CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

CASE ANALYSIS
TEN THOUSAND VILLAGES OF
CINCINNATI : THE FIRST YEAR &
BEYOND
Submitted By :
CRM_Sec : B, Group 14
Avishek Mukherjee - 161212
Arpit Patidar - 161211
Raja Sinha - 161245
Rajat Parmar - 161246
Introduction
■ It’s a non-profit Fair Trade retail store, Ten Thousand Villages, located in
Cincinnati, Ohio . The time frame involves the store’s opening and first
two years of operations.
■ Two main players, Karen the Chair of the Board of Directors and Cheryl,
the store manager, struggle to develop a customer-focused plan to
ensure sales increases for their unique operation. Marketing issues
ranging from store location selection to inventory selection and
promotion are presented.
■ In addition to covering an alternative method of doing business through
cause-based marketing, the case provides a platform for c a relatively
new breed of strategies collectively known as customer relationship
management (CRM) to be implemented.
 Fair Trade
■ It is a trading partnership, transparency and respect that seeks
greater equity in international trade.
■ They engaged in supporting procedures, raising awareness, and
campaigning for positive change in conventional international trade
practices
■ 10 standards of fair trade, coincide with TTV’s operating principles-
■ Create opportunities for Economically Disadvantaged Producers
■ Transparency and accountability
■ Trading Practices
■ Payment of a fair price
■ Child Labour and Forced Labour
■ Working Conditions
■ Capacity Building
■ Environment
Customers
■ Demography : Females in the age of early 40s and with an income of
more than $52000
■ Customers who purchased ATO products shared demographic &
psychographic profiles. Regardless of their geographic location.
■ Products offered by TTV and other ATOs perfectly align with cultural
creative consumers values and interests.
■ They are targeting the socially conscious consumers known as Cultural
Creatives
■ TM – ATO consumers
■ Psychographic : No impulse buying, Knowledgeable, Awareness was
high, wanted to know every detail and were motivated for social
causes
■ Cincinnati ( Geography ) : Approx 51% female population, average
income was $40964, 38% population was in the age bracket of 35-64,
331280 people
Competitor Analysis
They had 4 major competitors i.e. 1 local and 3 national
Pier 1 Imports
■ TM – female, age 25-34 and also Kids by a subsidiary named CargoKids
■ Heavy advertising with a vast national coverage
■ Have both online and offline store location
■ The environment is not hectic as a mall
■ They are into 5 categories – furniture, housewares, bed & bath, seasonal
and decorative accessories
■ The positioning of the company is relaxing, stimulating and sanctuaray
■ They have competitive advantages in terms of price, visual presentations,
the multiple locations of the store and the variety of merchandise that
they possess.
 Cost Plus World Market
■ It imports products from 60 countries
■ Its different from the previous one in terms of the fact that it carries
food items and has a uniques store atmosphere.
■ It has its competitive advantage in the low prices that it offers, the
assortment and the shopping experience provided.
■ TM – Females, age 22-25
■ Have both online and offline store location
■ Confined their advertisements to in store promotions, sampling and
displays
Z Gallerie
■ The atmosphere differs from Pier 1 and Cost Plus World
Market
■ Dynamic, energizing with Bohemian Flair
■ Has 47 stores in 13 states
■ Offers over 3000 products – constantly changes its products
to maintain a level of excitement and encourage exploratory
shopping
 From the Ridiculous to the Sublime

■ Small boutique located in O’ Bryonville, right down the street from

TTVC
■ Local establishment, small monthly sales
■ Products – handicraft items, Jwelery and Giftware
■ Follows Z Gallerie’s dynamic layout and bohemian atmosphere
TTVC ( Competitive Analysis)

■ Competitors couldn’t capture the TM of TTVC i.e Cultural

Creatives
■ Pricing was competitive
■ Competitors couldn’t match their shopping makes a
difference experience
■ They positioned themselves as fair trade, IFAT member
 Product–wise Competitors
■ The supermarket is buying in large volumes and thus gets
economies of scale and thus is able to offer the products at lower
price then TTVC

■ Kroger ( Super Market)- Mainstream grocery store

■ Cincinnati Catholic Church- diocese

■ The diocese was indulged into strong promotion activities and

thus the prices it charged to the customers were even below the
cost of TTVC
Effective focus on existing customers by
Karen & Cheryl ?
■ They can do this with the help of e- CRM strategy which is further
classified into 2 parts i.e. Acquisition strategy and Retention Strategy
■ This method encompasses all the CRM functions with the use of the
net environment
■ Life cycle –
– Data collection – customer preference information
– Data collaboration – TTVC specific needs to fulfill customers
– Customer Interaction – provide proper feedback
■ Components
– Operational
– Analytical : maintain long term relationship
– Collaborative
■ This is a form of free advertisement, it creates a strong
customer base, and it reaches out to the “cultural creatives”
they missed out on in the first year.

■ While current customers can tell them about TTVC, they will
then be able to go online to research their products more.

■ By understanding the customer, their needs and how to

satisfy them, they will be able to create and develop a strong
and loyal customer base that they can rely on to reach
organizational goals.

■ At the same time, they are reaching out to people that they
haven’t been able to reach before and this will in turn help
them to increase profits..
What, how & when they should do?
Acquisition Strategy
■ Create a social media platform
■ Create Website which should be efficient and responsive
■ Webisodes can be used to actually sensitize the TM about any social
cause as it was disccused that the cultural creatives are motivated
for a social cause.
■ Customers can be engaged with the help of content

Retention Strategy
■ Personalised offers to customers who are of high value
■ Personalised communications via mail and social media
■ Implement a customer loyalty program- Platinum, Gold & Silver
■ Customer Services
■ Customer Referal Marketing
What problems might they encounter and
or what actions should they avoid ?
Problems
■ They have to go through a change in the organization as they are not currently customer centric
but to successfully implement e- CRM they have to be customer centric.

■ They will have to bear huge costs because implementing e-CRM will be a great expense
especially for a not for profit organization.

■ Effective and responsive website needs to be developed

■ Global competition

Actions
■ Create a customer focused culture in the organization

■ Adopt customer based managers to assess satisfaction

■ Develop an end- to- end process to serve customers

■ Recommend questions to be asked to help customer solve a problem

■ Track all aspects of selling to customers

■ Reduce local advertising and focus more on online

What aspects of such a strategy were most
important ?
■ Implement loyalty plan

■ Personalise promotions and offers for loyal customers

■ Identification of customers for cross selling and up selling

■ Customised products

■ Customer recognition which will make them feel that they are
valued and will thus provide them with an incentive to return
Thank You