Swinburne University: Ben & Jerry's Business Strategy Case Analysis

This case study examines the business strategy of Ben & Jerry's, focusing on its mission, vision, and strategic approaches. The report analyzes the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, considering both internal and external factors. Key strategies include super-premium pricing, product differentiation, and brand loyalty, along with a strong emphasis on corporate social responsibility (CSR). The analysis uses PESTLE and SWOT frameworks to evaluate the political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental factors impacting the company. The study identifies challenges in balancing financial goals with CSR initiatives and recommends strategies to enhance competitiveness, including innovation and cost-cutting measures. The report highlights the importance of adapting to changing consumer preferences and global economic conditions to maintain market share and profitability.

BUSINESS STRATEGY

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Executive Summary
Strategic management has become most critical aspect in the modern day business. The
report indicates the problem statement at business level is that Ben & Jerry is unable to focus
on profit generation and CSR strategies of the firm. This report analyses the strategies used
by Ben & Jerry’s where it was found that it focused on the strategies like Super-premium
pricing, No GMOs, product differentiation, brand loyalty, small-scale Growth and
franchising, market strategy and corporate environment strategy. The internal analysis of the
company showed that being under the parent company and large varieties of products are the
strength of the company while weakness includes lack of brand visibility outside specific
region. They have opportunities in the emerging markets while threats are from the
turbulence in the global economic environment. The external environment suggests that
company needs to focus on the economic and social parameters which can be done with the
help of innovation and cost cutting measures.
Content

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s
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................2
Problem statement.................................................................................................................................2
Business strategy...................................................................................................................................3
Internal and external analysis and strategic recommendation................................................................5
Internal analysis.................................................................................................................................5
External analysis................................................................................................................................6
Recommendations.................................................................................................................................7
Social responsibility..............................................................................................................................7
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................8
References.............................................................................................................................................8

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Introduction
In today’s time businesses are facing many kinds of challenges and in this environment it is
critical that firms take strategies to improve their business condition. In the business
environment in which profitability has become the major concern for the company, the areas
such as corporate social responsibilities have become hard to implement successfully
(Edmondson, 2014). In this regards it is critical for the company to make business strategies
that satisfies the needs of the consumers. Ben & Jerry's super-premium ice cream company is
one of the super-premium companies that are known for selling ice-creams that has different
types of tastes. In the competitive environment, it is critical that a firm understand the type of
competition they are facing. In this regard understanding the internal and external
environment is critical. This report illustrates the problem statement for the company that
they are facing in the strategies of business level. It evaluates the business strategy of the
company with reference to mission and vision statement. It also elaborates the internal and
external analysis for the cited firm and recommendation that can help in improving this
current business strategy.
Problem statement
Among the different types of challenges that are faced by the company, the major challenge
that is confronting their business is that they are not able to manage the financial issues along
with the social issues so as to achieve both CSR and financial aims. It is the approach to CSR
that removes the tension by viewing societies and businesses as interdependent and
integrating social challenges into business level strategies in a manner that it provides
benefits to both business and society. But the problem is that this company is not utilising its
business level strategies in an appropriate manner so as to remain competitive in the market
(Goff and Hartel, 2013). This company has neither adopted competitive pricing and neither
have they adopted focus strategy so that they could be able to enhance their target market. A
demand for lighter foods that is healthy has been from many years but this company has
failed to address it. They are failing to make strategies that support natural ingredients use in
their products. This company is facing issue related to executive compensations as many
debates to utilise it for the goodwill of the company.

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Business strategy
Their mission statement of the company is distributed in three parts i.e. economic, social and
product. The economic mission is to manage their firm for sustainable financial growth. The
social mission is to operate the firm in a manner where they actively identifies the central role
that businesses plays in the structure of the society by initiating innovative methods to
enhance the quality of life of the larger community (Cohen, Greenfield and Stevens, 2012).
Product mission is to create, distribute and sell the finest quality ice-creams that are natural
and related products in larger variety of innovative flavours. On the other hand the vision
statement of the firm suggests that company is going to make best possible ice-creams, in the
nicest possible manner.
Their mission and vision statements of the company are more idealistic but the strategies used
by the company do not tend to be so. Some of the strategies used by the organisation include:
Super-premium pricing: In the time when the competition has become a severe concern.
This company is doing nothing to provide competitive advantage in terms of pricing. There is
only of its product i.e. “CR Best Buy” that combines excellent quality at a significantly lower
price (Marshall, Goff and Hartel, 2012).
No GMOs: This Company has focused towards no-GMO in their food products. This helps
them in fulfilling their social mission of innovating ways that works in the favour of the
society. In the time when most of the companies are not willing to choose this method for
their production, this strategy differentiates them from others.
Product differentiation: Their strategy is to enhance the product quality so that when
customer pays for it, they do not feel that it is not worthy to pay such higher prices. The
company aims to enhance the all-natural products and use high quality ingredients along with
innovative flavours have given them competitive advantage over the rivals. They have also
given Quirky flavour names such as Phish food, Chunkey Monkey, Chubby Hubby etc. This
is different from that of their competitors. This company also fulfils its product and social
mission by using recycled materials and dioxin-free paper in their product packaging. This is
also helping them in lowering their cost at the lowest of level. They have involved continuous
improvement approach is their business so as to remain competitive in the market. Product
differentiation along with process differentiation helps them in maintaining themselves
different from their consumers (Du, Bhattacharya and Sen, 2010).

