Alison Barnard Case Solution And Analysis, HBR Case Study Solution & Analysis of Harvard Case Studies

Problem Statement

Alison Barnard has started ‘In-Jean-ius’ but her new management personnel has decided to quit and she cannot replicate herself in that location. Another problem is that by keeping the track of inventories she decided to implement a system to monitor the sales and margins but the salesperson was not trained yet.

SWOT Analysis

External Analysis

Women’s denim was a $6.3 billion market with highly isolated space by means of several retailers and manufacturers ranging from chain stores, department stores and boutiques. It was a huge market and Alison wanted to enter the market before anyone else would steal her idea. She had already kept her idea secret from her boss where she was working initially. She did not trust anyone and thought that since they had all kind of resources that’s why they could steal her idea.

Jeans and t-shirts are now no longer weekend dress and even she used to wear jeans and t-shirts in her workplace and Babson. Denim had become a fashion wear and women had almost about eight pairs of jeans in their wardrobe. It was an opportunity for Alison to capture the huge women’s denim market. Since women had gotten conscious about their wearing, Alison Barnard could avail the opportunity by targeting such customers’ need.

Women are more conscious with the fittings of their jeans accordingly to their body. They will like the jeans which are fitted to their body and do not give much preference to the brand loyalty. It can be an opportunity to provide fitted wears to them and it can also be a threat for Alison Barnard because she cannot rely on them. As discussed, women did not prefer brand so they solely focus on the fittings of jeans and t-shirts accordingly with their body size.

According to the research, 28 percent of women are willing to spend $25-$50, 16 percent spend $51-$75, 14 percent spend $76-$85, 17 percent spend $86-$100, 16 percent spend $101-$130 and 9 percent spend above $130. These researches indicate high spending behavior of women towards jeans buying and it shows good opportunity to enter the women denim market. 86.7 percent of women told that a reason to buy from a certain store is that those that store carried wears that fit them and furthermore brand preference is based only after the fitting factor. 82 percent of women told that they are not loyal to any one brand and need more selection along with information regarding jeans’ brands and styles.

Women dislike the jeans buying process due to several reasons even though they enjoy purchasing a new jean. Disorganization of the stores and unavailability of jean sizes lead women to ask for help which was mostly a problem in many of the stores.

Territory protection is an opportunity for Alison Barnard and the denim manufacturers did not sell to retailers that are near to their other clients to avoid saturation. It resulted in isolating the markets into different retailers but it made it hard to find a good location.

Internal Analysis

Initially she did not have capital to invest for her denim business store but later she found limited capital, which was enough to start a business but she needed more investment in order to expand her business chain to different locations.

She made a compact shelving system that started almost from the floor up to the average height, which could be feasible for every customer. The store was made in order to be comfortable and warm so that every customer would feel good.

Alison Barnard invested in highly effective inventory management software to monitor her overall sales and profit margins efficiently but her salesperson had not been trained yet and he was not even giving response to her call.

Though she had a good idea to purchase for her opening inventory but she did a terrible mistake by buying some jeans that she did not buy normally. The reason behind this was that she was new in the market and some brands from where she wanted to buy, did not sell to new stores.

She immediately surpassed her estimated business plan and it was growing more than her expectations. She generated a net income of $20,307 on the sales of $294,061. She had been providing fitted jeans for everyone and no other retailers had this idea. Word of mouth was an important factor which resulted in increasing of its sales.

Another factor was good customer services provided by Alison Barnard. She was directly dealing with the customers properly with more attention rather than her employees would give them. Obviously, employees would not entertain the customers in the way how Alison used to deal............................

This is just a sample partial case solution. Please place the order on the website to order your own originally done case solution.

Alison Barnard, 27, knows the trade, retail and fashion. As MBA, part-time in retail, it is developing a business plan for the premium jeans and tops boutique based on its view that "women are not loyal to the brands they fit loyal." In Jean-Navy, her six-month-old corner store in the beautiful North End of Boston, was greater than its estimated income from day one, in large part because that Alison has the skill and passion to help her find a pair of high-end clients just the right "jeans. As from the very beginning, this hit running enterprise consumes almost every waking hour. Nevertheless, creative, energetic founder is much less concerned about burnout than to have its retail stores duties usurp its ability to plan and manage growth. While it plan to roll out in-Jean-IUS stores in major cities like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, which will be critically dependent on its ability to attract and develop management talent with a keen eye on the landing. Her latest hire with management capacity of just decided to go away, leaving Alison wonder if this problem is to reproduce itself in the same place as I have to scale "Hide
? by William Bygrave, Carl Hedberg Source: Babson College 15 pages. Publication date: 01 November 2006. Prod. #: BAB139-PDF-ENG