Ajisen Ramen: Marketing Analysis, Strategies, and Recommendations

This report provides a comprehensive marketing analysis of Ajisen Ramen, a Japanese-based food chain. It begins with an introduction to the company, followed by a SWOT analysis, identifying its strengths (diversity, instant food), weaknesses (market penetration, R&D investment), opportunities (franchising, new products), and threats (health concerns, competition). The report then outlines Ajisen Ramen's marketing objectives, including market share expansion and profit growth. It delves into market segmentation, targeting university students and survival enthusiasts, and positioning. The core of the report examines the marketing mix strategies, detailing product offerings (noodles, spices), pricing (low cost), placement (airports, supermarkets), and promotional activities (internet, sales promotion, and public relations). The report also discusses service marketing strategies, focusing on the process of making ramen noodles. The conclusion reiterates the key findings and the company's strategic direction. Finally, the report provides a list of references used to support the analysis.

Running head: Marketing for mangers
Marketing for managers

Marketing for mangers
1
Introduction
A Japanese based company called Ajisen Ramen was founded in 1968 at Kumamoto, Japan.
It has 700 plus chain in all over the world. It’s targeting to open more food chains in all over
the world. It has its branches in Australia, Cambodia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia,
Malaysia, the Marianas, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, the United States,
and Vietnam. There is something different about Ajisen Ramen that is its soup which helps in
prohibiting ageing.
Swot Analysis of Ajisen Ramen
Strengths
The strength of Noodle Company called Ajisen Ramen comes from its diversity. The noodles
of Ajisen Ramen have been favoured in college dorm rooms to high class of restaurants. One
of the biggest strength of noodles is that it is an instant food and it functions as a staple for
dinners and breakfast of all ages of people.
Its price is also very convenient that it is affordable to every income group of people. Dishes
related to noodles include a broad range of tastes such as Spicy Pad Thai, Home Style
Macaroni and Cheese Noodles. Noodles can also be added in wide range of meats, vegetables
and sauces for special diets.
Weaknesses
Ajisen Ramen has the biggest strength of unique adaptability in its dishes; it also has some of
the weaknesses that it is lacking in terms of market penetration. The fast food industry
includes the infinite choices for the consumers such as pizza, fried chicken, tacos,
hamburgers and others. The noodle industry still needs to capture the actual thought of the
consumers in the same way.
It does high investment in research and development more than in improving the quality of
their dishes which is a weakness for Ajisen Ramen. As there is no need of investing so much
funds on research and development only.
Opportunities

Marketing for mangers
2
Ajisen Ramen has the opportunity to develop its own space in the American dining pantheon
by restaurant franchising just like the world famous fast food organizations such as Dominos,
McDonald's, Pizza Hut and Taco bell has increased the choice of everyday foods.
Ajisen Ramen has the opportunity to grab the market share by introducing new products and
services.
Threats
Health impact of noodles on the consumers can be a threat for the Ajisen ramen as noodles
contains high amount of sodium carbohydrates and gluten which makes consumers to switch
to other food items.
Noodle Company, Ajisen Ramen has to compete with many of the organizations. Also with
the makers of instant noodles which are available in grocery stores such as Maggie and
instant noodles and others.
Marketing objectives
The Marketing objectives of Ajisen Ramen are mentioned below:
Ajisen Ramen is preparing to expand its market share by opening the branches at the airport
also. It already having its branches at many of the airports but this year they are planning to
have at least ten to fifteen more shops at the airports to attract the Chinese tourist towards its
restaurants and to provide them the taste of home.
In 2016 they have faced decline in their profits, earlier in 2014 it was 2.4 billion therefore the
company is looking forward to the strategies which can help in increasing the profits of the
company. They are planning to open 10-15 restaurants till the mid of 2018. Under the brand
called Japanese Ramen restaurant (Companies, 2018).
They are also creating the awareness of their products in the market by promoting through
advertisements and campaigns. They are also planning to strengthen the operations of its
delivery and not restricting to only shops.
Market segmentation

Marketing for mangers
3
Market segmentation can be defined as the process of dividing consumers and business
markets in different groups (called as segments). Ajisen Ramen divides its consumers in
different segments which are as follows:
 University students
 No time to cook
 Sportsmen
 Survival tourist
 Visitors at restaurants
Targeting
They are targeting on university students, who cannot cook as they are always in a hurry but
they want to eat warm and they prefer instant food. Hiking and survival fanatics, who
generally collect the food to prevent the people from any kind of disaster, therefore they get
prepared to handle it successfully.
Positioning
The position of Ajisen Ramen can be described as the simple and very tasty convention food
available in US market which is perfect for college students as they have no extra time to
cook. It is also perfect for those who have no knowledge related to cooking and the people
who want to have warm food but can’t cook (Morgan, 2012).
Marketing mix strategies
Product
Ajisen Ramen provides very tasty hot noodles with different tastes, types and different
presentations on a very reasonable price. They serve their noodles in their restaurants and
also sell in a form of packet which can be cooked very easily. They have different spices for
different type of noodles such as udon, soba, somen, (Chinese) egg noodles, and rice noodles.
They have the whole recipe written on the packet. Ajisen Ramen noodles also called as
instant noodles as it takes very minimal time to be prepared which is not more than five
minutes (Asian Review, 2017).
Price

