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costco business model strategy and model for other industries
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Asset utilization ratio analysis of a company used for the group project Costco has been a strong company for many years. Asset utilization/ efficiency ratio is important for evaluating this company because this ratio is frequently used to compare a company’s efficiency over time. In accounting, asset is an economic resource, which means that anything that is capable of being owned or controlled to produce value has positive value to the company, is considered an asset. The more efficient Costco is with asset management, it shows how well they use their assets to generate revenue. A gain in revenue does not mean they are making profit, but part of the company’s goal is to maximize profit. The main assets we use to evaluate asset utilization are account receivable, inventory, and fixed asset, cost of goods sold, sales and total asset. Target has been looking for ways to expand. Target’s value proposition is “Expect More. Pay Less.”. This has always been their proposition and it seems to work. Target seems to meet most of their consumer’s expectation and provide the best for them. Target is a competitive retail market to Wal-Mart and Costco mainly because they carry better brands than Wal-Mart. This strategy markets the brand from Wal-Mart. The market is competitive and one wrong move will haunt them. For example, Target’s 5% reward program off purchases at Target locations and on their online website builds million and there are new customers who have not shop yet at Target. Target expanded and builds more City stores and opened 125-135 stores in Canada and they are working slowly to expand to operate 200 or more stores over time. The one recent issue with credit card security has affected many of their sales. There was a... ... middle of paper ... ...ory ratio, which means that their strong sales and this indicate better liquidity. Costco’s day sales in inventory is much lower which means they take less time to convert their inventory into sales and Target’s days sales in inventory is higher which means they take longer to generate their inventory into sales. Costco also does better in collecting accounts receivable because their days sales in receivable is much lower and target’s days sales in receivable is nearly 10 times higher. Cash means a lot to a company and being able to collect cash faster than their competitor gives them more option. Costco’s asset turnover is higher which means how many times Costco sells or turnover its asset and this is a sign of high efficiency. Costco is known for being efficient internally and externally. Costco takes the upper hand is utilizing their assets to generate sales.
As compared to its rivals, Target has presented its brand as a middle-class brand which assists in attracting customers that find other stores like Walmart unpleasant
Costco is one of the good companies in the USA. The company has quality products that function in four different department's food, health care, employee discount cost, and some types of delivery services. The company actually sells fewer kinds of products than Wal-Mart, Giant and others, however, this means that they can keep their costs down this way. They are also able to keep costs down by charging customers a yearly fee, which allows Costco to have more brand loyalty because of this. So, Costco is a good option because it has provided better services for many years.
Costco’s business strategy is different from their competitor’s in the wholesale retail industry because their purpose is to keep overhead down and pass the savings to their customers. They do this by choosing not to advertise, sell fewer brands and having an innovative approach by having their own manufacturing facilities for a variety of merchandise. Costco does not market their warehouses and their marketing is through word of mouth from current customers who also must have a membership to shop at Costco. When compared to Walmart Costco sells four brands of toothpaste and Walmart sells sixty brands of toothpaste. Costco can buy more for less from the manufacturer of the four brands of toothpaste and pass the savings on to their customers. Costco’s strategy is to sale a limited number of items because this strategy according to (Lutz, 2013) “increases sales volume and helps drive discounts.” Because of Costco’s profitability in the retail market they have managed to continue to be profitable even in an oppressed economy. Costco’s focus is on high-end customers indicated by some of the brands they carry such as Coach Handbags. Costco offers three different levels of membership and is only open to customers who have a membership. Costco’s philosophy is they do not advertise or markup items more than 15% in order to save their customer’s money. These practices lowers the overhead costs and continues passing the savings to the customer. Costco is an international company and has (Costco Wholesale Corporation, n.d.) “462 locations in 43 U.S. States & Puerto Rico; 87 locations in nine Canadian provinces; 25 locations in the United Kingdom; 10 locations in Taiwan; 9...
Opportunities: Target has an opportunity to leverage its strength to overcome some of its weakness.
