A Comprehensive Analysis of Primark's Rise, Challenges, and Strategies

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Primark, a prominent fast-fashion retailer, investigating its evolution, current market position, and strategic approaches. The report begins with an executive summary and terms of reference, outlining the scope and objectives. It then details the research methodology, including the sources used. The findings section explores Primark's history, product portfolio, store locations, and its approach to problem-solving, particularly concerning supplier issues. The report delves into Primark's planning, communication, monitoring, and review processes related to its supply chain. Furthermore, it identifies and describes current problems faced by Primark, assessing their nature, scope, and impact. The analysis incorporates SWOT, PESTLE, and stakeholder analyses to evaluate the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats, and external factors influencing its operations. The report concludes with an analysis of the root causes of Primark's problems, drawing conclusions and offering potential business options and recommendations for future development, with detailed appendices, acknowledgements, a reference list, and a bibliography. The report aims to understand Primark's strategies and challenges within the competitive fast-fashion market.

An investigation into the rise of Primark
1

An investigation into the rise of Primark
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY……………………………………………………………..2
1.0 TERMS OF REFERENCE..............................................................................................
2.0 PROCEDURE..................................................................................................................
2.1 BOOKS, WEBSITES AND JURNALS.............................................................................
3.0 FINDINGS........................................................................................................................
3.1 BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO THE ORGANIZATION.......................................................
3.2CURRENT PRODUCT PORTOFOLIO AND STORE LOCATIONS................................
Task 1 Compile a timeline diagram which outlines the major development the
organisation has faced since its launch in 1969....................................................................
Task 2 Describe its current product and store location portfolio...........................................
3.3 HOW PRIMARK HAS PLANNED,COMMUNICATED,MONITORED AND
REVIEWED PREVIOUS ATTEMPTS TO RESOLVE It'S PROBLEMS..............................
Task Investigate and discuss how Primnark has planed,communicated, monitored and
reviewed previous attempts to resolve problems whit suppliers.........................................
3.4 PRIMARK CURENT PRPBLEMS; NATURE, SCOPE AND IMPACT..........................
Task Describe the nature, scope and impact of any current problem/s facing Primark....
Describe a problem, its nature, scope and impact..............................................................
3.5 ANALYSIS OF PRIMARK..............................................................................................
3.5.1 SWOT ANALYSIS.......................................................................................................
3.5.2 PESTLE ANALYSIS....................................................................................................
3.5.3 STAKEHOLDERS ANALYSIS....................................................................................
PROBLEM SOLVING..........................................................................................................
4.0 CONCLUSION...............................................................................................................
Task Using your research information undertake an analysis of the causes of the
problem/s at Primark by using the following models...........................................................
4.1SITUATION OF ORGANIZATIONS................................................................................
Task Based on your analysis draw a conclusion that clearly identifies the main issues
faced by Primark..................................................................................................................
4.2 ORGANISTION CONCERN..........................................................................................
2

4.3PROBLEM SOLVING.....................................................................................................
Gather and interpret information to solve a problem...........................................................
Evaluate options to make a decision...................................................................................
Plan, monitor and review the implementation and communication of decisions.................
5.0 OPTION.........................................................................................................................
5.1 PLAN FOR SUPLIERS..................................................................................................
Task Suggest possible business options that enables decision makers at Primark to
resolve the problems identified in your report......................................................................
6.0 APPENDICE..................................................................................................................
7.0 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS..............................................................................................
8.0 REFERENCE LIST........................................................................................................
9.0 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................................
Bibliography.........................................................................................................................
3

Executive summary
The purpose of the paper is to understand the existing state of the fast fashion
company, Primark through the identification of its problems, concerns and problem
addressing techniques. The paper discussed about the popular clothing and accessory
brand, Primark, which started its operation in Ireland. The brand expanded globally by
the strategy of offering trendy clothes with affordable pricing. The offerings of the
company is solely focussed on the changing fashion choices of target population. The
paper identified various problems of the company, ineffective communication strategy,
partially effective auditing process, inclusion of sustainability in the complete process of
supply chain and perceived notion about fashion brands, being unethical, lower quality
and unsustainable.
4

