Marketing Positioning Strategy Akij Food and Beverage Limited

The major objective of this report is to get Consumer perception and positioning strategy as well as the financial condition of a manufacturing company, here focus on Akij Food and Beverage Limited. Other objectives are to know about market monitoring of the products and financial growth and future prospect of the company and to investigate Consumers requirements and demands. Finally, find out what makes the Akij Food and Beverage attractive to its user.

Objectives of the study:

(a) Broad Objective:

The ultimate objective of the study is to gain real-life exposure in any kind of service sector and to get a clear idea about Consumer perception and positioning strategy as well as the financial condition of a manufacturing company.

(b) Specific Objectives:

• Various consumer perceptions about the product of AFBL and different positioning strategy.
• Market monitoring of the products and financial growth and future prospect of the company.
• Informative advertisement to inform the consumer about the product and communication with different media.
• To find out whether Akij Food & Beverage is popular among the consumers in the beverage market?
• To investigate Consumers requirements and demands
• To see whether the advertisement of Akij Food & Beverage Ltd.’s is effective.
• To find out what makes the Akij Food & Beverage attractive to its user.

Findings of the study:

From the analysis, it can be deduced that among all the eight brands of AFBL, the most consumed and preferred brand is MOJO followed by FRUTIKA and SPEED. As the influencing factors for the consumption of AFBL’s CSD products, packaging plays a vital role, then finally the taste. The full silver packaged pet bottle turns out to be a great success for AFBL’s CSD products.

For the consumption of the mineral water SPA, availability played a vital role and this was because of the wide range dual distribution channel. Price of SPA is less than a few other brands in the market, thus it also played a supportive role.

The brand FARM FRESH is another least consumed product and the influencing factor for consumption were the taste and branding. The product didn’t seem to be highly accepted by the audience.

Methodology:

Study approach: The study is explorative in the context of Bangladesh and focused mainly on the beverage market.

Sample size: Sample sizes were approximately 40, which were selected for filling up the questionnaire.

Sample selection: As a survey was to be conducted, an initial plan for stratified sampling was designed. The respondents were to be picked from the following clusters-

• The service holders or Businessmen including end users, decision makers, and opinion leaders.
• House wifes
• A younger generation or students from business school

Once the strata were selected, convenient sampling procedure was adopted for the ease of data collection.

Sources of data:

Majority of the study is based on primary data. However, some secondary data source is used for background study.

Primary Sources:

• Face to face interview with the AFBL officials

Secondary Sources:

• AFBL, Official records
• AFBL Annual report
• Resume of the activities of the international institutions
• Through different E-mail address.
• Other published materials
• Company record

Akij Group: An Overview

History:

AKIJ GROUP OF INDUSTRIES is considered to be one of the most aged industries that are still sustaining with great success and prosperity. It was more than fifty years ago the company emerged into the market. Entrepreneur, Founder and lifetime Chairman Late Mr. Sheikh Akij Uddin initiated the business in the 1950s with a single product of cigarette naming Akij Biri. This brand is one of the well-known units of Akij Group and it is considered to be one of the oldest and most well-known products across the country and in the few international markets as well. Then in the late 70s, Dhaka Tobacco Industries came to the fold of Akij Group when the government decided to disinvest and hand over the factory to the private sector from the nationalized sector. It was the first booming stage of Akij Group and from then onwards this entity diversified its business in the various product line and reached the peak of success.

From such small beginnings, it has expanded into one of the top corporations in Bangladesh, and not only in size. Akij Group is proud of its infallible quality and excellent service by valuing its consumers as unique individuals and trying best to provide merchandise to suit the needs of each distinct consumer group. AKIJ group has never limited its aims to profit making.  Besides playing a part in developing the country commercially, it has also worked hard to preserve its environment and culture.  The company is proud to say that the word wastage means little to them; all their factories have been constructed with recycling and the environment in mind.  The non-profit making concerns of the Group are involved directly in sustaining the progress of Bangladesh.  A large number of people are employed by them and cared for as members of the AKIJ family.

The history of Akij Group stretches back to later part of the forties. In its infancy, the Group started in a humble way with jute trading which was known as the golden fiber of the country, earning the highest amount of foreign exchange.

