Business Expansion Strategy: A Case Study of Duque Papetier in Germany

This case study examines Duque Papetier, a small stationery business in Germany, analyzing its potential for business expansion. The study begins with an overview of the German wholesale stationery market, including annual spending on writing and drawing materials per capita and a comparison with other European countries. It then analyzes the company's sales data over three consecutive years (2015-2017), providing sales forecasts for 2018 and 2019, and assesses the feasibility of business expansion, considering both the pros and cons and relevant international standards (ISO 9001, 14001, 37001, 26000, and 31000). The study also includes a cost analysis of a new building, specifies the mean value of orders, and explores methods for improving customer satisfaction and survey response rates. Statistical data, including correlation coefficients and descriptive statistics, are used to support the analysis. The conclusion summarizes the findings and recommendations for Duque Papetier's business strategy.

DUQUE PAPETIER CASE
STUDY

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
2.1 Brief overview of Germany's wholesale stationery market..................................................1
2.2 Locate and extract annual spending on writing/ drawing materials per capita on graph......2
2.3 Analysing total sales of consecutive three years (2015- 2017).............................................2
2.4 Feasibility of business expansion in Germany along with international standards..............4
b. International standards that apply to Duque............................................................................5
2.5 Cost of new building.............................................................................................................6
a. 30 year repayment mortgage...................................................................................................6
b. Recalculation of monthly cost.................................................................................................6
2.6 Specifying mean value of orders...........................................................................................7
2.7 Customer satisfaction and methods for improving responsive rate......................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10
APPENDICES...............................................................................................................................12
Appendix 1................................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
The Duque Papertiers gross is stationer small business in Germany as the present report
will give overview of wholesale stationery market with reference to MGCC report. This will be
stating annual spending of drawing and writing materials per capita of major European countries
especially France and Germany. In the similar aspect, it will articulate total sales of multiple
categories of three consecutive years with scatter plot, correlation and even sales forecast of
year 2018 and 2019. Last but not least, it will show methods for improving consumer survey
responsive rate along with descriptive statistics.
2.1 Brief overview of Germany's wholesale stationery market
As per trade association for Office Supply and Writing materials, the stationery market
of Germany is positioned in appropriate aspect. The total turnover of this industry is approx
€14.8 billion per year as it is equalised to every spending on individual which is higher than
€182 on annual basis. In this similar aspect, €35.2 is spent on drawing and writing materials of
Germany as it is on second position among European Union. The organizations positive attitude
in industry of stationery has been underpinned through fact of more than 70% of major brand of
stationery had lead to increment in sales in year 2015. As per association of German stationery
brands has total turnover of this industry had attained growth by 3.5% among 2014 and 2015.
On basis of its outcome has presence of increment in domestic demand grew by 2.5% and
international demand faced growth by 5% (MGCC perspectives, 2018).
While articulating trends and potentials, the stationery brands of Germany has the best
position throughout the world. The stationery brands of Germany in writing and drawing
materials have gained significant market share as it is against private labels. On the contrary, it
comprises broad range of products along with huge challenges and developments. The paper
and paper related products such as document folders had expected for continuing path for
decreasing the turnover but this category of product is suffering in significant aspect with
increment in digitalisation in private and work life. However, the paper and paper related
products along with brands of other category products had faced positive rate of growth like
writing instruments and office supplies as well with 5% growth in year 2015. Further, this trend
will continue in year 2016 and so on with level of import and export as it has flat trend pattern
(Germany - Stationery - Market Analysis, Forecast, Size, Trends and Insights, 2018).

2.2 Locate and extract annual spending on writing/ drawing materials per capita on graph
Country Yearly spending
Germany 35.2
Hungary 9.6
Italy 18.6
Poland 8.5
Switzerland 35.5
Austria 35
France 35
Interpretation: On basis of above graph, annual spending of writing and drawing
materials per capita has been traced of seven European countries. It has been articulated that
Switzerland is leading in this segment which is about 35.5 and followed by Germany and
Austria. In the similar aspect, Poland, Hungary and Italy is at lowest aspect. Further, it has been
extracted that drawing and writing materials in Germany had best market share in EU countries
(He and Lu, 2018).
2.3 Analysing total sales of consecutive three years (2015- 2017)
a. Assessing sales
(Table in appendix)