1.0 Terms of reference
The CEO of PRIMARK requested a report to be written on the 5/6/2019. The purpose of
the report is to examine the fall and rise of PRIMARK. The researcher from COMZOO
CONSULTANS LTD completed this report. The problems are to be identified using a
SWOT analysis, PESTLE and STAKEHOLDER analysis. The conclusion will draw
together the analysis and identify the main problems. The report will also offer
recommendations for future development. The report will be completed by12/7/2019.
2.0 Procedure
The report for understanding the existent plans and strategies of Primark was
undertaken by researching about the company through secondary research followed by
the understanding about existent problems of the company.
2.1 Books, websites and journals
Gano, D. (2011) Seven steps to effective problem solving and strategies for personal
success. 1st edn. EBook: Reality Charting.
Belton, V. and Stewart, T.J. (2001) Multiple criteria decision analysis: An integrated
approach. 2nd edn. Boston, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Mayer, R.E. (1992) Thinking, problem solving, cognition. 2nd edn. New York:
W.H.Freeman & Co.
https://fashionunited.uk/primark-sustainability
http://businesscasestudies.co.uk/primark/engaging-with-stakeholders/what-is-a-
stakeholder.html
https://www.localdatacompany.com/blog/primark-whats-the-secret-to-its-success
https://stores.primark.com/index.html#
Essential
Adair, J. (2013) Decision making and problem solving strategies. 2nd edn. London:
Kogan Page.
Proctor, T. (2009) Creative problem solving for managers: Developing skills for decision
making and innovation. 3rd edn. New York: Routledge.
Recommended
Belton, V. and Stewart, T.J. (2001) Multiple criteria decision analysis: An integrated
approach. 2nd edn. Boston, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Mayer, R.E. (1992) Thinking, problem solving, cognition. 2nd edn. New York:
W.H.Freeman & Co.
McClelland, D.C. and C, D. (1988) Human motivation. Cambridge, England: Cambridge
Universitry Press.
SMART goals (2016) Available at: https://www.projectsmart.co.uk/smart-goals.php
5

(Accessed: 25 July 2016).
Van Emden, J. and Becker, L. (2014) Presentation skills for students. Basingstoke:
Palgrave Macmillan.
Websites
http://theproblemsite.com
http://www.studygs.net/problem
CMI (2012) Henry Laurence Gantt: the Gantt chart. Available at:
https://www.managers.org.uk/~/media/Campus%20Resources/Henry%20Laurence
%20Gantt%20-%20The%20Gantt%20Chart.ashx
Institute of Leadership and Management (no date) Https://www.I_l_m.Com/. Available
at: https://www.i_l_m.com
Poster presentation (2015) Available at:
http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/assess/poster.html
3.0 Findings
3.1 Brief introduction of the organization
The Irish clothing distributor Primark is located on the regions like, Ireland, United
Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Portugal, the Netherlands and Spain. The main office of
Primark is located in Dublin. The fast fashion brand, Primark have expanded its
business with the popularity in Ireland. Primark expanded to United Kingdom after its
home country. The fashion company spread across the global with the strategy of
internationalization and the offerings of trendy clothes and affordable pricing. The
international fashion retailer offers beauty, homeware and fashion products through its
stores in 368 plus locations in the globe. It is known for offering high value of trending
clothing and accessories with affordable pricing structure. The fast fashion retailer
sources their garments from the factories of Bangladesh, India, Vietnam and China due
to the presence of lower cost of material and labour. Primark aims at satisfying the
changing preferences of the customers by sourcing from a strategic assortment of
factories/manufacturers of the world.
Task Compile a timeline diagram which outlines the major development the
organisation has faced since its launch in 1969.
6

Timeline of Primark
(Source: Primark.com 2019).
7

The fast fashion brand, Primark is based in regions of United Kingdom which is
known for its clothes, footwear and accessories. The company was founded in the year
1969 by Weston family. The fashion retail brand now possess 345 stores which are
situated in around eleven countries. The company targets the population who are
attracted towards low-priced clothing items with the association of recent trends. In the
year 2016, the net revenue of the company amounted up to 378.7 million pounds. The
net worth of the fast fashion brand, Primark was around 200 million pounds in the year
2011. In 2007, the market share of Primark in United Kingdom was 4.1 percent. The
market share rose up to seven percent in the year 2018.
The first store was established in the year 1969 in the regions of Ireland by
opening the first store in Dublin. Primark own a total of 38 stores in Ireland. In the year
1973, the very first store in United Kingdom was established and now owns 174 stores.
In the year 2006, Primark established its first store in Spain, Madrid. Presently, Primark
has 42 stores in the regions of United Kingdom. The fast fashion brand, Primark
established the very first store in the Netherlands with currently, 15 stores (PERRY and
WOOD 2018). The first store of Portugal, Liege and Germany was established in the
year 2009. The store of Austria was established in the year 2012. The Primark store of
France was established in the year 2013. In 2014, the fast fashion brand opened two
new stores in France. The USA store of Primark was established in the year 2015. The
store of Italy was first established in the year 2016. The largest store of Primark is
established in Birmingham high street with the area of 160,000 square feet that is of a
total of five floors. The largest store of Primark in Birmingham is accompanied by three
dining cafés, which includes Disney. It also consists of a barber shop and beauty studio.
3.2 PROVIDE AN OVERVIEW OF ITS CURRENT PRODUCT PORTOFOLIO AND
STORE LOCATIONS
Task: Describe its current product and store location portfolio
The portfolio of Primark in regards with its store location is presented below:
United Kingdom: The fast fashion brand Primark own 174 stores in United Kingdom. In
Britain, the stores of Primark are situated in the shopping centres and high streets. Very
few numbers of retail stores of Primark are located in retail parks, which could be
considered as an opportunity for the purpose of expanding Primark in Retail Park
(Stores.primark.com 2019).
8

