Founded by CEO Rajiv Dembla in 2006, the company focuses its own sales efforts on customers within the state of Florida and has a team of four account executives—Mary Beth, Suzanne, Franco, and Syl—who act as the salespeople for the organization. Rajiv relies on the same territory design that he has for the past several years, in which he divides the state geographically into four equal-size regions, and the account executives are responsible for the cities within their respective region.
Rajiv is not an especially quantitative manager by nature, but he did acknowledge the need to do a sales forecast for the upcoming 2020–21 fiscal year. He used the sales force composite method by asking his account executives how much each expected to sell during the coming year and then totaling those estimates. This type of method has worked for the company in the past, but Rajiv is concerned that Syl acts in the spirit of the marketing adage “underpromise and overdeliver” by intentionally underestimating his sales expectations so that his quota will be lower. To be safe, Rajiv also determined the sales forecast by taking a moving average of the previous four years of sales (see Table FY 2020-21 Forecasted Sales and Quotas).
FY 2020–21 Forecasted Sales and Quotas
Account Executive
Forecasted Sales
Quota
Mary Beth
$180,000
$200,000
Suzanne
180,000
200,000
Franco
180,000
200,000
Syl
180,000
200,000
Total
$720,000
$800,000
Based on an average of these two sales forecasts, Rajiv set out to develop the yearly sales quota for each of his account executives. As he usually did, he kept the quota as simple as possible by basing it on gross dollars brought into the firm from sales, and he made it equal for each account executive. To ensure that his sales team is aggressive, he set the quotas slightly higher than the forecasted sales. As further motivation, Rajiv put 25 percent of each account executive’s compensation in the form of a bonus for meeting or beating sales volume quotas.
John Cook, Rajiv’s executive assistant, is more sensitive to the needs of the staff than Rajiv and tends to be the one that people talk to freely. Mary Beth complains to him privately, “This quota system does not reward—and even punishes—me for doing what I do best, building relationships with customers through in-person consultations, field demonstrations, and attending trade-show events to ensure everything goes smoothly.” She finds these activities invaluable for serving the customer and keeping her pipeline of business full in the long term, but they do not necessarily generate sales volume in the short term.
While Suzanne tells John, “I have no problem with the quota because my territory includes the home city of Orlando. I know all of the businesses there and have no problem generating sales,” Franco comes to John upset. His region includes Tallahassee, Pensacola, and the rest of the Florida Panhandle, which is more rural, is farther away from home, and has fewer businesses. As a result, he says, “I am miserable! I can’t meet these unfair quotas!”
Syl tells John, “I have the same problem generating sales at times in my north-central Florida territory because there are fewer large cities. But,” he whispers with a smile, “I don’t worry about it. I recommend more expensive trade-show supplies and services to my customers at the end of the fiscal year to boost my short-term sales. And if I need more sales to meet my quota, I just do some creative accounting and record sales numbers for this year which should come due at the beginning of next year. It works every time.”
John is in a quandary. He normally keeps the staff complaints confidential, but in this case he feels like he needs to tell Rajiv that all is not well at Lasting Impressions.
Questions
(1) Based on the facts given, evaluate Rajiv’s territory design. What other basic control unit might Rajiv have used besides cities? Why?
(2) What other forecast method(s) should Rajiv have used besides the sales force composite moving average? Why?
(3) What type of sales quota did Rajiv use? Did he set the appropriate quota level? Why or why not?
Marketing
The Recall Computer Co. has six territories, each represented by one salesperson. After extensive planning, the company determines that each territory would be expected to achieve the following percentages of total company sales for 2020:
Territory 127%
Territory 215%
Territory 318%
Territory 412%
Territory 520%
Territory 68%
These figures are used as the standard for comparing each sales representative’s actual 2020 sales. The company projected sales for 2020 of $18,500,000. Determine which sales representative’s territory had the best performance by using the performance index, if the actual sales for 2020 in each territory were $5,425,000, $3,205,000, $3,710,000, $2,400,000, $3,900,000, and $2,000,000, respectively, for territories 1–6.
* I attached the chapter’s reading
discussion board
Marketing Assignment Help Please watch the following videos and read the accompanying articles (if applicable) in preparation for this week’s discussion board.
1. Every Costco brand is Called “Kirkland Signature” (Article)
https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/05/business/costco-kirkland-signature/index.html (Links to an external site.)
2. Boxed CEO shares the 3 things making his ‘Costco for millennials’ soar (Video and article)https://www.cnbc.com/2017/03/24/boxed-ceo-shares-3-things-making-his-costco-for-millennials-soar.html (Links to an external site.)
3. How Boxed CEO built a $100M company from his parents’ garagehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jf-zgLcnfH0 (Links to an external site.)
4. Inside Boxed’s Secret Weapon to Defeat Amazonhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5de4y_adFk (Links to an external site.)
Discussion Board Questions
1. Discuss the success of Costco’s Kirkland brand. Are there other companies that could benefit from this same strategy? Other companies like Walmart and Target have their own in-house brands, called Equate and Up and Up. What is the difference between the Kirland in-house branding model and the Walmart/Target in-house model?
2. The Boxed CEO says that for the last 30 years, “value=price.” The Boxed definition of value is “price, convenience, and a little bit of brand.” Discuss the difference between the two definitions of “value”. Is there anything else that you would add to the definition of value at Boxed?
3. Boxed has been described as “Costco for Millenials.” Why is Boxed so successful with Millenials? Do you think it will be just as popular for the next generation (Gen Z) of shoppers? Why or why not?
Case study and do the powerpoint
Governance and Sustainability at Nike A and B, Lynn S. Paine, Nien-he Hsieh, Lara Adamsons
1. Should Nike revisit its commitment to Road to Zero? Would you lower the water targets or find the resources elsewhere? What would you recommend if you were in Jones’ position? In Sprunk’s position?
2. What’s your understanding of Nike’s distinction between “competitive” and “pre-competitive”? As a member of the sustainable investment management committee, would you have recommended a wholesale acquisition of DyeCoo? Why or Why not?
3. What is your view of Nike’s argument that “playing offense” on sustainability can drive innovation, growth, and profitability? What is the evidence for your view?
4. What is your view on the CR practices of Nike? Which practices do you think are good and what practices need to be imporved?
only need to answer the question 1