SWOT Analysis

Strategic management is the process of developing strategies in order to gain the competitive advantage in the market. It is a continuous planning, monitoring, and analysis of the organisation environment (Amadeo, 2018). The company has to be analysing the business environment to develop the strategies. There are different business models which helps the company in identifying the strength and weaknesses of the company. In this report, Tesco has been taken into consideration to identify the strength and weakness of the company to develop the competitive strategies. Tesco is a British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer which headquarters in Welwyn, Garden City, Hertfordhire in United Kingdom. It is the third-largest retailer in the terms of gross revenue and ninth largest retailers in the world in the terms of revenue. It was established in 1919 with a physical store after that it expanded by opening the shops in different areas. The company has shops in seven countries such as Asia, Europe. The company expanded the business with the rapidly rate across the country. The company operates in many areas to expand the business that is why it diversified into the areas such as retaining of books, clothing, electronics, furniture, petrol and many others (Tesco PLC, 2018).

In the beginning of the report, the SWOT analysis has been used to identify the strength and weakness of the company. After that strategic issue faced by the company will be discussed and then recommended the solution. The strength and limitation of the company will be mentioned in the end of the report.

SWOT analysis is a business model which helps the company to identify the strength, weaknesses, opportunity and threat. It is an internal analysis of the company which is classified in the four components.

Strength

It has been seen that the Tesco achieve the many rewards for its retails excellence, customer services, and the overall shopping experience. The company has high quality of services due to which the numbers of customers are attracted towards the services. It is one of the largest profitable supermarkets and high goodwill value in the world which is a biggest strength of the company. The company has the high cash reserves ration and wide range of property which evaluate the strong financial position of the company in each and every type of economic cycles. The financial position of the company helps to expand the business in the new market or it can attract the large number of customers by increasing the customer (Hashemi, and Samani, 2017).

The company has some areas where it has to improve in order to grab the high market share. It has been analysed that the consumers are not buying the product as the other many product items to having the less disposable income. The retailer of the company is highly dependent on the UK and Europe market for its sales and did not spend the time and resources on developing the other market. Competition is also a weakness for the company in order to gain the competitive advantage. The retailer reduces the prices due to competition in the market but its face the loss (Mind Tools, 2018).

Strength

There are many opportunities for the company due to which the company can earn the high revenue. There are many areas in which the company has to grow with its online market and home deliveries services. The company comes under the contract of joint venture with the local companies. The joint venture with the local companies helps the company to improve their performance by analysing the market research and market intelligence. The company has much opportunity in the private label market in the terms of expansion (Hill, and Westbrook, 1997).

It has been seen that the competition is the biggest threat for the company in order to achieve the objective of the company. The competitors of the company came from the global market and offering the low prices with the greater variety. The economic condition of the country also a big threat for the business of Tesco because it affects the market share and profitability. The purchasing power of consumers is relies on the condition of the economy. It has been seen that the company has high labour threat in the terms of increased wages because it increases the production cost of the company. The company face the pressure of prices strategy in the market due to high cost of production (Shaw, 2017).

Competitive strategic issue

Tesco faced the marketing strategic issue in the terms of fundamental policy choices must be addressed in order to achieve the objective of the company. The company has high goodwill value which is a biggest strength of the company but it became an issue. The high competition is the strategic issue which is face by the company. As per the supermarket report, the company face the competition the top and lower end of the market. The sale of non-food is reduces that was the biggest challenge faced by the company. The competition of the company is reached at the higher level due to increasing the online competition. The online competitors of the company attack on the sales of non-food items by reducing the prices of the products (Marketing week, 2013). The company faced the heavy loss due to decreasing the sale of non-food items. From the above analysis, it is also founded that the competitors are the biggest threat for the company. It is observed that the competitors of the company became the obstacle in the way of achieving the success. Nowadays, the consumers are more active on the online websites for shopping instead of visiting the shop here and there (Madsen, and Walker, 2015). Each and every company expand their business in the online market to attract the large number of customers. The competition of the company arises in the market. Due to high goodwill value of the company it set their prices slightly high as compare to the other companies. As per the reports, it has been seen that the company fall in UK with the sale of 1pc. The company suffered with the profit of £120m last year due to decrease in the sale, and loss the £1bn to quit he business in UK and £804m write down the value of land in the UK (The guardian, 2014).  The competitive strategy of the company is not good in the terms of prices due to which the company suffered with the heavy loss. The reason behind that the company is unable to understand the marketing threats.

Weakness

The company faced the issue of marketing strategy because the company did not set the right target at the right time. Tesco is still generating the revenue and it is the greatest retailer in the world but now it suffered with the declining profit from last two years. It is founded that the strategy develop by Clarke is not working because it provides more discount and offers to attracts the customer. In the festive season, the company provides the many offers to attract the customer but it becomes an issue for the company because the profit margin of the company is declining. Clarke did not set the specific margin of trading in the UK and will move with the consumer’s trends which are a reason for the company to suffering from loss (The telegraph, 2018).

