Rawling Assignment 2022

RUNNING HEAD: RAWLINGS
MARKETING
GLOBAL SPORTS MARKETING

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Executive Summary
Rawling Company is a recognized sport brand from United States. Globally, it offers high
priced and quality sports products to customers. Its mission is to provide quality product to
raise the potential of the customers. Its key product is basketball and it is offered in multiple
varieties and on different digital channels. China as a chosen market offers fine market to
Rawlings. It has adequate strength, mediates weakness and low opportunities and threats.
Quality content, digital presence, brand endorsement will help the Rawling in developing a
strong position in the market.

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Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Rawlings Company....................................................................................................................3
Mission Statement..................................................................................................................3
Brief product overview (Basketball)..........................................................................................4
Market overview (China)...........................................................................................................4
SWOT Analyses.........................................................................................................................6
Strengths.................................................................................................................................6
Weaknesses.............................................................................................................................7
Opportunities..........................................................................................................................7
Threats....................................................................................................................................7
Marketing objectives and strategies...........................................................................................8
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
Bibliography.............................................................................................................................10

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Introduction
The discussion reflects on the concept of ‘Marketing’. It involves the actions and steps for the
promotion of product and services in the market. The business conducts marketing research
and develops a marketing plan for brand promotion (Kerin & Hartley, 2015). Emphasizing on
the structure, the initial section provides key information about the company named
‘Rawlings’. It also includes its mission statement. The following section includes the product
overview of ‘Basketball’ offered by Rawlings. The succeeding part involves the market
overview of and company’s SWOT analysis. It also includes the marketing objective and
strategies. The key purpose of the essay is to develop a marketing plan of a sports brand.
Rawlings Company
Rawlings Company is an American based sports brand founded in 1887. Its headquarters is in
Missouri, United States. George and Alfred Rawlings are the founders of the brand (Rawlings
, 2019). It is engaged in multiple product line. It offers sports goods including baseball,
softball, football, basketball, gloves, bats and other sports accessories. It has also initiated
manufacturing chairs, bags and tents (Bloomberg , 2019). Its technologically upgraded
products benefit the company in dominating the industry. Its effective and efficient products
allow the athletes to reach to their full potential and deliver high performance (Rawlings ,
2019).
Mission Statement
The mission of the company is to enable maximum participation by developing high
performance equipment and protective apparels to the sports professionals (Rawlings , 2019).

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Brief product overview (Basketball)
It safeguards its Basketball from imitation through patent rights (Rawlings , 2019). It offers
wide collection of Basketballs based on the requirement. It sells 22 different types of
basketball (SOC, 2019). These mainly include ‘NCAA Virginia Cavaliers Alley Oop Youth
Basketball’, ‘NCA Colorado State Rams Basketball’ and ‘NCAA Virginia Cavaliers Softee
Basketball’. All the basketball differs in their design, size, usage, and price (Rawlings ,
2019). It also offers specific discounts on some of its basketball. The company has relied on
multiple digital websites for the sale of its basketball. These include E-Bay, Amazon,
Academy, Walmart and Dicks sporting goods (Academy, 2019). The customer positive
reviews states that it offers fine quality basketballs (Best Reviews , 2019).
Figure 1: Rawlings Basketballs
Source: (Rawlings , 2019)
Market overview (China)
To gain information about the china market, various aspects has to consider. It assists in
determining the market attractiveness (Kerin & Hartley, 2015).

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Market size
The China population is marked at 1.4 million (Heritage , 2019). The key sports brands in
China are Li Ning, Xtep, Kinglike and Deerway (Wang , 2019). An anta sport brand is the
largest sports brand in China (ISPO , 2019).
Leading suppliers
There are more than 2000 sports equipment manufacturers and suppliers in China. Some of
the key suppliers are ‘Wuhan Bailih Sports Equipment Co. Ltd.’, Shenzhen LDK Industrial
Co. Ltd.’ (MIC, 2019).
Market profile
It is a set of characteristics to determine the target market of a product or service. It considers
multiple factors including income, lifestyle, psychographic and socio-economic information
of the buyers (Kerin & Hartley, 2015).
The Per-Capita Income of the Chinese is counts to $16660 (Heritage , 2019). Their high
income clearly states that they have high disposable income and mediate purchasing power.
The growth of disposable income is allowing Chinese to experience better lifestyles (Mintel ,
2019). They opt for healthy lifestyle. The Chinese customers are pricing sensitive but highly
conscious towards their brand. They show high preference for luxury products (Zhu , 2013).
The target market of the China sport industry is youth of the country. This is because they
show high preference for sports.
Market trends
Following are the marketing trends of China for the year 2019.

