Brannigan Foods: Strategic Marketing Planning

Submitted bySUMMARY:At Brannigan Food 40% of the firms revenue is contributed by the soup division. The soup
industry is declining and the division shows declining profits and market share especially
among the baby boomers. Bert Clark wants to reverse this trend and he asks his 4 key
managers to give their expert opinions and recommend a turnaround strategy. Each key
manager suggests a different strategy from investing in a core market segment to acquiring a
new product line and customers.
By analysing the pros and cons for each strategy Clark has to select a best strategy to work
upon.
OBJECTIVE:

Identify risk and reward management policies regarding strategic planning, decisions
and new product development and acquisitions.
Analysing market, realistic costing and implications of competing ideas.
Understand quantitative analysis of multiple options and inform resource allocation
decisions.

Here the conflicting demands and short term and long term sales is understood and the
tension between successful consumer companies and major retail partners over shelf
space is to be evaluated.

CRITERION:Volume vs profit: Option 4 is the most profitable when it comes to analysing the case.
Short term: Option 4 is for the short term as the baby boomers will get extinct soon and they
contribute to the net income in a big way.
Health: First option is reflecting everything about health and convenience.
Opportunity and resources limits: option 3 deals with opportunity as R&D is the future.

OPTIONS:By analysing the above problem the four key managers suggested as follows
Option 1.
Srikant Tipha
Category Manager- Simple Meals, Heart Healthy Soups. Dry soups

He suggests to invest in the growing sector

Option 2.
Claire Mackey, Director of Finance and Planning
She suggests acquiring product lines to compliment the core growing sector
Option 3.
Anna Chong, Chief Innovation Officer
Suggested to invest in organic from internally developed new products
Option 4.
Bob Pugh, Director of Sales and Marketing
Who invested to invest in the core

Evaluations:
Option 1.
Pros: The strategy focuses on products and brands targeting the growing segments which are
beginning to shift into healthy life style to prepare meals due to time constraints
Cons: This strategy doesnt milk the cash cows but focusses on rising stars. The subsidy
cannot continue if only the star products are promoted. Experience of Annabelle acquisitions
did not meet the expected forecast
Option 2.
Pros. The advantage of this strategy is there in very less investment in R&D. The effects of
cannibalization will reduce if the brands that are required are kept
Cons. The company will spend large chunks of monetary assets in order to acquire a new
company. There is a deflection in striking the line of productions when the unity among the
companies is unstable as the previous acquisition of the company with Annabelle did not
meet the growth expectations. The board of directors will not go with this strategy
Option 3.
Pros. No need of heavy investments for acquiring small companies it also avoids the risk of
miscues in production line. The new innovations focus on different segments especially for
healthy meals and active life styles. By adding new product for the ready to eat category can
be proved most profitable for the company
Cons. As there is only one out of ten products that succeed in the market and the remaining
nine have a market life of less than two years, it is very difficult for the company to assign
monetary assets to these new products adding to that these 10 products wont be able to
accommodate the shelf space and were also reduced the shelf space of ready to eat soups.

Option 4.

Pros. This strategy focus on core products that is the ready to eat products which are the most
successful product in the market. Since we are focusing on the core products we are reducing
100 % risk of introducing new products in the market
Cons. Price deduction factor harm the brand image of the company. Due to heavy investment
proposals in the manufacturing plants and marketing the current product is failing to progress
in the market and doesnt add value to the current strategy

Recommendation:
According to us combination of option 3 and option 4 is the best alternative based on the
above mentioned data. Although these options alone will not help Clarke in the long term. As
we know that option 4 category gives us humongous profits in the long term and as we know
that the baby boomers are going to get extinct in the coming years and we need to focus on
the younger generation because their taste changes according to market trends. Secondly, the
option 3 category focuses on the research and development, and also this options deal with
milking the cash cows and invests in the rising stars. This combination of both the strategies
supports both the short term and long term profit goals with the investment made and also
stretches the life cycle of RTE soups and gives growth to the new product life cycle.