Value Chain Analysis of Coles Supermarket: A Strategic Management Perspective

This journal post analyzes Coles Supermarket's business level strategies through value chain analysis. It examines the primary and supporting activities of Coles and how they help the company gain a competitive advantage.

Strategic Management
Journal Post 4
Student Name
Institute and Affiliation
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Table of Contents
Introduction:....................................................................................................................................3
Value Chain Analysis:.....................................................................................................................3
Conclusion:......................................................................................................................................5
References:......................................................................................................................................6
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Introduction:
Coles supermarket has been operating its business in Australian market successfully. There are
several competitors in the market like Woolworths, ALDI and Metcash. Coles has been
developing its business level strategies to gain competitive advantages. In future Coles will
invest in several different types of supermarket formats (Inside Retail, 2018). Their online store
has been gaining huge customers support and through this they are able to achieve wide range of
customer base. In this research, the researcher will analyse Coles business level strategies
through Value Chain analysis.
Value Chain Analysis:
Value chain analysis helps to demonstrate the organisation’s supporting activities and primary
activities. Through Value Chain analysis the research will reveal the Coles business level
strategies. Supporting activities are infrastructure of firm, human resource management,
technological development, procurement. On the other hand, primary activities are operations,
inbound logistics, outbound logistics, sales and marketing and service.
Figure 1: Value Chain Analysis
(Source: Bogomolova et al. 2016)
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Coles supermarket’s main value creating activities are inbound logistics, operations, Human
resource management and sales and marketing. Coles has been investing in developing their
future changes to compete with the economic trends and seasonal changes.
Inbound Logistics: Coles products directly comes from the regional and national centres and
after completing quality test, the products transported to the stores. Coles has own distributions
and trucks which are used in their distribution network. This has enabled greater advantages of
shipment punctuality and avoiding workers strike. Thus Coles is in better position in terms of
product quality and efficiency in distribution.
Human Resource Management: It talent management team has been able to manage wide
range of employees. Their Human resource management team try to investigate the need of the
employees and value their opinions. Moreover, they are able to provide the desired benefits to it
employees. Apart from that their training and knowledge development process has also been able
to motivate and train them to achieve competitive advantage.
Sales and marketing: Organisational dynamism and in-store promotions are the two sales
promotion strategies has been adopted by Coles to gain competitive advantage. They have
reduced the prices of certain items and it helps in boosting short term inventory and sales
turnover.
Conclusion:
The Value chain analysis helps to demonstrate the strongest elements of Coles which have been
helping Coles to gain competitive advantage. Both the primary and supporting activities of Coles
supermarket has been going hand in hand and thus Coles is still the leading supermarket in
Australia.
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References:
Bogomolova, S., Loch, A., Lockshin, L. and Buckley, J., 2016. Consumer factors associated with
purchasing local versus global value chain foods. Renewable Agriculture and Food
Systems, pp.1-14.
Inside Retail. 2018. Coles to invest in new strategic direction - Inside Retail. [online] Available
at: https://www.insideretail.com.au/news/coles-signals-new-strategic-direction-201806
[Accessed 4 Dec. 2018].
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