factor for Amazon therefore the success of the business depends on that. Amazon has to face a lot of technological challenges and to find a way to be ahead of the competitors.
Secondly, Amazon.com expanded internationally, pursued strategic acquisition and bought new firms to bring new services, assets, capabilities, services, and skills.