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1. E-Commerce trade is prevailing high in the country. Therefore, digital presence is
highly mandatory for the brands.
2. Selling via social media is proves to be highly effective. These include Alipay and
Wechat.
3. China offers a high growth opportunity for brands.
4. In brand promotion, quality of branding and content is of high significance
(Marketing Interactive , 2019).
Distribution channels
Online distribution channel is highly famous in China. This is because it has 400 million
users. Alibaba.com and Taobao.com are key online distribution channels (Nelson , 2010).
SWOT Analyses
SWOT is a framework to determine the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats. It
application benefits the company in developing plans and adopting strategies to avail the full
benefit of future opportunities and to minimize or eradicate the possible threats (Yuan, 2013).
Strengths
1. Rawlings offers multiple products including gloves, bats, sports clothing, chairs and
leather goods (Rawlings , 2019). It acts as its strength because failure in one product
line may result in overall business failure.
2. Rawling Company has a multichannel presence. It operates via retail stores and digital
channels (Mallscenters , 2019). It benefits the company in gaining the attention of
mass customers.
3. Its large customer strength counts to its strength. This is because it distributes product
in 40 countries including Germany, Italy and Canada (SOC, 2019).

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4. It is offering products since 1887 (Rawlings , 2019). It has developed high brand
recognition in United States. It acts as its strength because it easily gains customers
trust.
Weaknesses
1. Rawlings Company’s employees have given negative reviews about the company
over ‘Glassdoor’ and ‘Indeed’. It has received a rating of mere 2.6 stars from its
human resource. (Glassdoor , 2019). It acts as its weakness because it leads to poor
word of mouth. Additionally, it also develops a problem in attracting new human
resource for the company.
2. Its sports products are priced high (Walmart , 2019). It act as it weakness because it
fails to gain the attention of customers belonging from low economic class.
3. It opts for limited marketing via celebrity endorsers named Adrin Gonzalez and Mark
Teixeira (Celebrity Endorsers , 2019). Therefore, its limited advertising acts as its
weakness because it leads to low customer attention towards the brand.
Opportunities
1. Rawlings Company is expanding its market in Australia (CISION , 2014). It will offer
a chance to the company to increase its customer strength and overall business
revenue.
2. The growth in Sports Industry of U.S. offers future opportunities to Rawlings
(Topmba , 2019). It attains a chance to avail better annual returns.
Threats
1. Rawlings competitors are Riddell, Easton, Wilson Sporting and Schutt Sports
(Zoominfo , 2019). These offer threat to the company by offering product at
competitive price.

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Marketing objectives and strategies
It includes the goals set by the businesses for the achievement of organizational objectives.
To achieve a significant position in China, Rawling has to rely on following strategies.
Use of Wechat: Rawling should avail the use of social media website named ‘Wechat’ for
brand promotion. This is because it is highly used social media website in China. It has
around 1 billion monthly users (Kharpal , 2019). It will be best suitable because this
application allows the company to convert their followers into members. Additionally, it will
help in gaining high customer engagement and directly connecting to the customers in China.
Use of digital channel: Rawling Company should opt for digital websites to sell its products.
This will help the company in aligning with the marketing trends of ecommerce presence.
Quality content: It should recruit a marketing specialist from China. This will benefit the
company in developing quality content in marketing. It will help the company in following
the market trend of China.
Brand endorsement: Rawling should opt for Yao Ming for promotion of basketball in
China. This is because he is a recognized professional player of basketball (Britannica ,
2019). This will benefit the company in gaining the attention of Chinese customers.
Conclusion
The discussion focuses on a recognized sports brand named ‘Rawlings’. It is evaluated that
Rawling is a multinational sport brand offering innovative, customized and multiple products.
Its mission is to provide high quality products to the customers to assist them in reaching
their full potential. From the product overview, it is evaluated that it offers high quality
basketball in 22 varieties. Based on market overview of China, it is recognized that China has
high market size with adequate number of suppliers. Its customers have fine income and

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follow high lifestyle. They are price sensitive and brand focused. Online distribution channel
is highly prevalent. It has high strengths, mediate weakness, and low opportunities and
threats. It should opt for brand endorsement, Wechat, quality content and digital channel for
brand promotion in China. Thus, it concludes that China offers favorable market to Rawlings
basketball.

