Background of Ocado and analysis of its environment

Primarily, it is imperative to accentuate that Ocado is a supermarket that conducts its activities online. This has made it to reach its clients from diversified parts of the world most importantly within the United Kingdom. Their service has flourished for almost a decade making it to be one of the successful online supermarkets. On the same breathe; it has performed well, in terms of quality delivery and efficiency in service dispensation making it to stand as the most trusted online supermarket.

Primarily, retail sector is a major contributor of UK’s economy and thereby any business and as such, such  business play a very significant role in the economy of the country by boosting its market both at the local level and international level since it increases the country’s generation of revenue. Ideally, it is important to underscore that Ocado is a firm that was established in 2000 by its trio founders namely; Tim Steiner, Jason Gissing, and Jonathan Farman. Its founders were visionary leaders who wanted to see its business grow beyond the parameters of United Kingdom and for a very long period of time they have been working on diversification of their market to other parts of the world (Beynon-Davies, Jones, & White, 2016). Now that Ocado wants to expand its market to China, it ought to understand the environment of the said country. Practically, the best way of achieving this is through the employability of Triple Bottom Line. This is the best approach in that the company is able to assess its sustainability and performance in the said country in tree major dichotomies namely, social, environmental, and economical performance. This will give Ocado an opportunity to determine whether the environment in which they are operating in is friendly and most importantly whether their services and products would be accepted by the Chinese consumers. First, it would be prudent for Ocado to have requisite knowledge of the Chinese market (Beynon-Davies, Jones, & White, 2016). Having understood, it can now devise a better approach than their immediate competitor in order to capture the attention of its consumer within the given environment. It can achieve this in number of ways and the most dominant way is through sensitizing its market on the primacy of buying their products and through recruitment of Chinese employees which would in turn convenience the others to shop with them and thereby increasing the marketability of this noble online retail. Socially, Ocado may be compelled to have better treatment of its consumers through the provision of after sales services and offering of discounts a fact that would see to it that they reach the higher echelons of business competition at the Chinese market working towards heightening their sales.

Competencies and resources of Ocado

According to Beynon-Davies et al., (2016), Ocado has adequate resources in conducting its online business. This is attributed by the fact that in the past it has been able to conduct successful business in terms of delivering of specified products to its clients. This shows that first; it has enough manpower that would see to it that a given product reaches its destination at appropriate time. Moreover, it also implies that the firm has different warehouses located in different position to make it easy to get the groceries and supply it to the client who has ordered it. Secondly, it may also be viewed that the firm has enough carrier such as vehicles to see to it that the given appliances and groceries are transported well to its terminus. In nutshell, Ocadoenjoys plethora of advantage in that in 2016, it registered 21.8% increase in generation of profit (Beynon-Davies, Jones, & White, (2016). This amounted to £ 14.5 m in the same year. In order to identify the company’s resources and competencies in the market, it would be prudent to look for its success and factors that have led to this. Nonetheless, the company has really invested in online marketing making it to one of the best retail supermarket that is flourishing in this platform. Ideally, this online supermarket was founded in 2000 therefore it has grown over number of years to reach its peak in the market (Eden & Ackermann, 2013). The notable competencies that is being exhibited by Ocado is that it has wide knowledge on online marketing  a fact that makes it stand a better chance to be one of the leading retail supermarket that conducts its business online. Additionally, it has employed many technocrats who are well conversant with digitization of the market. Similarly, it has been observed that Ocado has mega warehouses where they can source for the products required by its clients with ease for its delivery to the immediate destination (Morden, 2016). Since the firm is anticipating expanding its business to Chinese market, it has to take into consideration number of factors that are of primary value. The most basic advantage of this online supermarket in China is that it has been on the market for a very long time and thereby are well conversant with how to serve their clients and have effective way of delivering the said products to their customers harnessing good cordial relationship with them (Morschett, Schramm-Klein & Zentes,  2015). There is need for Ocado to identify the goods or rather products that its competitors are dealing with in order to take another course of the line of products so as to continue attracting its wider market at the territorial influence of China. However, there is a significant competition mounted by four mega supermarket using the same platform namely Ada Tesco, Morrison’s and Sainburg (Beynon-Davies, Jones, & White, (2016) Beynon-Davies, Jones, & White, (2016). Similarly, the entry of Amazon has further heightened the competition. Nevertheless, it is speculated that Amazon retail supermarket would be majorly dealing with fresh or rather groceries from the market. On the other hand, this retails supermarket  has advantage over the others in that it has experience in online marketing as it has conducted its business successfully in United Kingdom making it to be the most trusted site operating online. Another advantage is attributed to the fact that its website is well developed and easy to access or use. For any new users it does not have complexities in signing up on it and thereby making it easy for any person to be able to sign up and be able to see the variability of the goods that are being offered by the said firm.

The mission and vision statement of Ocado

Moreover, due to the flexibility that is mostly evident in Ocado, it would perform better in China market as they can be able to meet the needs of its consumers by understanding what they need most in the market (Rothaermel, 2015). This will also go along way delivering the required commodities at their paces of connivances and thereby consolidate the relationship among the two dominant parties. It has been found out that most of Chinese squarely depend on the groceries that this firm stands a better chance to see to it further heighten its services to the extreme end of the country considering that it has worked under this platform for a very long period of time thereby well acquainted with the requisite skills on this usage. 