Ireland: The stores of Ireland are located in the regions like, Carlow, Athlone, Clonmel,
Cork, Dublin, Dundalk, Dún Laoghaire, Ballina, Ennis, Galway, Castlebar, Drogheda,
Limerick, Longford, Letterkenny, Kilkenny, Portlaoise, Navan, Killarney, Newbridge,
Mullingar, Tralee, Sligo, Santry, Rathfarnham, Wilton, Wexford and Waterford
(Stores.primark.com 2019).
United States: The stores of United States are situated in Boston, Brooklyn, Braintree,
Danbury, Burlington, Freehold, Willow Grove, Staten Island and King of Prussia.
Austria: The stores of Austria are situated in the areas like, Graz, Innsbruck,
Vosendrof, Gerasdrof bei Wien and Pasching.
France: The fast fashion company, Primark owns numerous stores in France. The
stores are situated in Creteil, Dijon, Bordeaux, Le Havre, Lille, Marseille, Paris, Lyon,
Metz, Cagnes-sur-Mer, Serris, Metz, Evry, Toulouse and La Valette-du-Var.
Germany: The Primark stores of Germany are located in Bremen, Berlin, Cologne,
Bielefeld, Essen, Hamburg, Dresden, Dortmund, Karlsruhe, Frankfurt, Hannover,
Krefeld, Braunschweig, Ingolstadt, Leipzig, Gelsenkirchen, Münster, Stuttgart,
Weiterstadt, Kaiserslautern, München, Mannheim, Wuppertal and Saarbrucken
(Petersen 2017).
Italy: The stores of Italy are located in Brescia, Verona, Arese and Campi Bisenzio.
Spain: The stores of Primark in Spain are located in Algeciras, Almería, Barcelona,
Bilbao, Cadiz, Camargo, Armilla, Huelva, Badajoz, Albacete, Cordoba, Coruña, Las
Palmas, Logroño, Gran Canaria, Madrid, Churra, Malaga, Orihuela, Palma, Pamplona,
Murcia, Alicante, Roquetas de Mar, Castellón de la Plana, Ruzafa, Sevilla, Valencia,
Vitoria-Gasteiz, Santiago de Compostela, Majahonda, Santa Cruz de Tenerife,
Valladolid, Zaragoza, Oviedo and Tarragona.
Netherlands: The stores of Primark in Netherlands are located in Almere, Alkmaar,
Den Haag, Arnhem, Amsterdam, Eindhoven, Dordrecht, Groningen, Nijmegen,
Enschede, Tilburg, Hoofddorp, Hilversum, Zoetermeer, Utrecht, Rotterdam, Venlo,
Zwolle and Zaandam (Stores.primark.com 2019).
Belgium: The stores of Belgium are situated in Antwerp, Ghent, Brussels, Hasselt,
Liege, Bruxelles and Charleroi.
Portugal: The stores of Portugal are located in Almancil, Braga, Porto, Portimao,
Lisbon and Almada (Stores.primark.com 2019).
Slovenia: There are a single store in Slovenia which is Primark Ljubljana.
9