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Bibliography
Academy, 2019. Rawlings Active Grip Indoor/Outdoor Basketball. [Online] Available at:
https://www.academy.com/shop/pdp/rawlings-active-grip-indoor-outdoor-basketball
[Accessed 4 December 2019].
Best Reviews , 2019. 10 Best Rawlings Indoor Basketballs. [Online] Available at: Rawlings
Active Grip Indoor/Outdoor Basketball [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Bloomberg , 2019. Rawlings Sporting Goods Co Inc. [Online] Available at:
https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/RAWL:US [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Britannica , 2019. Yao Ming. [Online] Available at:
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Yao-Ming [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Celebrity Endorsers , 2019. Celebrities Who Endorse Rawlings Sporting Goods. [Online]
Available at: https://celebrityendorsers.com/endorsements/rawlings-sporting-goods/
[Accessed 4 December 2019].
CISION , 2014. Rawlings expands its presence in Australia's growing baseball market.
[Online] Available at: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rawlings-expands-its-
presence-in-australias-growing-baseball-market-240088141.html [Accessed 4 December
2019].
Glassdoor , 2019. Employee Reviews. [Online] Available at:
https://www.glassdoor.co.in/Reviews/Rawlings-Group-Reviews-E118459.htm [Accessed 4
December 2019].
Heritage , 2019. 2019 INDEX OF ECONOMIC FREEDOM. [Online] Available at:
https://www.heritage.org/index/country/china [Accessed 4 December 2019].

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ISPO , 2019. China’s Largest Sports Brand Is Anta Sports. [Online] Available at:
https://www.ispo.com/en/companies/anta-chinas-largest-sports-brand-anta-sports [Accessed 4
December 2019].
Kerin, R. & Hartley, S., 2015. Marketing: the core. McGraw-Hill.
Kerin, R. & Hartley, S., 2015. Marketing: the core. McGraw-Hill.
Kharpal , A., 2019. Everything you need to know about WeChat — China’s billion-user
messaging app. [Online] Available at: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/04/what-is-wechat-
china-biggest-messaging-app.html [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Mallscenters , 2019. Rawlings Brand - hours and store locations. [Online] Available at:
https://www.mallscenters.com/brands/rawlings [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Marketing Interactive , 2019. 5 China marketing trends for 2019. [Online] Available at:
https://www.marketing-interactive.com/5-china-marketing-trends-for-2019/ [Accessed 4
December 2019].
MIC, 2019. Suppliers List. [Online] Available at:
https://www.made-in-china.com/manufacturers/sports-equipment.html [Accessed 4
December 2019].
Mintel , 2019. CHINESE CONSUMERS ARE IN PURSUIT OF RICHER EXPERIENCES
AND QUALITY OF LIFE. [Online] Available at: https://www.mintel.com/press-centre/social-
and-lifestyle/chinese-consumers-today-are-in-pursuit-of-richer-experiences-and-quality-of-
life [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Nelson , C., 2010. Developing China Sales and Distribution Capabilities. [Online] Available
at: https://www.chinabusinessreview.com/developing-china-sales-and-distribution-

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capabilities/ [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Rawlings , 2019. About Rawlings. [Online] Available at:
https://www.rawlings.com/about/about-company.html [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Rawlings , 2019. NCAA Basketball Collection. [Online] Available at:
https://www.rawlings.com/site-content/content-basketball.html [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Rawlings , 2019. Patents. [Online] Available at: https://www.rawlings.com/about/about-
patents.html [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Rawlings , 2019. Save Big On Pro Gloves. [Online] Available at: https://www.rawlings.com/
[Accessed 4 December 2019].
SOC, 2019. Rawlings. [Online] Available at: http://www.soc.duke.edu/~s142tm10/mike4.htm
[Accessed 4 December 2019].
Topmba , 2019. Sports Industry Growth Enriches Opportunities in Sports Management.
[Online] Available at: https://www.topmba.com/jobs/career-trends/sports-industry-growth-
enriches-opportunities-sports-management [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Walmart , 2019. Rawlings. [Online] Available at: https://www.walmart.com/browse/shop-by-
brand/rawlings/3734780_5678070_7975194 [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Wang , P., 2019. Top 10 China Sports Brands. [Online] Available at:
http://www.chinawhisper.com/top-10-china-sports-brands/ [Accessed 4 December 2019].
Yuan, H., 2013. A SWOT analysis of successful construction waste management. Journal of
Cleaner Production.
Zhu , R., 2013. Understanding Chinese Consumers. [Online] Available at:
https://hbr.org/2013/11/understanding-chinese-consumers [Accessed 4 December 2019].

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Zoominfo , 2019. Top Competitors of Rawlings Sporting Goods Company , Inc. [Online]
Available at: https://www.zoominfo.com/c/rawlings-sporting-goods-company-inc/66373239
[Accessed 4 December 2019].