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The founders of Protein Power Plates--a company with the slogan "Let's meat!"--contemplate adding plant-based burgers to their menu. This fictional case study by Lena G. Goldberg and Michael S. Kaufman features expert commentary by Lynn Blashford, Scott Uehlein.

The founders of Protein Power Plates--a company with the slogan "Let's meat!"--contemplate adding plant-based burgers to their menu. This fictional case study by Lena G. Goldberg and Michael S. Kaufman features expert commentary by Lynn Blashford, Scott Uehlein.

Corporate boards are more diverse than ever before. So why aren't firms seeing the expected results? Plus, one way to encourage consumers to upgrade, the headphone advantage, and more.

Toxoplasma gondii, which is estimated to infect 10% to 50% of the population, affects your brain and makes you disinhibited and less risk-averse. It also makes you 29% more likely to found a start-up.

Case Preview for 2069.

Explores channel management issues in the U.S. food industry. Natureview Farm, a Vermont-based producer of organic yogurt with $13 million in revenues, is the leading national yogurt brand (24% market share) sold into natural foods stores. It has achieved this through its special yogurt manufacturing process and through cultivating personal relationships with dairy buyers in the natural foods channel. Set in 2000, when the company faces financial pressure to grow revenues to $20 million by the end of 2001 due to a planned exit by its venture capital investors. The immediate decision point that the protagonist, Natureview's vice president of marketing, faces is whether to achieve this revenue growth by expanding into the supermarket channel.

Atlantic Computer, a leading player in the high-end server market, has detected a marketplace opportunity in the basic server segment. They have developed a new server, the Tronn, to meet the needs of this segment. In addition, they have created a software tool, called the "Performance Enhancing Server Accelerator," or PESA, that allows the Tronn to perform up to four times faster than its standard speed. The central question revolves around how to price the Tronn and PESA. Although cost-plus, competition-based, and status-quo pricing are the most common means by which firms establish prices for their offerings, these approaches may prevent firms from fully realizing the benefits that are due to them. Provides an opportunity to optimize value capture for the firm by utilizing value-in-use pricing (i.e., examining the value that a firm's offering creates for the customer, and using the savings generated as the basis for developing prices). Also allows for the exploration of the challenges surrounding the implementation of a value-in-use pricing strategy. These include the reactions of competitors, customers, and stakeholders within the firm.

Cambridge Sciences Pharmaceuticals (CSP) expects final approval for its revolutionary weight loss drug, Metabical. Metabical will be the only weight loss drug with FDA approval that is also clinically proven to be effective for moderately overweight people. Barbara Printup, Senior Marketing Director for CSP, must develop the positioning strategy and marketing communications plan in preparation for the launch of the new drug. Printup must consider the consumer decision-making process and the interaction between the consumer who purchases the drug and the health care provider who prescribes the medication. Despite promising medical studies and consumer research, poor positioning of the drug in the highly competitive market for weight-loss solutions could spell disaster. Students analyze market research data and consider the optimal positioning strategy and marketing communications program.

Metabical is a new weight loss drug from Cambridge Sciences Pharmaceuticals intended for moderately overweight individuals. In anticipation of final FDA approval, the senior director of marketing, Barbara Printup, prepares for the product launch and must make several critical decisions. First, she must select the optimal packaging size for the drug which typically requires a 12-week course of treatment. Next, she must determine the appropriate pricing. Since most insurance companies do not cover weight-loss medications, price has a direct impact on the sales forecast. To establish the initial demand forecast, Printup considers three approaches based on different assumptions. Her final recommendations must consider long term profitability and meet the company's desired return on investment.The case includes a quantitative assignment for students.

Rosewood Hotels & Resorts, a small luxury private hotel management firm running a collection of 12 individually branded hotels and resorts in multiple countries, was wondering how to foster customer retention and loyalty and capture the maximum value from its 115,000 guests. Rosewood had always allowed each hotel to stand as its own individual brand, with the Rosewood name presented as a muted sub-brand, if at all. Now Rosewood's new leadership was contemplating whether the firm should significantly increase the prominence of the corporate identity, making Rosewood a corporate brand. The main challenge that Rosewood's executives face is to assess whether the potential economic benefits from increased guest retention can outweigh the $1,000,000 marketing investment needed to implement the corporate branding strategy. The central focus is a quantitative assignment that asks students to calculate how customer lifetime value would be affected by a shift from individual branding to corporate branding.