Product Portfolio:
The product categories of Primark ranges from clothing category for women, men
and children, accessories, Homeware, confectionary, beauty products and footwear.
Primark also included Sephora products that are sold at a rate starting from 1 pound
from the year 2014. Primark included vegan options in the cafés for addressing the
increasing demand of target customers from the year 2018 (Rapley 2017). The
company is known for selling clothes and accessories at lower cost as compared to
other fashion brands like H&M, Forever 21 and Zara.
3.3 DISCUSS HOW PRIMARK HAS PLANNED, COMMUNICATED, MONITORED
AND REVIEWED PREVIOUS ATTEMPTS TO RESOLVE PROBLEMS
Task: Investigate and discuss how Primark has planned, communicated,
monitored and reviewed previous attempts to resolve problems with suppliers
Primark have faced various allegations and issues in the past about supply chain
management. The fast fashion brand have incorporated the system of Global Sourcing
Map, which utilizes the online platform for implementing transparency in the system.
Global Sourcing Maps enables customers to develop the knowledge about the suppliers
and around 1071 factories. One of the spokesperson of Primark communicated that,
“For a number of years, we’ve been working closely with industry partners sharing
information about where Primark products are made. This has included, for example,
details of our suppliers, their factories, as well as our supply chain practices,” The
information about the suppliers of Primark is published through the implication of
sourcing map in the 31 countries, which includes addresses, names, gender categories
and number of factory workers (Lee and Vachon 2016). The company decided to
publish information about their supplier after the act of communicating the details of the
sourcing practices by around 98 percent of the factories, which are also involved in
manufacturing garments and accessories for other brands (Fütterer 2019). The director
of Ethical Trade and Environmental sustainability at Primark, Katherine Stewart
communicated the planning process and motive of implementing transparency in the
supply chain of the fast fashion brand, “Transparency for supply chain has always been
a critical agenda. This wasn’t a case of us not having the data, we know where our
10

products are made (Binet et al. 2019). For us, we felt there was a natural cadence for
getting this information out and launching the website was the first step, with the Global
Sourcing Map following on as a second phase,” The reason for the implication was
responding to the preferences of stakeholders and increasing consumer base for
Primark.
3.4 DESCRIBE THE NATURE, SCOPE AND IMPACT OF THE CURENT PRPBLEMS
FACING PRIMARK
Task: Describe the nature, scope and impact of any current problem/s facing
Primark
Primark is a popular fashion brand, which is known for offering clothes and
accessories that are in trend with the association of lower price. Although the company,
Primark offers affordable fashion but negatively contribute to the environment through
carbon footprint. Primark has developed a pre conceived notion of being non-
sustainable and unethical in executing the operational activities (Ivanov, Tsipoulanidis
and Schönberger 2017). The company has adopted various initiatives towards the
factor of sustainability, the company is a member of Sustainable Apparel Coalition The
initiatives involves the transformation from plastic to paper bags and have aimed for
reducing the wastes from packaging and production process. The fast fashion brand
have tried to resolving the concerns by monitoring the greenhouse gas emissions.
However, the brand reflects minimum information regarding the report of greenhouse
gases and initiatives for negative environmental impact. The company have
experienced controversies regarding the collapsing of Rana Plaza, which reflected
safety issues. The current problem of ethical and environmental concerns of the
consumers have extended to the option of brand switch to other brands like H&M and
TK Max. The current problems of Primark reflects the scope of brand switching and may
lower customer conversion rates. The published information about the reports regarding
reducing the climatic impact is not available in the public forum, except energy efficiency
in stores (Cooper et al. 2015). The impact of the current problem can increase the
preconceived notion of the fast fashion brand of being unethical and unsustainable
(Ivanov, Tsipoulanidis and Schönberger 2019). The lack of communication regarding
set goals and objectives for minimizing the carbon footprint of the company, which
creates misunderstanding and unwillingness amongst target market. The company has
appointed a team of Ethical Trade and Environment Sustainability for monitoring the
11

negative impact through the operational process (Bringezu and Bleischwitz 2017).
However, the auditing implemented as the form of sourcing criteria and at the final stage
of production, which cannot assure the quality attainment and fair labour practices in the
actual process of action. The company is moving towards complete sustainability by
incorporating practices of animal welfare but the business do not share the source of
raw materials of numerous product offerings.
3.5 ANALYSIS OF PRIMARK
3.5.1 UNDERTAKE A SWOT ANALYSIS TO IDENTIFY WHY THE ORGANIZATION
IS FACED WITH IT’S CURENT PROBLEMS. IDENTIFY AREAS WITHIN THE SWOT
THAT MAY HELP THEM RESOLVE THESE PROBLEMS
SWOT ANALYSIS
Strengths
1. It offers an extensive variety of clothing and accessories.
2. Primark started sourcing sustainable materials with a transparent supplier
management system.
3. It owns more than 300 stores.
4. It employs around 50,000 people from around the world.
5. It offers trendy fashionable clothes and accessories in lower cost in comparison
with the competitors like Zara and H&M (Lluesma and Ruiz 2018).
6. The company focusses on the practice of Ethical trading which covers the areas
like, avoiding labour exploitation, sustainability in production and employees
rights.
Weaknesses
1. Primark is majorly dependent on the application of word of mouth in place of
advertising, which can be a disadvantage for the fashion brand.
12