Akij Group’s ceaseless efforts with dynamic management and support from our numerous clients have led our Group in diversifying its business activities. In the second phase, the Group went into manufacturing handmade cigarettes popularly known as “Biris”. This sector gave a real boost to the revenue earning of the Group as well as making a substantial contribution to the government exchequer. With the passage of time, the Group undertook new ventures and presently there are 15 units of industries under its umbrella-like cigarettes, handmade cigarettes, printing & packaging, jute mills, textiles, Hand board, Particle boards, Matches, Zarda, Cement, pharmaceutical, leather processing, and real-estate business are in operation, catering jobs for more than 32,000 people in various categories.

The Group has plans for setting up more projects. The projects are already in pipeline. Foreign investors have shown a keen interest in joining with Akij group for joint ventures. I hope that the matter is under our active consideration and will soon mature. This will also help the nation’s economic growth and will create job opportunities for various professionals.

Statistical Data:

Akij Group is not a public limited company and not enlisted in the stock exchange market. It is a complete privately owned venture with no external public share and corporate share. Each of the ventures of AKIJ Group is entitled to be profitable and this aspect makes them extremely financially strong in the market. The directors are the offspring of the late chairman and founder. With no debt in the market, Akij Group of Industries are operating and performing at the optimum level and is considered to be one of the top-notch leading industries in Bangladesh. Some statistical facts of Akij Group are stated below:

• A total number of employees: 32000 (approx) in various categories.
• Annual turnover (revenue) of the entire group in the year 2011-2012 was Tk.335.66 (Core) approx.
• Tax paid in the year 2011-2012 was Tk.34 (Core) approx

AFBL: Mission, Vision & objective:

Mission:

To be the market leader in quality food & beverage sector discovering & satisfying the desire & need of the community working in harmony with our customers, employees and business partners.

Vision:

To be the leading food & Beverage brands excelling in product quality, social, technical & marketing creativity; and service to our customers through the skills and cordial commitment of our employees.

According to Late Mr. Sheikh Akij Uddin regarding AKIJ Food and Beverage Limited (AFBL), “We will manufacture and introduce those high quality products in the market that we ourselves and our family will always use; we will not just produce products for the consumers in the market and let our family consume other foreign products”.

Goal:

To achieve market leadership, profitability, good corporate citizenship, and sustainable growth.

Objectives:

The main objective of the company is to increase the market share in related diversified Products in Bangladesh and to assure the potential customers of the quality and durability of the products.”

AFBL: Morale, Ethics & Values:

• Believing in quality and excellence in service
• Believing open communication, personal responsibilities, integrity, and active participation
• Supporting the creative diversity and share of ideas
• Building a culture of learning based on leadership, teamwork, accountability, and co-operation.

The 4ps of Product, Price, Place, and Promotion are subjected to their mission and to execute and coordinate them properly in order to sustain and enhance consumer satisfaction and also encounter proper profitability.

Portfolio of Akij Group:

With the passage of time, the Akij Group undertook new ventures and presently there are 15 units of industries under its umbrella-like cigarettes, handmade cigarettes, printing & packaging, jute mills, textiles, Hand board, Particle boards, Matches, Zarda, Cement, pharmaceutical, leather processing, and real-estate business are in operation, catering jobs for more than 32,000 people in various categories.  . The individual groups within these areas are responsible for their own worldwide operations, with regional units around the globe supporting their efforts.

Akij Group has related diversification and their product ranges are divided into different product lines. This decentralized structure gives the greatest degree of entrepreneurial responsibility and the ability to nurture the closest possible ties to its customers. Cross-Group and cross-regional cooperation are crucial for the success of innovation. At the same time, it enables Akij Group to provide comprehensive, customer-focused products, solutions and services for the local market.

Product of AFBL:

The recent launching of the Akij Groups beverage line has been gaining popularity among all carbonated water lovers. It gained popularity, particularly among teenage people and children. The favorite brand name Mojo gained popularity within a short period. Presently the company able to introduce new types of product which increase the depth of the category of AFBL

Akij food &Beverage limited started there journey officially in July 2006 with three products but within this two-year company able to add a lot of products on its rosters. The products which are offering now by the company are given to the next page:

Business Philosophy:

Akij Group diversified their business in the Food & Beverage industry because in Bangladesh we have 14 corers people. It is a large market size to serve and food is required continually for the population. Akij food & beverage want to serve quality food for their target market.