Costco’s business strategy is providing high end goods in bulk with low price, the benefit of Costco’s flexible prices is that they can control it to save on budget costs such as packaging, while protecting the promised quality. Costco’s primary target market are large families, upscale customers, and small businesses it offers refunds for all the products
In December 2013, Target was attacked by a cyber-attack due to a data breach. Target is a widely known retailer that has millions of consumers flocking every day to the retailer to partake in the stores wonders. The Target Data Breach is now known as the largest data breach/attack surpassing the TJX data breach in 2007. “The second-biggest attack struck TJX Companies, the parent company of TJMaxx and Marshall’s, which said in 2007 that about 45 million credit cards and debit cards had been compromised.” (Timberg, Yang, & Tsukayama, 2013) The data breach occurred to Target was a strong swift kick to the guts to not only the retailer/corporation, but to employees and consumers. The December 2013 data breach, exposed Target in a way that many would not expect to see and happen to any major retailer/corporation.
Costco benefits from the fact that their name is associated with quality and low prices. They are highly recognized
Costco’s close relations with unions have enabled for their wages, remuneration packages and employment standards uniform across all stores (D.umn.edu 2014). Having stores located worldwide means that Costco has to be mindful of the different laws and regulations that exist in the different countries and to be very careful not to go against any laws and regulations in the host country.
However, the quick ratio says the opposite. When inventories are subtracted from current assets, and then current assets are divided by current liabilities Costco is king. Kroger comes in second, while Walmart trails closely behind Kroger. The five-year averages for Walmart, Costco, and Kroger regarding the quick ratio is 0.24, 0.53, and 0.27 times. Therefore, when the inventories (much of which is perishable food items) are excluded, Costco seems to be more liquidable than Kroger and Walmart.
High quality product a low cost: “Costco is able to offer lower prices and better values by eliminating virtually all the frills and costs historically associated with conventional wholesalers and retailers, including salespeople, fancy buildings, delivery, and accounts receivable” (Thompson, 2016).
Target Corporation being a retail industry, the structure by product grouped to a functional level practices works the best. This is necessary for the other functional levels to collaborate as a single team to produce a positive customer shopping experience. Target Corporation further divided the functional level into a geographic area to exercise management tasks effectively with the given authority. Each structure of the management at the geographic level has a strategy discussion, a line of communication, growth, and progress reporting according to the corporate reporting plan. Jana Potts who manages Target Corporation store has closer to 300, 000 employees working for her and the effective can be improved if the role is broken within domestic into channels, stores into broader segments and a separate global position. The rapidly growing online channel and global expansion are necessary to support Target Corporation's strategy of internal growth and sustain it for long term sustainability. These structural changes will allow Target Corporation to connect with its employee at a functional level and bring changes faster, track and monitor the
1. The Discount Department Store. Target prefers to be called as the latter instead of just department store. Expect more, pay less. With this tagline, the customers expect to purchase more items and pay the least amount possible. Not like other retail industries like its competitor Kmart and Wal-Mart, Target maintains retail value in terms of product offerings. They are known in their designer’s items in clothes, exclusive beauty products, categorized and functional goods, and seasonal offerings. It also sells the greatest number of gift cards among its rival business.
...aviors. Also, coupon ads or coupon booklet (like Costco’s) to mail monthly to members are something to considered. This is not only to advertise for different Target’s products but also to increase shopping activities because everyone does like promotions. Continuing to expand its private label offerings is also a great way to cut cost and earn more profits. As mentioned above, Target should also expand its operations globally and diversify its brand to become a more dynamic retailer. Moreover, growing and expanding online market to compete with Amazon or Ebay’s shopping experience could help Target in cutting cost of storing inventories as well as providing more convenience way to shop.
Target has used the marketing mix very well, and it shows in the yearly rise in sales. The continuation of marketing will be vital especially with the always changing trends in our times.
There is a reason that it is the second largest and continues to grow. There are many things we can take from what Costco has done. Craig Jelinek said “treat the consumers with respect and treat employees with respect, good things are going to happen to you.” He treats his consumers with respect and they keep coming back to buy more good at the lower prices that Costco has. All of the benefits that he is giving his employees between their wages and healthcare, this in return puts money back in the economy and makes for a healthy country. Another thing to learn from this is creating a happy work environment. By treating its employees well Costco believes that it is creating a happy work environment in which they believe will result in a more profitable company. Also what you can learn from Costco is they are marking things up by fourteen percent or less. This is attracting customer to their goods, and as stated in the article by David Schick “they are selling more olive oil, more cranberry juice, and more throw rugs than just about anybody.” This is allowing Costco to get larger discounts from their suppliers and allowing Costco to set the industry’s lowest price. Some simple things as that are good to take away from what Costco has done. Treating people right makes them want to come back, lower prices helps you sell more and get larger discounts when you buy things, and helps you