Week 8 EOC: The Adventure

It was a windy, cloudy day in Berlin, Germany as Phileas stepped off the train to explore the city. There seemed to be something off about this particular day, like something major was going to happen, either good or bad. Phileas didn’t what and didn’t really pay much attention to this sort of off feeling he was getting this particular day. His time was limited in Berlin, so he had to make sure he saw and got done what he needed to in time for the next train of town. Quickly, he headed toward the inner city to see what it had to offer. The streets were flooded with people, walking in every direction, some bumping shoulders as they passed others, birds seemed to be flying in odd patterns. It almost seemed like the world was not itself that day. “Am I missing something?” Phileas asked himself. Not really thinking too much of it, he carried on with his adventure. He started to get hungry so he looked for a bar nearby to grab a quick bite. After searching through the crowd of people and chewing up a bunch of his time, Phileas at last found a bar. Just like the streets, that too was flooded. Phileas grabbed himself a table and waited for the bar to clear up. It took, a little bit of time but he finally got a beer and placed an order for food. He ordered a basket of fries and wings. Not an unusual bar order but just enough to get him by. After about thirty to forty-five minutes and a couple beers, Phileas started to get upset about still not receiving his order. Knowing his time in Berlin was coming to an end, he confronted the bar tender. “Where the hell is my food? It’s been forty-five minutes, I’m starving and my train leaves soon.” “Sorry sir, we’re a little backed up at the moment. I’ll see what we can do for you. Is there perhaps something else I can get you while you wait?” “Jesus, this is ridiculous! I demand the best damn thing on your menu and I definitely don’t expect to be paying for this!” “Certainly sir, we’ll get something going for you right now!” The bar tender came back five minutes later with two plates; one with his wings and fries, and the other with something that Phileas couldn’t’ keep his eyes off of. “Here you go sir,” said the bar tender, “here is your wings and fries, and also I brought something special on the house.” “What are these things?” asked Phileas. “These sir, I present to you are ‘Poppin Pretzels’. Filled with melted cheddar cheese, bacon and sausage. Here, try one.” Phileas took one bite and BAM, his eyes lit up with satisfaction. “My god, these are delicious! It has every element I look for in a bar snack; crunch, cheese, and meaty and greasy. PERFECTION!” The poppers were so good, he asked for the recipe and took it back home with him. 

Week 10 EOC: Road to Success

For this week i need to:
Tweet
Read book
Finish blogs
Come up with some creative content
Show up to class
Have a good breakfast before finals

Poppin Pretzels Ad

Music Fades In

Announcer:                                              Hello there, Phileas Fogg here to introduce to you yet another exciting new snack I had discovered during my recent time spent in Germany. Poppin' Pretzels. Poppin' Pretzels consists of a delicious, melted cheese, with sausage, and crispy bacon bits on the inside, and a warm, doughy, lightly salted outside. Phileas Fogg's Poppin' Pretzels. Coming to a bar near you.

Music Fades Out

Promotion

A lot of thought goes into figuring out how you're going to promote a new product. Do you want TV commercials? Radio Ads? Billboards? What's your budget? Who's your audience? These are all things to consider for promoting your product. "Promotion spending is relatively high to inform consumers of the new product and get them to try it." Marketing: An Introduction, pg 259. We didn't want to go out and spend the big bucks on a bunch of advertising. Just to see how the product takes off, we came about promoting with a cheaper approach. For the Poppin Pretzels, our promotion will be mainly word of mouth, billboards, flyers, and radio ads.  "I'm curious to see what kind of distribution it's going to get because of that." -Caroline Dhavernas. 

Business Mission Statement

The Phileas Fogg company has always been driven by giving customers quality products at affordable prices. We have put forth 110% effort  into making that all of our customers are satisfied and enjoying the products that we put out. "Mission statements should be meaningful and specific yet motivating." Marketing: An Introduction, Pg 40. That's why our mission statement is "It's better to be tasteful than to be wasteful." Our products are put together with quality ingredients that are fresh and prepared daily. 

Objectives

The main objective of my product is to bring a exciting, quality bar food snack at a reasonable cost with a reasonable amount that anyone can enjoy. Typical bar food snacks can be pricy and come with very little product. That's not the case with the Poppin Pretzels. Poppin Pretzels come in two different sizes, both at a low cost. You can can get a small plate with 12 poppers @ $5.99 and a large plate with 25 poppers @ $10.99. The small plate is good because it can be used as a personal plate or it can be shared between 2-4 people. I want to make sure customers get quality and quantity so that's why both plates come with a reasonable amount of poppers at a great low cost! "The company’s objectives should be defined in specific terms so management can measure progress and plan corrective action if needed to stay on track." Marketing: An Introduction, pg MP7. 

SWOT Analysis

S.W.O.T. Analysis- An overall evaluation of the company’s strengths (S), weaknesses (W), opportunities (O), and threats (T). Marketing: An Introduction, pg 54. At Phileas Fogg, our S.W.O.T. Analysis is simple and easy to read.