In the soft drink industry, there are many local & foreign companies. Akij wants to be local unique soft drinks producer with the same quality of the foreign company. For this purpose, AFBL produces CSD for young target group who like to live stylist life. The main slogan of AFBL is “Brings Quality in Life”.

AFBL has its own marketing & sales department in Akij chamber. The functions of this department are very wide and dynamic. Main functions performed by this department are:

• Product development
• Raw material sourcing
• Find out or create a market for its product
• Price set up
• Packaging development
• Developing a communication strategy
• Preparing sales forecast
• Maintain sales management in the field
• Keeping a record of sales and stock
• Collection & analysis of competitors information

Besides these, it performs a number of activities to conduct their day-to-day business. Under the marketing & sales department, a Brand team performs the key role of real marketing.

Employees of Akij Group:

In AFBL Marketing and sales department a number of employees work under Sr. G.M (Marketing & sales).  Numbers of employees are working in different positions on the 4^th floor of Akij chamber. Here I found:

•  Senior General Manager
• General Manager
• National Sales Manager
• Brand Manager
• Purchase executive
• Research executive
• Brand executives
• Brand officers
• Event management officers.

Beside these employees, AFBL has a Sales team working all over the country. Four Regional sales managers control these sales forces.  An area sales manager & an area sales officer is engaged to conduct regular sales management for each sales area. They work at the retail outlet with the authorized distributors. The actual marketing activities of AFBL are performed by the Brand office under Marketing and sales department. 

Internal Situation Analysis:

Factory & Machinery:

Factory of Akij Food & beverage Ltd has been established in a beautiful site at Krishnapur, Dhamrai, Dhaka. It has come with one of the best food & beverage industry in Bangladesh. All the machinery are being imported from two international well-reputed companies in Germany naming The Krones Group, headquartered in Neutraubling, Germany & Ningbo Sipa Safety Equipment Co., Ltd. All the machines are fully automatic and digitally controlled. Such high-tech production plants that are sensitive to reject products itself that fails to meet the standard level that has been set. In total there are only six companies in the sub-continent using such sophisticated machinery to manufacture CSD products, and among those companies, AFBL is one of them. This factor reflects the quality of the factory and the machinery which in turn reflects the quality standard of the products of AFBL.

For any technical breakdown highly experienced and trained engineers are there to serve round the clock.

Financial:

AFBL has a strong financial background as because 100% of its financial back up is being provided by the parent company AKIJ GROUP. All the initial investments regarding the establishment of the company, its products and even for the marketing purpose, the parent company provided full support. No financial out-sourcing such as debt or bank loan was being made by AFBL. Because of such strong financial backup, huge marketing activities, promotional campaigns were been possible for its products to strongly compete with its competitors. And now after four years of operation, the company is solvent enough to finance its promotional activities by itself but if furthermore huge investments are required then AKIJ GROUP is always there to provide full flagged support.

Human resource:

AFBL believes that their teamwork is their greatest asset. Useful contributions made by each individual bring them much closer to their goals. AFBL made up of a group of passionate individuals, uniquely qualified from diverse disciplines but working towards their vision. AFBL ensures that their employees are provided with:

Functional Departments:

From the production till the selling of the AFBL’s products, several departments work interconnected and they are outlined below:

• Production Department: This department handles the entire production process of AFBL’s products
• Marketing Department: This department is divided into four categories
• Brand Dept: Develops the marketing and promotional strategies for AFBL’s products and executes them.
• Sales Dept: Forecast, Pursue, Co-ordinate & Monitor the entire nationwide sales of AFBL’s products.
• Sales-force Training Dept: Trains, pursue to work, motivates & monitors the sales force working in the field for AFBL.
• Distribution Dept: Distributes accordingly the final products from the factory to the entire country’s individual distribution points from where products of AFBL are being sold to the retail outlets.

The following departments: Finance & Accounts, Audit, Administration, Human resource (HR), Purchase, Import & Export, Ad & Creative, and IT & Transport of AKIJ GROUP conducts the department operation for AFBL to carry out and complete the departmental portfolio of Akij Food & Beverage Ltd.