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Brand loyalty: This Company has worked tremendously towards improving the favourable
reputation and image. This is done with their promotional campaigns and donation to social
causes and utilisation of eco-friendly products. They have ranked 1st in terms of CSR when
asked from their customers in the polls which helps them in addressing their corporate
mission statements.
Small-scale Growth and Franchising: The economic mission of the firm is to achieve the
profitability, increasing value to the stakeholders and create career opportunities is addressed
with the help this strategy. The success in this strategy is achieved through establishing
several franchised “scoop shops” throughout nation and Europe. It is this “scoop shops” that
adds to their profitability and it is also the major source of employment they are providing.
This company also gains a competitive advantage through franchising by extending their
market share, enhancing revenue and publicizing the firm’s brand name utilising minimal
amount of start-up capitals (Ciszek and Logan, 2018).
Market strategy: Investing in innovation so as to get new products at regular intervals
especially in terms of flavours, focusing on grass-root community involvements along with
the “down home” local image are some of the major marketing strategies they are applying.
This firm’s Waterbury ice-cream factory is the one of the most visited spots in Vermont.
They also do their marketing with the help of creative television advertisements and public
relations campaign. The brand recognition is also improved by the company with the help of
innovative online marketing and web-based promotion that is done with Yahoo. This helps
them in achieving their economic and product mission.
Corporate environment strategy: It was the first firm that adopted CERES (Coalition for
Environmentally Responsible Economies) principles as a part of their environmental strategy.
It is a group that non-profit coalition of the interest coalition of interest groups working in
partnership with the firms so as to achieve environment sustainability goals. This company’s
environment goals as a firm are to reduce its negative influence on the environment,
promoting sustainability farming and safe methods of food production which reduces
environmental degradation and also utilises its business as a channel for social and
environmental change. Their CEO takes initiatives to ensure that everyone is involved in the
environment sustainability and values are shared throughout the firm. Everyone gets
informed about the environmental issues (Bourgeois III, et al. 2017). At the time of
orientation only employees are informed about the environmental policies of the firm. There

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are employee led groups called Green teams that work in the areas like recycling,
compositing and writing eco-facts for the firm newspaper. These strategies help them in
achieving all the mission and vision statements of the company especially in terms of the fact
that they are able to manage the financial issues such as over costing along with social issues
such as environment degradation.
Internal and external analysis and strategic recommendation
For recommending the best possible strategy for the company, it is critical to analyse the
internal and external environment for the company.
Internal analysis
Strength
 It is having large numbers of products to offer especially in terms of flavours.
 It is having strong name in the CSR.
 Its leadership supports CSR activities.
 Big market name such as Uniliver is the parent company which provides them with
strong financial base and other kinds of resources (Kearins and Collins, 2012).
Weaknesses
 Its pricing seems to be its biggest weakness as it does not allow them to target larger
section in the market.
 This company does not have international reputation it is strong in specific region
only.
 In the recent years they have failed to make balance between financial and CSR
objectives (Lundqvist, et al. 2013).
Opportunities
 They have opportunities in the developing markets such as India and China which has
growing urban class having huge spending power.
 They have the opportunity in the niche market where the competition is not so high.
 They also have opportunity in the local cost market if they tend to reduce the overall
prices for their products or if they use competitive pricing (Isaak, 2016).
Threats