In year 2015, 2016 and 2017 there are multiple categories like general office supplies,
printer cartridges, writing and drawing materials per capita and low cost printers etc. There is
observance that printer cartridges increased through 4% in year 2016 but opposite movement
was about 15.38% with articulation of general office supplies as in 2016 by 8% with decrement
by 14.81%. Henceforth, low cost printers raised with 2015 which was similar in year 2017. The
product category of office furniture along with drawing and writing materials increased in both
year 2016 and 2017.
There is increment in shredders with huge proportion i.e. by 16% in year 2016 and with
this context, shredders also have surplus of 16% along with paper based supplies as in 2017, it
was constant. In nutshell it had been extracted that from year 2015 to 2016 through 10.30% and
in 2017, it falls by 2.20% 2017 (Mommsen, 2018).
b. Mixed pie chart of each category of product in 2016 and 2017
c. Total and year's correlation coefficient

Interpretation: Correlation coefficient is replicated as degree of statistical measure with
alteration in value of single variable for predicting change to another value. Further, the
variables which are positively correlated, the value raises or decreases in particular tandem. In
simple words, it measures strength and particular direction of linear relationship among
variables on basis of scatter plot. In the above scenario, the correlation coefficient of total sales
and year is about 0.73 which is strong positive linear relationship which could be elaborated that
both sales and year will move in similar direction (Baak, Koopman and Klous, 2018).
d. Predicting total sales of 2019 and 2018
There is articulation of equation with context of scatter plot as €6500 (x) + €162000 with
forecast for year 2018 and 2019. There will be extraction of outcome with substitution of x
value as of 4 and 5. While undertaking 4 in equation, there will be outcome of €188000 and
with 5 its result will be €194500.
2.4 Feasibility of business expansion in Germany along with international standards
a. Pros and Cons of business expansion
Belgium and Germany (Expanding business)
Pros Score/10 Cons Score/10
Enhancing customer 9 Cost control 7

base
Distribution 9 Diversification 8
Technology
upgrading 8 degrading quality 6
Availability of
resource 9
High employee
turnover 5
Total Pros 35 Total Cons 26
Average Pros 8.75 Average Cons 6.5
Total pros – Total Cons
35 – 26
9
Interpretation: The above table is evaluating feasibility of business expansion in
Germany and Belgium with appropriate scoring of its advantages and disadvantage from 10. By
considering total score of pros and cons, its final outcome is about 9 which shows that it is
beneficial for Duque for performing business expansion as it enhances customer base,
technology updates and even availability of resources in efficient manner as its average is 8.75.
b. International standards that apply to Duque
There are various standards which are applicable to the activities performed by Duque.
These standards consist of the following:
ISO 9001 Quality management : This standard provide various guidance for company
and organization which ensure that their product and services meet their customer's requirement
and ensure that quality is constantly improved. These standards are based on number of quality
management principles that includes customer focus, motivation and implication of top
management. Organization such as Duque that are using ISO 9001 helps the firm ensure that
customers get consistent , good quality products and services which helps the firm in improving
their customers base (International Organization for standardization, 2018).
ISO 14001 Environment management : This standard provides guidance and tools for
organization to manage their environmental responsibilities. This standard focus on specific

approaches such as audit, communication labelling and various environmental challenges such
as climate change. This standard is developed by ISO technical committee and various
subcommittees.
ISO 37001 Anti- Bribery Management systems : Bribery is the most challenging issue
and to reduce this issue ISO has developed a new standard to the companies such as Duque to
fight bribery and promote an ethical business culture.
ISO 26000 Social Responsibility : It is the most important factor for organization to
increase their efficiency and improve their performance by contributing to the society. ISO
26000 provide guidance for operating their business to provider benefit to the society. This
ISO helps the organization in contributing to the health and welfare of society.
ISO 31000 Risk management : This standard provide guidance to the organization to
reduce the risk which is affecting the performance of the company. This standard provide
principles, framework and process for managing the risk. Using ISO 31000, organization can
achieve their overall objective of firm. It provides guidance for internal and external audit
programs.
2.5 Cost of new building
a. 30 year repayment mortgage

b. Recalculation of monthly cost
2.6 Specifying mean value of orders
Interpretation: There is representation of standard deviation on basis of particular mean
at data base. There is presence of measure of standard deviation as it is above or below
population on basis of raw score (Xiao, 2018). Furthermore, there is replication of standard
score which should be placed with particular reference to curve of normal distribution. On basis
of above point, there is negative z score of -0.23 which represents raw score which is less than
its mean as evidence of Duque's owner with appropriate belief.
2.7 Customer satisfaction and methods for improving responsive rate
The consumer survey rate can be improved by using the various methods such as
keeping survey length short, keeping the response length short, sending personal email follow –
ups, Engage in manual telephone follow -ups, Identifying the target market, building
relationships etc (5 Tactics to Improve Survey Response Rates, 2018). Customer survey rate is
required to improve their experiences which helps in identifying their needs and demands which
helps in identifying providing the products and services according to their requirement (Bell,
Bryman and Harley, 2018).