The main divisions of Akij Group are:

• Akij Food & Beverage Ltd. (AFBL)
• Akij Corporation Ltd. (Dhaka Tobacco)
• Printing & packaging
• Jute mills, Textiles
• Particle boards
• Matches, Zarda
• Cement
• Pharmaceutical

Supporting divisions of Akij Group are:

• Human resources division
• Finance and Accounts division
• IT service divisions.
• Corporate communication and business development division.
• Audit Dept.
• Administration Dept.
• Purchase Dept.
• Import & Export Dept.
• Transport Dept.
• Ad & Creative Dept

Strategic Analysis of AFBL:  

Four Ps Analysis of AFBL:

The 4ps analysis of a company involves a detailed study of the company’s Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. Each of these segments of AFBL is exemplified below.

Products

Akij Food & Beverage Ltd (AFBL) believes in providing optimum quality products to value its customers. All the high-tech machinery and factory site is established to enhance the capability to satisfy consumer needs in a profound quality processed manner.

AFBL has categorized its products in eight products line and each line incorporates various brands to captivate the market. Groups or the product line are distinguished by the company based on the machinery used for manufacturing the products. AFBL has the planning of introducing more different and unique products in their product line and even they are planning to diversify more on their product line. Tabular presentation of the products as the product line is shown below:

Figure-: Product of AFBL

Product Description:

MOJO:

MOJO is a carbonated soft drink (CSD) in cola flavor. The packaging of the product is very attractive because of its color combination which is majority red and the art design on the bottle and can. AFBL is the first company to introduce full silver bottle packaging and this makes its product more attractive than other competing brands.

FRUTIKA:

FRUTIKA is a brand for juice product that is available in four different flavors.

• FRUTIKA Mango
• FRUTIKA Grape
• FRUTIKA Red-orange
• FRUTIKA Mixed fruit

The products were launched in August 2008, and since the entrance in the market, Frutika captivated a large share in the market because of its taste, packaging and unique promotional activation. The ingredient of all types of Frutika is provided in APPE

SPA:

SPA is mineral water that was launched by AFBL in April 2007. The product’s full silver packaging makes it very attractive. The unique marketing communication and the products look assist it to make a moderate market share.

FARM FRESH:

The brand FARM FRESH denotes dairy products of UHT milk and Pasteurized milk. The brand entered the market in September 2007.

Product Development Matrix:

Product development matrix is a tool to analyze in which market with which category of product, a company has penetrated.

As per AFBL’s brand portfolio, the assortment of the brands with respect to the product development matrix is provided below:

Most of AFBL’s new products have been developed and launched in the current beverage market, with no market development made. But for the new products Wild Brew & Farm Fresh, a new market of non-alcoholic malt beverage and UHT milk was developed.

Production Process of Akij Food and Beverages:

There is a common plant for beverage production. Dosing unit is common for juice and beverage. Power and water supply depart are common for all production. Reform, closure and label units are common for water, juice and beverage department.

Figure: Production process of Akij food and beverages.

 Product quality:

AFBL brings quality in life. Their products contain the following qualities:

• Already shows good performance.
• Good features.

The Name. A name that contains quality

• Each person use results in the same satisfaction.
• The service system is efficient, competent, convenient.

Fit and Finish. All products look and feel like a quality product.

Price:

Pricing is one of the crucial aspects of a products destiny to success and failure. There are many different methods of pricing a company can employ. But the main scrutiny is to strategically set the pricing that facilitates the company and the product as well

In the beverage industry of Bangladesh, people are quite pricing sensitive and thus prices of almost all the competing products are the same.

The ultimate price is then analyzed by AFBL using two methods:

• Competition-based pricing: Here AFBL identifies whether its product price is similar to the competitors or not. As because the beverage market is very price sensitive, this price cannot be more than competitors and even cannot be very less than competitors as because it will impact profitability. So the price has to be close to the competitors’ price.
• Market-oriented pricing: Here AFBL justifies whether the price of its product is a price that will be accepted in the market and considered to be a market-oriented price rather than a price that will imbalance the market pricing philosophy.

Pricing Strategies:

• They do not use Profit maximization pricing
• They use single pricing
• Their product price does not change in various geographical areas/ zone pricing do not available
• They offer a quantity discount.
• Their price conveys a value-based image.
• They do not use price skimming or price penetration strategy
• They do not use real-time pricing
• There are no legal restrictions on retail price maintenance, price collusion, or price discrimination.
• There is no flexibility in pricing because the industry is competitive
• There is no chance of getting involved in the price war. The price is neutral and no chance for joint product price consideration.
• They do not set their price according to their competitor product price.