 Strengths:

Consistent quality- We continue to produce products with fresh, high quality ingredients. 

Price- The pricing of our products is so reasonable that competitors can’t even compete with them.

Marketing- Focused marketing campaign with clear goals and strategies.

Weaknesses:

Competitor Market: Competitors may develop expensive new marketing campaigns.

Lack of Funding- We will have to take out loans for the first year to get the product going.

Opportunities:

New- New products could spark a whole new wave of bar food.

Customer Loyalty-  Customers are always looking for new and exciting products to try and we give them the opportunity to let them try our new products first hand and let them give input toward new product ideas.

Threats:

Competition- Competitors may develop similar products

Price Fluctuation- Fluctuations of products may occur.

Target Marketing Strategy

The company must first decide who it will serve. It does this by dividing the market into segments of customers (market segmentation) and selecting which segments it will go after (target marketing). Marketing: An Introduction, pg 9. I plan to target bar goers of all sorts. Whether you go to the bar every now and then or the bar is practically your second home, we want to serve you! To design a winning marketing strategy, the marketing manager must answer two important questions: What customers will we serve (what’s our target market)? and How can we serve these customers best (what’s our value proposition)? Marketing: An Introduction, pg 9 We already discussed who we will be serving, but how can we do our best to serve them? Customers are always welcome to give feedback on products and we will make the proper adjustments needed to give our customers the best tasting products we can serve.

Price

Price plays an important factor on products. It can decide whether or not a customer is going to buy the product or tell you the quality of the product. "The price the company charges will fall somewhere between one that is too high to produce any demand and one that is too low to produce a profit." Marketing: An Introduction, pg 275.  Me personally believe that snack food such as bar food should come with a reasonable price for a reasonable quality. For example, I wouldn't like to pay $15 for 5 wings and one cup of dipping sauce. So that's why for my famous Pretzel Poppers, I have priced them at a small plate  @ $5.99 for 12 poppers and a large plate @ $10.99 for 25 poppers. Each plate is included with unlimited dipping sauce of your choice as well. "Rather than offering high quality at a high price, or lesser quality at very low prices, marketers in all industries are looking for ways to offer today’s more financially cautious buyers greater value—just the right combination of product quality and good service at a fair price." Marketing: An Introduction, pg 79

Distribution

When a new product is discovered, not exactly everyone hears about it right away. We want to change that. The distribution of our product, Poppin Pretzels, will be to the whole United States. I figured, "why not let everyone have a chance to try this delicious new product?" It will be targeted towards the low-mid to upper-mid class bars. This will give the majority of bar goers to have a chance to experience the poppers, and possibly turn out to be their new favorite snack. So unless you're a high end bar/club goer and don't venture into your local bars, you probably won't get to experience these delicious snacks yourself. "The idea that consumers will favor products that are available and highly affordable and that the organization should therefore focus on improving production and distribution efficiency." Marketing: An Introduction, pg 10.

Product

Creating a quality product takes thought and a wise choice of supplies. That's why our Poppin Pretzels are made with quality ingredients to give you the biggest bang for your buck. "Marketing planning involves deciding on marketing strategies that will help the company attain its overall strategic objectives." Marketing: An Introduction, pg 55. First off, the dough is made with ingredients that blend together to make a soft, doughy, golden outside. We give you the option between two German-native cheeses; Tilsit and Butterkase. Tilsit is light yellow cheese, almost like a cheddar cheese and Butterkase is almost like a swiss cheese. Both melted to mix well with the other ingredients. We added bacon and sausage in the mix for a great blend of cheese, meat, and slight crunch from the pretzel with lightly sprinkled sea salt on the outside. "Marketing managers must ensure that their marketing dollars are being well spent." Marketing: An Introduction, pg 58.

Implementation Evaluation Control

One way of defining marketing implementation is, the process that turns marketing plans into marketing actions in order to accomplish strategic marketing objectives. Whereas marketing planning addresses the what and why of marketing activities, implementation addresses the who, where, when, and how. Marketing: An Introduction, pg 57. The “who” part of the process is everyone involved at Phileas Fogg company and has been involved in purchasing any products from the company. These people include consumers, advertisers, distributors, and suppliers. Without this group of people, our company wouldn’t be able to operate the way it does. The “where” is any place the product is made, distributed, consumed, or even thought about. In today’s constant evolving world, it has become easy to keep updated about hearing all the latest news, so you can hear about all of our product news via the web as well. The “when” is any environment that our products are being consumed. Whether that be bars or parties at the office. The “how” usually is a smaller, slower process in the beginning and hopefully blooms into what you expect your company to turn out to be. This process will start by reaching out to local bars and distribution companies to form a partnership so that we can distribute and manufacture the product properly and then sell them in bars across the nation. Consumer reactions, costs of manufacturing the product, and total profits will all be evaluated before the control process can begin. Marketing control—evaluating the results of marketing strategies and plans and taking corrective action to ensure that objectives are attained. Marketing: An Introduction. Pg 58. We will go about fixing any issues based on the reactions/comments we get on our products.