Ocado: An English Online Supermarket

Business Environment

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK ..............................................................................................................................................1
1. Examine The Management Structure And The Governance Of Ocado..................................1
2. Assess and evaluate the effects of external environmental influences on Ocado...................6
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Ocado is an english online supermarket, working in Internet Retail Industry. It was
founded in year 2000 by Jonathan Faiman, Jason Gissing and Tim Steiner. It has no stores. The
company does only home deliveries from its warehouses. It has its headquarter in Hatfield,
Hertfordshiren, UK. Company only serves its services in England and Wales (Our story so far,
2019). Report will highlight about overview, history and organizational structure of the
company. It will also tell about the stakeholders and their relationships with Board of Directors.
This report also explain about the importance of Pestle analysis for the company and its
influences on the company.
TASK
1. Examine The Management Structure And The Governance Of Ocado
OVERVIEW
Ocado PLC is an English Online Supermarket who mainly deals in Groceries and
Consumer Goods. It provides its services only in England and Wales. This company was started
in year 2000. It was founded by Jonathan Faiman, Jason Gissing and Tim Steiner with the help
of merchant bankers. It has no stores or shops. It only deliveries of goods from its warehouses to
the customers home. It has listed on the London Stock Exchange in year 2010. Its revenue was
£1,598.8 million, operating income was £(31.9) million and net income was £(44.9) million in
year 2018. Its website is www.ocado.com.
HISTORY
Ocado Plc was launched in year 2000. Its operation began in 2001 with the first delivery.
In 2002, its did partnership with Waitrose. Then its started doing commercial deliveries. Since,
then delivery area also increased over 2.2 million households. In 2005, this area increased to 10
million households.
In 2009, Ocado launched its mobile app whose name is 'Ocado on the Go'. In 2010, It
was listed on London Stock Exchange. Also, company raised fund by offering IPO for the first
time. In 2013, Company did commercial delivery to its strategic customer.
In 2015, Ocado's sales exceeded £1 billion in annual, which lead company to earned
profits in 10 years of establishment of company. In 2017, they did deal with French Casino
Group which lead to 20% increased in share price. In 2018, Company did deal with Canada's
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second largest supermarket chain Sobeys and Kroger, the US retail company (Bailey and et.al.,
Ocado Innovation Ltd, 2018).
ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE AND MANAGEMENT OF OCADO
Ocado follows hierarchical structure. Thus, company is governed by Board of Directors.
In hierarchical organizational structure, company's functions are divided into tasks. According to
these tasks, jobs are created. Then, These jobs are converted into Departments. Then Company
employ Chief Officer for every departments. Under the chief officer, general manager,
employers, supervisors, leaders and employees are hired. They are those people who are
specialized in specific fields and they are hired on the basis of their skills, knowledge and
experiences in that field.
In this hierarchical structure, whole organization is working at the basis of power of
authority in which top management and chief officers make decision or policy or strategy and
communicate to the middle management team. Middle management team implement those
decision, policy or strategy and communicate to the front line manager and employee
representative. Front line manager and employee representative work on that decision, policy or
strategy. If they face any organizational issues regarding decision, policy or strategy or they need
to reporting then they go to middle management team who then go to top management team.
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Illustration 1: Organizational Structure
Source: The Official Board, 2018.