Strategic Management of Waitrose: Analysis and Recommendations

Assignment/Essay

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
Background analysis of Waitrose...........................................................................................3
Internal and external analysis ................................................................................................4
SWOT analysis of Waitrose ..................................................................................................4
PESTLE analysis of Waitrose ...............................................................................................5
Identification of company's sustainable advantage ...............................................................6
Porter's Five Forces model ....................................................................................................6
Strategic recommendation based on analysis ........................................................................8
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES .............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Strategic management refers to management of resources of the company for attaining
organisational objectives and goals. The strategic management includes analysing and evaluating
the competitive advantage, internal organisation and strategies of the companies. A prescriptive
approach to the strategic management demonstrates how development of strategies is executed
by analytical and evaluative procedures in which opportunities as well as threats are considered
any general principle (Andersen, Torp, and Linder, eds., 2019). The following report includes
company naming Waitrose. This is a UK supermarket chain and it is facing high competition in
market. This report includes background of the company, external as well as internal analysis
and determination of sustainable advantage of the firm. Also suggestions are made for this
company to overcome competition.
Background analysis of Waitrose
Waitrose is a company which has total sales which is continually rising in tough grocery
environment with the firm enhancing 0.5% of market share last year (Waitrose case study, 2019).
This company is willing to close several store and restraining expansion due to lack in operating
profits for a period of six months. There are basically four rivals of this company across the
world. They are Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury and Tesco. Waitrose is shutting it's branches due to
various reasons listed below -
Over expansion – The different Waitrose places like Staines, Leek and Cardiff are all
heartlands of Waitrose and these have failed to attract shoppers and potential customers for
earning higher profits. Customers are inclining more towards buying the necessary items locally
from weekly shopping in bulk resulting in decline of sales of supermarkets.
Prices - There is increase in popularity of companies willing to offer discounts, such as
Lidl and Aldi has exerted pressure over grocery markets in relation to reorganise their pricing
strategy (.Bianchi, Mingo, and Fernandez, 2019.). The middle class individuals experience
satisfaction from bargaining from these German discounters. The prices offered by Waitrose are
generally higher than it's competitors. Thus it is essential for this company to manage it's pricing.
This company is launching online services of the products which will require huge investment.
Thus it is needed that Waitrose must emphasise on various aspects before entering into online
selling.