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 Decreasing economic health of the global market is having impact on the sales of the
premium products as people are not willing to spend much.
 The decreasing profit margins are not allowing the company to spend on the CSR
initiatives.
External analysis
In order to understand the external environment, the use of PESTLE analysis is effective.
 Political: The political environment of the world is not so stable. With China and US
indulging in trade war, imposing extra taxes on each other has a negative impact on
the development of the society. In this environment, it is not easy for any company to
do significant investments in any country. Since the taxes on premium items is
enhancing in many parts of the world hence getting higher profits might not be easy
for the company.
 Economic: The economic slowdown in American and European region is reducing the
bargaining power of the people. It might be hard for most of the firms to improve the
economic position in such an environment especially when people have restricted on
investing on the premium products. The economic condition does seem to be
improving in the coming years hence Unilever will have to make appropriate
strategies to tackle the turbulence in the market (Hansen and Hansen, 2010).
 Social: There is a change in the society and its preferences. Consumer preferences are
also changing at much faster speed and hence it is critical that for the company also to
keep improving their ice-creams so that consumer’s taste buds can be attracted.
People these days are looking for the taste variations at relatively lower cost which is
provided by many of the competitors of Ben & Jerry’s (Valentine, 2012).
 Technology: The technology that is involved in both operations management as well
as marketing within the industry is highly advanced. Technologies are also involved
in functionalities like data management as demand forecast has become an essential
aspect for the business growth.
 Environmental: Environmental concerns have increased and governments have
become very strict on the use of materials that are harming the environment. Due to
this, firms such as Ben & Jerry need to improve the ways in which they are using
materials for packaging. But it won’t be a significant problem for the company as this
company has a strong environmental protection strategy (Clements, 2012).

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 Legal: Governments have become very strict on quality of the products along with
this the business related laws are also changing at the global levels at much faster
speed. It is essential that the cited firm looks at all the legal aspects so as to avoid any
legal compliance.
Recommendations
According to the business environment of the company, some of the recommendations are:
 Use of advanced digital marketing techniques can be beneficial such as data based
marketing especially in terms of personalised marketing and marketing through social
media channels.
 It is also recommended that company protect its image in the shades of being acquired
by Unilever with the help of socially responsible business strategy (Kopel, 2015).
 Company also needs to reduce their cost of operations for enhancing the profit
margins.
 Cleaner manufacturing process needs to be adopted.
 In order to reduce the operational cost and empowering distribution system it is
critical that company opens new manufacturing plants in different parts of the world.
Social responsibility
There are many stakeholders that will get affected by the above based recommendations. But
the two stakeholders that will be majorly impacted by the recommendation will be investors
and customers.
Consequences for investors
Investors need to put in new sum of money on the technology development which can be
hard decision for them in the time of global financial crisis (Kim, 2014). It also creates an
ethical dilemma that where they should focus on profitability enhancement by making cost
cuts with the help of management and generate source or should keep on investing on the
projects related to CSR.
Consequences on consumers
Consumers will get chance to interact with company with the help of digital mediums hence
will be able to understand the actual requirements of the people (Ashill and Jobber, 2014). It

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creates an ethical dilemma is the sense that consumers will be more likely to get influenced
by the aggressive marketing done by the company.
Conclusion
From the above based report, it can be concluded that Ben and Jerry’s is following strategies
such as diversification, brand loyalty and product quality enhancement to improve their
position in the competitive market. Its strength includes the support of big companies such as
Unilever while the weakness includes lesser brand image outside specific region. It has
opportunities in the emerging market and faces threats from global economic crisis. The
external environment seems to be more challenging for this firm to operate. It is
recommended that this company utilises more digital mediums to reach to customers at
personal levels.

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References
Ashill, N.J. and Jobber, D., 2014. The effects of the external environment on marketing
decision-maker uncertainty. Journal of Marketing Management, 30(3-4), pp.268-294.
Bourgeois III, L.J., Mariani, E., Yu, V.J., Bourgeois III, L.J., Mariani, E. and Yu, V.J., 2017.
Ben & Jerry's and Unilever: The Bohemian and the Behemoth. Darden Business Publishing
Cases, pp.1-11.
Ciszek, E. and Logan, N., 2018. Challenging the dialogic promise: How Ben & Jerry’s
support for Black Lives Matter fosters dissensus on social media. Journal of Public Relations
Research, 30(3), pp.115-127.
Clements, J.D., 2012. Corporations are not people: Why they have more rights than you do
and what you can do about it. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Cohen, B., Greenfield, J. and Stevens, N., 2012. Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream &
Dessert Book. Workman Publishing.
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reviews, 12(1), pp.8-19.
Edmondson, B., 2014. Ice Cream Social: The Struggle for the Soul of Ben & Jerry's. Berrett-
Koehler Publishers.
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Kim, S., 2014. What’s worse in times of product-harm crisis? Negative corporate ability or
negative CSR reputation?. Journal of Business Ethics, 123(1), pp.157-170.

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Kopel, M., 2015. Price and quantity contracts in a mixed duopoly with a socially concerned
firm. Managerial and Decision Economics, 36(8), pp.559-566.
Lundqvist, A., Liljander, V., Gummerus, J. and Van Riel, A., 2013. The impact of
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