Customer survey rate is improved by responding to the customer feedback in order to
provide satisfaction. It also can be improved by identifying the target audience before the
survey is conducted to forecast about the response from number of customers. Consumer survey
rate is improved by sending personal mail to the consumers about the survey in order to provide
ease in filling the survey questions. Also, keeping track of the consumer that haven't responded
to the survey the company has sent to give them a call for asking them about their feedback and
re- sending the survey to provide the response towards organization (Wu and Tso, 2018).
Organization by keeping the length of the survey short can increase the consumer
survey rate as consumer are busy and they did not have that much time to provide the response
to the lengthy survey. So, in order to improve the consumer survey rate organization must keep
the survey length short so that consumers can easily answers all the questions regarding to the
survey and more consumer response will be attracted (Samphantharak, Schuh and Townsend,
2018).
Descriptive statistics
Interpretation: As per theme of rating factors of customer satisfaction such as customer
service, quality of P & S, sales staff and price/value. The customer service or support is between
fair and good with average respondents and similar to quality of P&S and sales staff.
Furthermore, its price value is with mean or average of 1.95. On basis of statistical accuracy is
every variable is in range of 0 to 0.20 with their middle value is excellent in customer service
and sales staff. The highest mode is about excellence is of sales staff and customer service
where lowest is of price value and then quality of P&S. In the similar aspect, standard deviation
is measure of assessing risk which is less than 0.90 then it represents fewer movements as per
considering its mean As per statistics of standard error, it is accurate so it could be replicated as
cause of concern.

CONCLUSION
On basis of above report, it could be concluded that industry of stationery has developed
innovative products and services with adjustments of innovative consumer habits along with
preferences and vitality in market and special issues aroused in recent scenario. In the similar
aspect, the trend of this related development of people with creativity and caused with huge
demand of writing and drawing materials. The product's sales has attained growth which is
above average rate and serving counter movement with increment in usage of digital products
and this trend will be continued in year 2016. It had shown that German stationery market is one
vital sector and contributing efficiently in its economy but turnover is altering on vast aspect
with continuous expansion of product range. Furthermore, e-commerce has attained growth in
this industry with huge range of product assortment along with 24 hour accessibility as most
important reason with aspect of each consumer and it is impacted by economic conditions. It
had reflected that annual spending on writing/drawing materials per capita where Germany and
Switzerland are leading with difference of 0.2. With context of wholesale stationery market with
appropriate analysis with sales of multiple products such as printer cartridges, low cost printers,
office furniture, shredders and many more and in this context writing and drawing material per
capita has gained significant market share. The business expansion in Germany and Belgium is
beneficial to Duque but with compliance of International standards. It could be summarised that
consumer survey responsive rate must be improved with efficient communication in better
aspect.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Baak, M., Koopman, R. and Klous, S., 2018. A new correlation coefficient between categorical,
ordinal and interval variables with Pearson characteristics. arXiv preprint
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Bell, E., Bryman, A. and Harley, B., 2018. Business research methods. Oxford university press.
He, C. and Lu, K., 2018. RISK MANAGEMENT IN SMES WITH FINANCIAL AND NON-
FINANCIAL INDICATORS USING BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE
METHODS. Management. 16. p.18.
Mommsen, W., 2018. The Emergence of the Welfare State in Britain and Germany: 1850-1950.
Routledge.
Samphantharak, K., Schuh, S. and Townsend, R. M., 2018. Integrated household surveys: an
assessment of US methods and an innovation. Economic Inquiry. 56(1). pp.50-80.
Wu, C.W. and Tso, K. F. G., 2018. Good Practices and Considerations in Conducting Email
Survey for Fashion Retail Industry. In Contemporary Case Studies on Fashion
Production, Marketing and Operations (pp. 105-117). Springer, Singapore.
Xiao, J., 2018. Recycled Aggregate Concrete. In Recycled Aggregate Concrete Structures (pp.
65-98). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
ONLINE
5 Tactics to Improve Survey Response Rates. 2018. [Online]. Available through
<https://tribalvision.com/improve-survey-response-rates/>.
Germany - Stationery - Market Analysis, Forecast, Size, Trends and Insights. 2018. [Online].
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International Organization for standardization. 2018. [Online]. Available through
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