Marketing

It has been seen that the company faces the issue of competitiveness due to high competition in the market. The company faced the heavy loss in the online market just because of high competition. To recover this loss, the company has to open the new stores as it has strong financial position. The large number of physical stores of the company reaches at the large number of consumers. The company can target the physical stores instead of online market to recover the loss (Rugman, and Verbeke, 2017). The company has to set the budget for the proper use of the prices and to earn the high revenue.

It is founded that the company failed in the online market so the company has to focus on the online market. The company has to develop its own websites and makes it creative from which the large number of consumers can easily attracts. As per the above discussion, it is observed that the company is financial strong due to its high property. The company has to invest in the technologies to create the websites more creative so that the large number of consumers attracts towards the goods and services of the company (Baker, 2014).

The company faced the issue of strategic competition in the market. The reason founded behind the failing is that the company is not able to understand the market threat. It is necessary for the company to analyse the strength, weaknesses, threat and opportunity. The company also has to invest in the research and development process to analyse the market trends. It is also beneficial for the company to analyse the market threat and opportunity. Competitors of the company are the biggest threat which is founded by the analysis. The competitive strategy developed by the company is not good just because of lack of understanding of the market threats. It is necessary for the company to invest in the analysis to know about the market situation to develop the market strategies in order to achieve the competitive advantage (Solberg, 2017).

Strength

• The model helps to identify the strength and weakness of the company which is necessary to evaluate in order to achieve the competitive advantage.
• It is also beneficial to identifying the issues which affects the business.
• The company is more able to understand the business better by using this model.
• The company can take the advantage of its strength by analysing the strength.
• The company can easily develop the business goals and strategies to achieve the competitive advantage.
• By analysing the threat and weaknesses, the company can improve those areas by investing (Business Queensland, 2018).

There are some limitations of this model due to which the company can face the issues and these are:

• The model did not determine the priorities issues so that the company can take step accordingly.
• It does not provide solutions or offer alternative decision of the problems to the company.
• The model provides the too many ideas and opportunities but did not helps the company to select the best one among the many options.
• The model can produce the lot of information but it is not necessary that all of its useful for the company. It is difficult for the company to select the useful information among the whole information.

 Conclusion 

From the above analysis, it has been concluded that the company expanding the business with rapid rate. The company develop the competitive strategies to gain the competitive advantage in the market. SWOT model is used to identify the strength, weakness, threat and opportunity of the company. It has been seen that the high goodwill value is the biggest strength of the company but due this company face the competition. The company faced the issue of competitive strategies due to lack of understanding of the market threats. The company suffered with the heavy loss in the online market due to high prices as compare to the others. It is recommended that the company has to adopt the new technologies to develop the creative website to attract the customer and invest in the research and development department to know about the market situations. The model is beneficial for the company to determine the strength and weakness. It also helps the company to understand the business better but it has some limitations too. The model does not prioritise the issues and also does not provide the solutions which solve the issue of the company. It has been concluded that the models helps to analyse the market which is beneficial for the company in order to gain the competitive advantage.

References

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Hill, T. and Westbrook, R. (1997) ‘SWOT Analysis: It’s Time for a Product Recall’, Long Range Planning, 30(1): 46-52.

Madsen, T.L. and Walker, G. (2015) Modern competitive strategy. McGraw Hill.

Marketing week. (2013) ‘Tesco can destroy competition by cutting prices’. [online] Available from: https://www.marketingweek.com/2013/12/02/tesco-can-destroy-competition-by-cutting-prices/ [Accessed 20/12/18].

Mind Tools. (2018) SWOT Analysis. [online] Available from: https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTMC_05.htm  [Accessed 20/12/18].

Rugman, A. and Verbeke, A. (2017) Global corporate strategy and trade policy. Routledge.

Shaw, J. (2017) How to Complete a Personal SWOT Analysis [online]. Available from https://medium.com/thrive-global/how-to-complete-a-personal-swot-analysis-2f8769aebd5e [Accessed 20/12/18].

Solberg, C. A. (2017) International Marketing: Strategy development and implementation. Oxon: Routledge.

Tesco PLC. (2018) About us. [online] Available from: https://www.tescoplc.com/about-us/ [Accessed 20/12/18].

The guardian. (2014) Tesco in crisis: where’s the strategy?. [online] Available from: https://www.theguardian.com/business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2014/oct/23/tesco-wheres-the-strategy-cash-call [Accessed 20/12/18].

The telegraph. (2018) Tesco faces challenge as non-food sales fall prey to online rivals. [online] Available from: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/10093765/Tesco-faces-challenge-as-non-food-sales-fall-prey-to-online-rivals.html [Accessed 20/12/18].