Strategic Management Report: Corporate Strategy at Coles Supermarket

This report provides an in-depth evaluation of Coles Supermarket's corporate-level strategies in Australia, focusing on their expansion strategy and its components: integration, concentration, cooperation, and diversification. It assesses the suitability of these strategies within the Australian retai...Read More

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Strategic Management
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Executive Summary
This report evaluates the corporate level strategies used by the organization Coles
Supermarket for the process of their business operations in Australia. The report begins by
offering an overview of the organization Coles and the services or products offered by them
to the customers. The report next discusses the expansion corporate level strategy followed
by Coles, more precisely, the integration, concentration, co-operation and diversification
strategies followed by the organization and also the manner in which they are being used by
the organization. The report also highlights the suitability of these strategies and also
identifies the strategies which have been implemented by the organization. Finally, the report
concludes by recommending the stability and digital marketing strategies that the
organization can utilize to attain a higher level of growth.

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Overview of Coles Supermarket................................................................................................3
Overview of Corporate level strategies followed by Coles Supermarket..................................3
Suitability of the organization's current corporate level strategies............................................5
Discussion of the corporate level strategies that the organization has implemented.................5
Recommendation........................................................................................................................6
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
As stated by Brewster (2017), the business prospects of a business enterprise depend
substantially on the kind of business strategies that it is following for the management of its
diverse business processes. Hill, Jones and Schilling (2015) are of the viewpoint that the
strategies which a particular enterprise is utilizing for the process of the management of its
diverse affairs should be formulated on the basis of the analysis of the external business
environment in which the concerned organization is operational. More importantly, the
organizations at the same time need to take into effective consideration the requirements or
the demands of the customers and also the overall business goals that they are trying to
achieve (Furrer, 2016). In this regard, the corporate level strategies have evolved as one of
the major ones since they not only help the organizations to achieve their overall strategic
goals but also take into effective consideration the requirements of the external business
environment as well. This report will evaluate the effectiveness as well as suitability of the
corporate level strategies which are being currently followed by the organization Coles
Supermarket.
Overview of Coles Supermarket
Coles Supermarkets Australia Pty Ltd, founded in 1914 and trading under the name of
“Coles”, is an Australian supermarket retail chain which offers both retail and customer
service facilities to the customers (Coles.com.au, 2019). More importantly, the organization
under discussion here is known for the plethora of services or goods that it offers to the
customers starting from groceries to liquor, financial services and others (Coles.com.au,
2019). Furthermore, recently the organization has started to offer online or e-commerce
services to the customers which is called by the name of “Coles online” (Coles.com.au,
2019). The organization, although established as a single outlet in Melbourne by George
Coles, currently has more than 807 branches and together with its competitor Woolworths
Limited holds more than 80% of the retail market share of Australia (Coles.com.au, 2019).
The gross revenue of the organization for the year 2018 was A$39.288 billion and has a
workforce strength of more than 110,000 individuals (Coles.com.au, 2019).

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Overview of Corporate level strategies followed by Coles Supermarket
Christ, Burritt and Varsei (2017) are of the viewpoint that the corporate level
strategies are the kind of strategies or decisions which affects the entire organization and is
mainly intended to enhance the profitability of the concerned organization and also to
maintain its financial stability in the longer run. More importantly, it is seen that the different
kinds of corporate level strategies affects the human resources, finances, management and
other aspects of an organization (Birkinshaw, 2016). In this regard, it needs to be said that
there are four kinds of corporate strategies, stability, expansion, retrenchment and
combination strategies (Andersen & Andersson, 2017). These strategies are intended to help
the organizations to effectively utilize the opportunities presented by the external business
environment and also mitigate the adverse effects of the threats presented by the same.
According to Lloret (2016), one of the major reasons for the unprecedented success
gained by the organization under discussion here and also for its revival in the recent times
can be attributed to the effective corporate level strategies followed by them presently. For
example, it is seen that the organization is currently taking the help of expansion corporate
level strategy for the expansion of its business and also the different kinds of products or
services offered by it to the customers (Andersen & Andersson, 2017). The organization is
currently following the concentration, integration, diversification and co-operation strategies
which form the core components of the expansion corporate level strategies. For example, it
is seen that the organization following the diversification strategy which forms a major
component of the expansion strategy has extended the scope of the products or services
offered by it to the customers (Rahdari & Rostamy, 2015). In this regard, it needs to be said
that the organization in the earlier times used to focus only on the grocery products whereas
presently the organization along with the grocery products offers liquors, financial services
and others to the customers. More importantly, although the organization is focusing on the
diversification strategy yet in the recent times it is seen that following concentration strategy
the organization is focusing on the retail services offered by it. The net result of this is that
the organization is currently allocating all its resources for the expansion of its business in
this sector. At the same time, it is seen that the organization following the strategy of
integration is trying to integrate all the different products or services offered by it to the
customers, under one brand name (Abratt & Mingione, 2017). Moreover, the organization
following the co-operation strategy is trying to co-operate with the different organization so
as to offer different brands under one roof.