The vision of Ocado is well enshrined and self-explanatory as it touches on the core value of the organization success and sustainability and better performance and existence in the market. Its vision is to diverse their service globally taking into concern the needs of its clients. This vision is geared towards making this online supermarket to continue their empirical survey on regular basis so as to ascertain their performance on current basis in order to determine whether they are still relevant in the market and whether they ought to improve so as to peak their rival competitors in the market (Pollamarasetty, & Potti, 2016). Moreover, this vision is an inclusive one as it takes care of the needs and interests of the customers who are the major stakeholders towards the growth and sustainability of any business. This vision is well structured since it further puts into account the probability of the business expanding to other parts of the world. The first step towards the realization of this vision is evident where the firm wants to expand its market to China. This indeed coheres with its focus and thereby it is simper and easy for the firm to work towards bringing this to realization as it is already envisioned in their framework. Moreover, basing on the same vision statement, the firm stands a good position to learn and share its experiences with the new market in the view of expanding its working sphere or parameters of its operations.

The aforesaid online supermarket is geared towards offering the quality services in grocery sector through the usage of online platform unlike the previous held view of shopping. Due to digitization of technology, Ocado has taken keen interest in using this platform well to the latter to see toit that it can reach its clients from different parts of the world without any much constraints as it has some mechanism that it has put into consideration so as it comes to realization of that. The mission clearly spells that the firm would employ the use of online means over the traditional shopping (Hill, Jones, & Schilling, 2014). Therefore, using this platform the firm ought to fully see to it that all its activities are not hindered byprevailing factors suchas weatherand other factors that maylead to delay of the said product to its consumer at a given time. For all this activity to be a success, it would be very paramount for the firm to have enough workforce and many warehouse located at relatively good position where delivery of goods can be made withease without causing any delays (Pollamarasetty, & Potti, 2016). It is very imperative for this retail online supermarket to open different warehouse at different location so as to be very convenient in picking and delivering of the goods to its customers. 

It is ideal to understand the SWOT analysis of Ocado retail supermarket in the view of establishing its success and some of the underlying factors that limits its operation to go on effectively at some differentpoints of its business.

The notable strength of Ocado is that it deals with wide range of products. This gives it a viable chance to conduct its business successful without much limitation as it can be able to reach its diversifiedclients from different parts of the country and take care of the varied needs at the same time due to its diversification. Moreover, it has made contracts with other affiliate companies for its smooth running of activities (Bettis et al, 2014). This has seen it perform and dispensing its services well as there is smooth coordination of its affiliate companies resulting to effective performance of the venture. Similarly, the aforementioned online retail supermarket understands its market well something that keeps it above all other firm competing on the same scale in the market. This is attributed by the way they easily and effectivelydeliver goods to its terminus.

The earlier stated online retail supermarket heavily relies on UK market. This becomes its major shortcoming towards diversification of its market to other parts of the world.In 2007, it registered an incredible loss to a tune of £40 m. As such, it took long for the firm to recover from this a fact that affected its performance(Pollamarasetty, & Potti, 2016). That aside, it is also clear that Ocado haslimited itsoperation within the parameters of UKlocking out other potential consumers from other parts of the country outside the said parameters.

The firm has an array of advantage in that it relies on online retail market in UK. It is ideal to state that most of the consumerswithin the said region are conversant with its operation making it stand a better chance to continue with its business with minimal limitations (Slack, 2015). The said retail shop has also been offeringnon-foodproducts putting at a better scale as it non-perishable and thereby stocking in its warehouse since it does not fact its consumption. Although, there is need to fully deal in array of products so as to stand abetter chance to counter their immediate competitor in the market and thereby sustaining the stiff competition.

There is stiff competition that is being posed by Morison’s,Sainburg among others in that category. Most of the online users and other clients are susceptible to other risks such as online fraudsters and scammers. Therefore,the firm has a herculean task to safeguard the information of its clients so as not to fall prey of this groups of scammers who mayexhort a lot money from them (Barney & Hesterly, 2015). Ocado has also a tough time to convince its clients on the security of its business and sensitise them on the advantage of using their site above others to as to obliterate the element ofscepticism that isalways evident in such group.

Considering factors that have earlier been mentioned, it is pertinent for Ocado to take clear and deep empirical survey of its market so as to establish the likes and dislikes of its Chinese market. There is also need for this retail supermarket to look critically into the government policy so as to be in tandem with the government of China forefficacy of its business operations (Stead & Stead, 2013.). The notable thing that Ocado can do is to also employChinese staff and integrate them in their organization. The most dominant  community is Chinese and thereby there is need of employing the said staff  as  one would  conductbusiness in their first language which would be easy unlike  one conducting  in English as there would be alanguage  barrier since its immediate consumers are the  locals.

Reference list

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Bettis, R., Gambardella, A., Helfat, C. and Mitchell, W., 2014. Quantitative empirical analysis in strategic management. Strategic Management Journal, 35(7), pp.949-953.

BEYNON-DAVIES, P., JONES, P., & WHITE, G. R. (2016). Business Patterns and Strategic Change. Strategic Change. 25, 675-691.

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Hill, C.W., Jones, G.R. and Schilling, M.A., 2014. Strategic management: theory: an integrated approach. Cengage Learning.

Morden, T., 2016. Principles of strategic management. Routledge.

Morschett, D., Schramm-Klein, H. and Zentes, J., 2015. Strategic international management. Springer.

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Rothaermel, F.T., 2015. Strategic management. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

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