Kudler Fine Foods

Kudler Fine Foods

Kathy Kudler's vision of owning an upscale specialty food store became a reality in 1998, when she opened to doors to her first store, located in San Diego, California. The store was an instant success. Pleased with the end of the year profit margins for her first store, Ms. Kudler decided to draw up a blueprint for more stores in various locations. Within five years of opening her first store in San Diego, Ms. Kudler had managed to add two additional stores to her chain: Del Mar location and Encinitas. Although Ms. Kudler was enjoying the rapid success of her company, she was not pleased with the numbers that reflected her customer loyalty. In an effort to increase customer loyalty, Ms. Kudler hired a consulting firm to assist her with finding the best approach achieve this goal.

After an extensive assessment analysis of Ms. Kudler's current operations, the consulting firm presenting Ms. Kudler with their findings and results. The consulting team informs Ms. Kudler that "KFF has seen strong success and now must ensure continued growth by expanding services, improving the efficiency of operations, and increasing the consumer purchase cycle" (Kudler Fine Foods, 2008). The consulting team informs Ms. Kudler that it will take a conscious effort from each employee to create and deploy an effective strategy. Each member of the organization must play a key role in achieving these objectives. Special attention must be paid to the supply chain and business processes, especially when developing a new product offering. The consulting team acknowledges the significant growth that the company has experienced in the past few years and has recommended to Ms. Kudler that she now needs to focus on expanding the services, improving the efficiency of its operations and increasing the consumer purchase cycle as a means to increasing the loyalty and profitability of its consumers. (Kudler Fine Foods)

The information presented in this paper will focus on the following strategic plans: Expanding Services (Revenue Increase), Frequent Shopper Program (Revenue Increase) and Increased Efficiency (Cost Reduction).

Expanding Services

Currently Kudler utilizes an assortment of techniques to expand its services. Hosting celebrity cooking parties has been the most productive in getting customers and potential customers to come out and actively participate in the festivities. The marketing strategy for this campaign was excellent. Although this approach has helped position the company to increase its consumer purchases, it has still not been as effective in ensuring that the company meets its overall objective. The consulting team proposes that the company implement social networking into its current strategy to expand its services. Social networking is a technology that is being used by most companies to reach multiple demographics at an affordable cost. Kudler would greatly benefit from this technology. It would eliminate the cost of posting flyers and mailing out invitations because all of the information would be posted on the company's social network page. Social networking would also enable the company to post the winners of various contests and promotions that the company wants to advertise.

Frequent Shopper Program

Kudler's Frequent Shopper program has also added to the company's consumer base. "Kudler's new initiative is tracking purchase behavior at the individual customer level and providing high value incentives through a partnership with a loyalty points program" (Apollo Group, 2003). This enables the company to appeal to the delicate appetites