Total sales of AFBL for a financial year:

Total sales of different product in a financial year according to its quantity are summarized below. Total sales here calculated as wholesale price. In the market, we have to purchase at a higher price. So a comparison of Wholesale price and Market price also illustrated by a graphical distribution.

Place

Place means that the pattern of distribution channel a company employs to make its products available to the final consumer. AKIJ GROUP OF INDUSTRIES is considered to have one the best distribution channel around the country. This profound distribution channel was especially been made to make their cigarette products available to the consumer in each and every part of Bangladesh. AFBL inherited the advantage and has been able to use the wide network distribution channel to promote and provide its products in each and every niche across the country. The distribution channel AFBL employs is called Dual Distribution Channel (DDC). In DDC, a company itself distributes the products and also incorporates large number distributes, who are individuals entities, to distributes the products to the final user.

Place

Products from AFBL’s factory are stored in the warehouse situated in various parts of Bangladesh. For Dhaka, the warehouse is at Tejgaon industrial area. Then the distribution dept at AFBL allocates the products to the distributors around the country. After the products are delivered from the warehouse or factory to the distribution point, the distributing companies accordingly distribute them among the retailers to be sold to the final consumer. The distribution companies are individual entities who are considered to be the business partners of AFBL. Apart from this channel, AFBL has its own distributing wing established in some part of Bangladesh to make the products available to its customer. But where there is the establishment of AFBL’s distributing wing, other distribution companies are NOT employed. This is because two channel in the same distribution point will create channel conflict that will intern effect the products selling and availability. AFBL solely do not want to depend on the distributors thus they have established Dual distribution channel.

AFBL has segmented the entire Bangladeshi market into 25 regions for its distribution purpose:

For these regions, there is a total of 263 approx distributing company who perform the distribution of AFBL’s products. All of the companies are well trained and associated with the AFBL’s products, business policies & strategies.

Promotion:

It is one of the most important facts of a company which it has to nourish in a very proper way to achieve the optimum outcome. AFBL values the importance of promotion because it believes no matter how high-quality, good taste, attractive packaging the product avails, it has to be properly communicated to the customer to pursue the final purchase. And to properly communicate the product with the customer, AFBL has a well structured Marketing Dept who is capable of developing projected strategic marketing plans. The Marketing Dept of AFBL is assorted into four divisions all working interconnected:

• Brand Dept
• Sales Dept
• Sales-force Training Dept
• Distribution Dept

The entire marketing department is situated on the 2^nd floor of Mofiz Chamber, 75 Dilkusha C/A Dhaka. AFBL has broadly categorized its promotional activities in two types:

Trade promotion (TP)

All the strategy crafting, developing, implementing and monitoring of trade promotions are being done by the sales department. Trade promotions are targeted for the retainers and the distributors. It usually involves free products, cash incentives and gifts for the retainers and distributors for high volume purchase.

Consumer Promotion (CP)

All the promotional activities that are targeted for the consumers are developed here. Strategy crafting, developing, implementing and monitoring of consumer promotions are being conducted by the Brand department. The Brand department compiles of well trained and experienced individuals designated as:

• Director (Brand)
• Brand manager
• Brand executives
• Event officers
• Event executives
• Brand officers
• Marketing officers
• Graphic Designers

Each brand officer is designated with certain brands. And the brand executives are the head of all brand officers and they are entitled to the functioning of all the brands of AFBL. Event executives and officers are responsible for conducting various sort of events associating with individual brands of AFBL. They are responsible for sponsoring and developing events and associate it with any specific brand of AFBL to create a promotional act for AFBL. The Brand Manager is the department head, to whom all other officials are accountable. And the Brand Manager is accountable to the Brand Director for the functioning of the Brand department. Currently, AFBL is affiliated with two agencies that provide various sort of promotional services, starting from generating innovative promotional ideas and concepts, strategically coordinating them and till execution.