Marketing for mangers
4
They want to serve every income group of people and also want to increase its consumers and
make them hard core loyal customers. Therefore in order to have the large number of
customers and to serve each income group of people, they are providing noodles in very low
cost. Low price with good quality will attract high number of customers (Varadarajan, 2010).
Place
Ajisen Ramen provide their products on places such as airports, several shopping sites
(amazon), super markets and hyper markets and grocery stores.
Promotion
Best results can be achieved with promotional platforms which have very high impact on the
consumers such as internet, newspaper, television, billboards and social media sites. (Daxue
consulting, 2013). In addition to this, sales promotion and public relations are mentioned
below.
Sales Promotion
Sales promotion under Ajisen Ramen aimed at pushing the product into super markets,
dormitories, universities and multinational companies through store displays, coupons,
discounts, free sample and others. To increase the demand, advertising efforts has been done
by the Ajisen Ramen. They also have sponsorship of schools, dormitories, sports events,
centres and new businesses (Armstrong, Kotler, Harker and Brennan, 2015).
Public Relations
Public relations are the key to success for any business as it helps to promote the company’s
features and competitive advantage. The main features of company’s noodles are quick, fresh
and tasty convention food. The parties who organize promotional activities for Ajisen Ramen
are dormitories, colleges, sports centres, survival for agency clubs and super markets
(Tomczak, Reinecke and Kuss, 2018). Therefore, the relations with these clubs and centres
helps in promoting the products through selling products and creating awareness among the
customers regarding the product.
Service Marketing Strategies
Service marketing strategies are the strategies which aim at delivering processes, experiences
and services instead of providing tangible goods to the customers.

Marketing for mangers
5
There are three types of service marketing strategies which are as follows:
 People
 Process
 Physical evidence (Professional Academy, 2018).
Process: It is defined as the way of delivering services to the customers which involves
various steps. It also can be explained as how a product is made and what are the procedures
of making the product (Lovelock, 2011).
Process of Ajisen Ramen noodles can be described as follows:
The process starts with making a thick mixture of flour and liquid. From the point of view of
Kenshirio, the most significant part of this process is to mix the flour and liquid and further
making a thick mixture of both the items until each particle of the flour get mixed with the
each and every particle of water. Then that thick mixture to make the ramen gets rolled into
some designed sheets and it remains for 45 minutes into the sheets. Duration of 45 minutes
allowed the glutens to rest the thick mixture and to develop properly. The final texture is
given after the whole process is chewy texture. When the sheets of ramen mixture get cut and
noodles start to form then the cut noodles make their way to different sections of the machine
and at the last noodles will be prepared for packaging. So this was the whole process of
making of ramen noodles (Truong, 2014).
Conclusion
Ajisen Ramen (Japanese based company) targeting to open more food chains in all over the
world. The biggest strength of Ajisen Ramen is its diversity. Ajisen Ramen has the
opportunity to grab the market share by introducing new products and services. Health impact
of noodles on the consumers can be a threat for the company. The main marketing objective
of Ajisen Ramen is to expand its market share. There are different marketing mix strategies
which involves seven P’s of marketing such as product, price, promotion, place, people,
process and physical evidence. Where it is explained regarding the promotional strategies of
the company and about the process of making the Ramen noodles.

Marketing for mangers
6

Marketing for mangers
7
References:
Armstrong, G., Kotler, P., Harker, M. and Brennan, R., 2015. Marketing: an introduction.
Pearson Education.
Asian Review, 2017, Ajisen China aims to give fliers taste of the Middle Kingdom [Online].
Available from https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/Ajisen-China-aims-to-give-
fliers-taste-of-the-Middle-Kingdom [Accessed 13 March 2018].
Companies, 2018, Ramen chain Ajisen China hit by 9.8pc drop in profit amid slowing
econom,[Online]. Available from:
http://www.scmp.com/business/companies/article/2008007/ramen-chain-ajisen-china-hit-
98pc-drop-profit-amid-slowing [Accessed on 13th March, 2018].
Daxue consulting, 2013, Market Research on Ajisen Restaurants in China, [Online].
Available from: http://daxueconsulting.com/market-research-on-ajisen-restaurants-in-china/
[Accessed on 13th March, 2018].
Lovelock, C., 2011. Services marketing: People, technology, strategy. Pearson Education
India.
Morgan, N.A., 2012. Marketing and business performance. Journal of the Academy of
Marketing Science, 40(1), pp.102-119.
Professional Academy, 2018, Marketing Theories – The Marketing Mix – From 4 Ps to 7 Ps
[Online]. Available from:
https://www.professionalacademy.com/blogs-and-advice/marketing-theories---the-marketing-
mix---from-4-p-s-to-7-p-s [Accessed on 13th March, 2018].
Tomczak, T., Reinecke, S. and Kuss, A., 2018. Introduction. In Strategic Marketing (pp. 1-
18). Springer Gabler, Wiesbaden.
Truong, B., 2014, The Process Of Making Ramen Noodles Is The Coolest Thing You'll Learn
Today [Online]. Available from: https://www.buzzfeed.com/briantron/how-to-make-ramen-
noodles?utm_term=.lyAG660zk#.urG0RRrlb [Accessed on 13th March, 2018].

Marketing for mangers
8
Varadarajan, R., 2010. Strategic marketing and marketing strategy: domain, definition,
fundamental issues and foundational premises. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science,
38(2), pp.119-140.