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Suitability of the organization's current corporate level strategies
The corporate level strategy that the organization is following, namely, expansion is
in synchronicity with the requirements of the business environment in which the concerned
organization is currently operating. For example, it is seen that the retail business
environment of Australia is actually congenial for the business operations of Coles and also
offers various growth opportunities for the expansion of the organization (Brewster, 2017).
Some of the most important opportunities that the retail business market of Australia is
currently offering to the organization are growth on the basis of product expansion, offering
different branded products or services to the customers and others (Shaukat, Qiu &
Trojanowski, 2016). It is on the basis of these opportunities presented by the retail business
market of the nation that the organization has decided to pursue the various expansion
corporate level strategies, namely, co-operation, integration, diversification and
concentration.
An analysis of the expansion corporate level strategy followed by the organization on
the basis of SAFe strategy model also highlights the suitability of the strategy under
discussion here. For example, it is seen that this expansion strategy undertaken by the
organization has enabled it to take the advantages of the opportunities and address the threats
faced by it in the external business environment (Brewster, 2017). Furthermore, the strategies
of diversification, integration and others followed by the organization are not only helping it
to offer better quality products or services to the stakeholders but also to address their
requirements as well (Lloret 2016). Finally, these strategies are completely feasible for the
organization and have even been implemented within the framework of the organization.
Discussion of the corporate level strategies that the organization has implemented
The organization Coles has already implemented the co-operation, concentration,
integration and diversification strategies within the framework of their organization to earn a
higher level of profitability and financial growth (Andersen & Andersson, 2017).
Furthermore, for the effective implementation of these strategies it was seen that the
organization took the help of Lewin’s change management model. More importantly, for the
effective implementation of these strategies the organization not only offered the right king of
training to the employees but at the same time integrated the different departments of their
organization, namely, HRM, finance, management and others (Abratt & Mingione, 2017).

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Recommendation
There are several other strategies that the concerned organization can pursue in order
to attain a higher level of growth-
 The organization under discussion here can use stability strategy to gain sustainability
and also maintain a stable position within the retail business market of Australia. This
is important because of the fact that the owners of the organization had to sell the
organization to Wesfarmers in 2007 because of the fact that it was not able to manage
its different supermarkets in an effective manner and also the revenue earned by it
was not stable. Thus, taking the help of this strategy the organization would be able to
mitigate the adverse effects of the threats presented by the retail business market of
Australia and would be able to maintain a stable position within the retail market.
 The organization even in the present times relies heavily on newspapers, radios,
television and other similar tools for the promotion and marketing of the products or
services offered by it. Thus, effective utilization of digital marketing strategies is
another strategic choice that the organization can utilize to increase the prospects of
its business in Australia. The effective usage of this will help the organization to
promote as well as market the services offered by it to the customers in a more
adequate manner and thereby enhance the sale of the products or services offered by
them.
Conclusion
To conclude, the corporate level strategies have emerged as one of the most important
strategies in the present times and help the different organizations to formulate the kind of
strategies which are likely to help them to attain a higher level of growth and also financial
stability. More importantly, the organizations need to select the corporate level strategies on
the basis of the threats and opportunities presented by the business market in which they are
operational. This is important since the business prospects of an organization depend to a
great extent on the kind of business strategies that it is following within the framework of its
organization. These aspects of the corporate level strategies become apparent from an
analysis of the corporate level strategies followed by the organization Coles.

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References
Abratt, R., & Mingione, M. (2017). Corporate identity, strategy and change. Journal of Brand
Management, 24(2), 129-139.
Andersen, T. J., & Andersson, U. (2017). Multinational Corporate Strategy-Making:
Integrating International Business and Strategic Management. In The Responsive
Global Organization: New Insights from Global Strategy and International
Business (pp. 13-34). Emerald Publishing Limited.
Birkinshaw, J. (2016). Multinational corporate evolution and subsidiary development.
Springer.
Brewster, C. (2017). The integration of human resource management and corporate strategy.
In Policy and practice in European human resource management (pp. 22-35).
Routledge.
Christ, K. L., Burritt, R. L., & Varsei, M. (2017). Coopetition as a potential strategy for
corporate sustainability. Business Strategy and the Environment, 26(7), 1029-1040.
Coles.com.au, (2019). Coles Supermarkets. (online). Retrieved from
https://www.coles.com.au/
Furrer, O. (2016). Corporate level strategy: Theory and applications. Routledge.
Hill, C. W., Jones, G. R., & Schilling, M. A. (2015). Strategic management theory. Cengage
Learning,.
Lloret, A. (2016). Modeling corporate sustainability strategy. Journal of Business
Research, 69(2), 418-425.
Rahdari, A. H., & Rostamy, A. A. A. (2015). Designing a general set of sustainability
indicators at the corporate level. Journal of Cleaner Production, 108, 757-771.
Shaukat, A., Qiu, Y., & Trojanowski, G. (2016). Board attributes, corporate social
responsibility strategy, and corporate environmental and social performance. Journal
of Business Ethics, 135(3), 569-585.