• ADCOMM LTD (works for the brands MOJO, CLEMON, FRUTIKA, SPA, FARM FRESH & CHIPS products)
• GREY, Bangladesh (works for the brand’s SPEED, LEMU, SPA, WILD BREW)

AFBL incorporates yearly bases contract with the two agencies mentioned above. The contract implies the agencies to work with the specified brands of AFBL and the remuneration is given using a method called:

Retainers fee approach:

AFBL pays a fixed certain amount of monthly fee to the Ad agencies. The fixed amount is paid even if the agency works every single day of the month and even if not working for a single day. The monthly fee has been set by negotiation between AFBL and the Ad agencies.

Sales Forecast:

Sales department of AFBL constructs the sales forecast for the product. Two types of forecasting are being done by the department:

Nation-wide Forecast:

It is the long term forecast usually for one year. The term period is from July to June.

Area-wise Forecast:

It is the short term forecast performed every month. The forecasting is made within the 25^th to 28^th of the respective month. Usually revised forecasting is done after every six months but in special cases, for example, Eid festival and other national events, it is done quarterly. Key officials associated with the forecasting purpose are Director (Sales), GM, AGMs, Sales Coordinators, Research officers, etc.

Promotion Strategies:

Advertising goals and objectives of AFBL

Brand positioning:

• To stand out their brand in the crowded marketplace.
• To stand out the brand message from the myriad of messages that clutter consumers’ minds each day
• To offer a unique value proposition.
• Positioning in a way that their product appears better in relation to other products in the market.

When a new brand appears in the market, the consumer gets acquainted with it and starts collecting information about it. On the basis of this information, the consumer creates an opinion of the brand and establishes a brand image. For a stable market position of a brand, consumer awareness of the new brand on the market is not sufficient. The consumer must prefer a brand and have a positive assessment of it as well as considering it in its purchasing decisions. The target position means deciding on the target image of a brand and how the consumers should compare it to other competitive brands.

Building Brand Equity:

• Distinguish product from others in the market – Value proposition
• Align what it says about the brand in advertising with what it actually delivers – Creating the brand

About Advertising:

Researches have done before Advertising:

• Sample testing
• Product Development
• Focused Group Discussion

Target Group:

• Mojo cola: especially Young Age People
• Lemu: All Age People
• Frutika: All Age People

Advertising Work:

• Image Enhance
• Brand Equity Build

Mechanisms of Persuasion:

• Try to show something that matches with today’s lifestyle. So that a bond can be created between the Audience and the product.
• For Persuasion they use neither appeals to authority (famous people)nor appeals to a desire to save – pricing ($29.95 instead of $30).

Advertising media:

Media chose for the ad are

• TV Ad
• Print media ad
• Billboard Ad
• Mobile Billboard Ad

Mobile Billboard Advertising:

• Item: Mobile Billboard
• Media: BRTC Volvo double Decker Bus
• Quantity: 20 Nos. of Buses
• Space/Bus:790sft (Left, Right, Back and Front without Glasses) per Volvo.
• Route:

R-1 Motijheel-Gulshan-Paltan-Press Club-Shahbag-Farmgate-Mohakhali-Banani-Khilkhet-Airport-Uttara-Tongi (Abdullahpur).

R-2 Motijheel-Gulshan-Paltan-Press Club-Shahbag-Farmgate-Shewrapara-Kazipara-Mirpur#10,#11,#12

• Running Hour:00to 24.00 Hours Daily.
• Price:2,75,000 per Bus
• Period: One year from the date of getting delivery assurance letter of Akij group.
• Delivery terms: Delivery accepted upon proper and satisfactory quality display after with delivery assurance letter.
• Renewal: As per the mutual consent after the contractual period.
• Advertisement: All Products of Akij Group can display as per the management decision.
• Payment mode: 80% in advance by A/C pay Cheque with WO & 20% after one year with final which will be retained as a security deposit.
• VAT & Tax: Excluded from the said rate (Payable by the AKU GROUP)
• Maintenance: All kind of repair will be done by another company.
• Payment adjustment: If the maintenance period delayed or display disrupted due to any kind of body destruction, the entire destruction of Buses of Retained in Garage as out of order, the bill will be curtailed/adjusted for the period of disruption/days proportionately from the final payment.

Sales promotion:

• Mojo Hatenate: A game show was conducted with those people who have mojo in hand on the road. A gift pack was provided to them.
• A 250 ml mojo is free with a 1-liter mojo.
• Quantity discount is provided.

Online Advertising:

They do not use any online Advertising.

Advertising Budget:

They use The Task Objective Method for determining advertising budget.