Teaching Note for 4249

Teaching note for case 915539.

Teaching note for case 917523.

Teaching Note for Product #913545.

Hunley, Inc. manufactures rods for the niche sport of fly fishing. It specializes in freshwater rods that are perceived as "middle-market" products, targeted at "avid" fly fishers, In the face of declining revenue and a decreasing price per unit sold, the company's president is considering several growth options, including introducing a rod made from state-of-the-art materials (moving up-market) and expanding distribution into Walmart (down-market). Hunley's president must decide whether either option is feasible and if so, what kind of marketing plan is necessary for each to succeed. If neither option is chosen, he must determine what other ways Hunley might grow. This is a rich marketing mix case that requires students to develop a qualitative and quantitative plan for Hunley's product line under two very different growth options. The discussion can illuminate numerous marketing issues that an instructor might want to emphasize, including: brand extension, product and company market position, positioning statements, market segmentation, introductory marketing programs, new product launches, channel conflict, sales force management of a strategic shift, among others. This case is suitable for an introductory marketing course for undergraduate or MBA students. It can also be used in a section on positioning and increasing consumers' willingness-to-pay within a strategy course. Further, the challenges facing Hunley are relevant to many courses in executive education.

Spreadsheet supplement for case 222018.

When and how much risk to take? In October 2020, Ken Sweder, CEO of Individual FoodService ("IFS"), contemplated this question as he evaluated a proposal to acquire Brady Industries, a distributor of janitorial and sanitation products. Sweder and his private equity partners at Kelso & Company had been working hard to grow IFS, and now they had a unique opportunity to make a transformative acquisition. The deal had great potential and risks; it was unclear if this was the right time to make such a large, complex acquisition amid disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic. Sweder needed to decide if he should recommend the transaction and, if so, how to set the right value creation plan for the combined company.

In 2015, the top management of French tire-maker Michelin, was evaluating Michelin's approach to divesting its rubber plantations ten years after incorporating a novel strategy. In 2004, Michelin had a Brazilian rubber challenge. Its Bahía plantation had been hit with the South American Leaf Blight fungus, the same fungus that destroyed Henry Ford's dreams of industrializing rubber production, and the plantation's productivity had dropped. Bahía had to go. That much was clear. But how to do it? From the Michelin headquarters in Clermont-Ferrand, the rubber plantations of Bahía Brazil seemed half a world away. Still, Michelin, then led by Édouard Michelin, great-grandson of Michelin's founder, was founded with a deep belief in the importance of treating its employees and the environment fairly. Michelin embarked on an ambitious plan to divest the plantation while practicing corporate social accountability. However, in doing so, it had to understand the needs of its plantation workers, its environmental impact, while also considering its own needs as a business. Now, Michelin had to evaluate how well the company had done with its Bahía program, if there was anything that could be improved in its divestment process, and whether or not the plan, or elements of it, was something Michelin should consider using again in the future.

The case discusses the ESG strategy of Dollar Tree Inc., a U.S. Fortune 500 company in the deep discount retail industry and the shareholder pressure faced by the company. In 2022, the company faced a shareholder resolution from renowned shareholder advocacy group As You Sow for the company to better mitigate and report on the climate risks faced by the business. The resolution challenged the company to intensify its climate transition plans and adopt a "net-zero" emission goal. A 2020 shareholder resolution at the company by a different shareholder received record-breaking support that had already caused the company to revamp its sustainability initiatives. This case provides an overview of Dollar Tree's business, the recent landscape of sustainability reporting and shareholder ESG resolutions in the U.S., and the narrative of management opposition to the resolutions. Overall, the case captures the interactions between environmental shareholder activism, corporate management and those charged with governance, especially the board of directors. This case is useful for students to discuss recent trends of ESG-related shareholder activism, sustainability reporting especially related to environmental issues, climate governance and how companies are reacting to them.