• They determine the Advertising Budget to reach the specific goals they have outlined for the advertising campaign.
• This is especially effective because they are starting out
• They are trying to grow rapidly
• Their advertising campaign strategies call for heavy spending upfront in order to win long-term customers.

BCG Growth-Share Matrix:

BCG Growth share matrix helps to identify brands position in the market as per market share. The matrix has four segments each reflecting a position of a brand for the company.

STAR:

A product in this segment denotes to have high market share when the industry is experiencing high market growth.

CASH COW:

Product in this segment tends to have maximum market share when the industry is floating in low market growth

PROBLEM CHILD:

Product in this segment tends to make the least market share when there is high market growth in the industry

DOG:

Product in this segment tends to be a burden for the company as there is low market growth and the product avails limited market share.

Graphical presentation of AFBL’s Brands as per the growth-share matrix:

AFBL is operating in the beverage industry for only 3 years and within this time span, it has the following three brands in the STAR grid which reflects great prosperity for the company.

• MOJO: (Market share: 27% & Market position: 02)
• SPEED: (Market share: 36% & Market position: 02)
• FRUTIKA: (Market share: 32% & Market position: 01)

Findings from a survey by AFBL:

From the analysis, it can be deduced that among all the eight brands of AFBL, the most consumed and preferred brand is MOJO followed by FRUTIKA and SPEED. As the influencing factors for the consumption of AFBL’s CSD products, packaging plays a vital role, then finally the taste. The full silver packaged pet bottle turns out to be a great success for AFBL’s CSD products.

For the consumption of the mineral water SPA, availability played a vital role and this was because of the wide range dual distribution channel. Price of SPA is less than a few other brands in the market, thus it also played a supportive role.

The brand FARM FRESH is another least consumed product and the influencing factor for consumption were the taste and branding. The product didn’t seem to be highly accepted by the audience.

After conducting my survey on the consumer perception of Energy Drink I found some good clue which helps the company to make their product more familiar which means more perceived by the consumer than now. The results which I found through my research are given below, and I want to mention again that I conducted my research based on 30 respondents.

*Gender                           

* Who uses Energy Drink more (Male or Female)?

Figure 30: Year: 2012

There are young male and female malt beverage drinker respondent is given on the basis of the percentage. On the graph, the young male malt beverage drinker respondents are 96.7% and young female malt beverage drinker respondents are 3.3 %.

Age

*which age people use more?

The above Bar-chart is showing the age of the respondents. Among the respondents,3% are from the age of 16-18 years, 7% are from 19-21 years, 43% are from 22-24 years; 30%,10%,6.7% are from the respondent of 25-27 years 28-30 years 31-above respectively.

Education

What‘s their educational level who like “wild brew”?

The above figure shows that 3.3 % of respondents are Doctorate and 46.7% respondents represent the Postgraduate and Undergraduate. Finally, again 3.3 % represents the H.S.C respondents. According to the above figure, it can say that the maximum respondents are postgraduate and undergraduate and their respondent’s rates are 46.7%.

Profession

The brand that the respondents use.

We have found in our research that student respondents are 63.3 %, businessman 3.3 % and Service holder 33.3 % are habituate to drink malt beverage where students are the high rate of consuming malt beverage which is 63.3%    

In terms of malt beverage, which brand name comes first in your mind?

In the term of the brand name comes first in our mind, here we have collected from 30 respondents about their opinion that is Crown 23.3%Wild Brew 53.3%, Heineken 10.0%, and others 13.3%.

Which one is the most preferable for you?

In the term of the most preferable to you, here we have collected from 30 respondents about their opinion that is Crown 10%, Wild Brew 66.7%, Heineken 6.7%, and others 16.7%.

Where Wild Brew got the high rate and the Heineken got the low response which is 66.7% and 6.7% accordingly.

Please mention the reason behind that: 

According to our research, we have able to find out that most of the respondents are drinking malt beverage and the reason behind that for the purpose of taste and this respondents rates are 50 %, and advertisement rate is 26.7 %,  price and pack design rate 10%, 3.3 % on availability chronologically.         

Awareness of Wild Brew malt beverage:

According to our survey, we have found that the 96.7 % respondents have their knowledge about Wild Brew and 3.3% respondent has not their knowledge about Wild Brew who rare malt beverage drinker. According to our research, we have able to find out that the most of the respondent’s rate about the pack design is good which is 66.7%, Average, Very Good, Excellent rating is 10%. Below Average is 3.3% rate about the pack design of wild brew.

The quality of Energy drink:

From the chart, we can see that the percentage of quality of Wild Brew Energy Drink where 43.3% respondent give Good which is high and 3.3% give below average which is low. Others are 13%, 16.7%and 23.3% respondent give excellent, very good and average chronologically.

SWOT Analysis:

Recommendation

Among the fast-moving consumer goods company, AFBL is one of the prominent native company which has several product lines and many more to come in the future. Having analyzed the problems of the company and the opinions of the users and potential users of Malt Beverage “Wild Brew”, we are able to come up with the following recommendation to recover the problems of the unpopularity of the product among the consumers who are aware and also those who are not aware of their product. Analysis from my report enabled me to improvise constructive recommendation regarding the marketing/communicational strategies and brand building of AFBL’s products. In the period of investigation, I came across many explanatory issues that won’t have been possible to attain without such thorough profound work. I have provided a recommendation as per the brands of AFBL and they are outlined below:

• Ensure consistent marketing strategy: While marketing their product’s Wild Brew, AFBL should focus on delivering one single theme about the product to its target market. Therefore with an ‘integrated marketing communication’ AFBL can build better brand awareness.
• AFBL should try to persuade the government to remove the tax on imported raw materials so that as a local company they can get a competitive advantage (both in price & quality)to compete with the competitors.
• Since the market of Malt Beverage “Wild Brew” is newly introduced, they should try to make their brand reliable and credible to the consumers, providing them with as much information as possible.
• The overall marketing and promotion need to be on the brand rather than one single product. AFBL needs to increase the number of catchy billboards and TV and newspaper advertisement to promote its brand. TV/electronic media is a very powerful media from where the message of a product can reach to the people very fast. Because from this survey it can be seen that most of the people get knowledge or become aware of a product through their family members, relatives, friends, neighbors. And among them mostly are housewives and students. Thus if AFBL increases their advertisement then they would be able to reach them easily. By this way, it will be possible to get a good number of customers who belong to their group.
• From the survey, it is seen that most of the respondents know about the AFBL (Mojo) brand but they are not aware of all the products that they have (Clemon, Lemu, FrutikaWild Brew & So on).
• AFBL should provide special offers for the users or the consumers of wild Brew to popularize its product. In order to capture this lucrative market segments; AFBL should consider putting on extra effort to popularize the wild brew brand among the users of the consumers. Like giving discounts on price or giving gifts (mobile phones, coffee maker, blender machine, etc.) while purchasing a refrigerator.
• One of the most influencing reasons for consuming AFBL’s products is the packaging. Most of the respondents stated the packaging to be very attractive and persuasive. Thus AFBL should continue with the existing packages of the brands specially MOJO, LEMU, CLEMON, SPEED, and FRUTIKA.
• The brand CLEMON has moderate awareness level but potentiality exists to increase the awareness level to a prospective reach as because consumers projected a positive attitude towards the strategic Marketing/Communicational theme. AFBL should focus on developing innovative promotional activities, which promotes the USP to a much greater extent and attain a higher level of exposure among the consumer to create more affirmative awareness.

Conclusion:

AFBL is conducting its business with a good reputation. Its sale is increasing over time. Consumers, as well as retailers, are satisfied with AFBL in terms of price, quality, and service. AFBL is successfully doing its business in Dhaka rather than other districts. This report and survey really helped me to know regarding products and financial condition of this company. It helped me better to correlate my theoretical knowledge with the practical domain. The Brand department of AFBL makes an intensive effort regarding the brand building of the products. The reflection of the efforts could be seen from the strategic marketing communicational theme and brands like MOJO, SPEED, FRUTIKA, CLEMON, etc. All the ratios we took into consideration present that the company is doing very well over time. The pace at which AFBL is currently accelerating will undoubtedly lead the company to the peak of success where the majority of the market shares will be held by the brands of AFBL. I will be concluding my research report by stating that, being able to work with a company which is in the growth stage of the organizational life cycle (OLC) enabled me to acquire a bundle of practical knowledge which will turn out to be a great support for my future strategy formulations and implementations achievements.