The use of homemade products has become nearly exotic in the contemporary world off global economy and corporate business. As a result, whenever there is a product that has not been manufactured on a conveyor belt, people are immediately hyped about t. Granted that the product must also meet the existing quality standards, it is often the origin of the product that defines its attractiveness. Therefore, in the course of choosing the proper marketing technique for the company’s product, it has been decided that the emphasis must lie on the fact that the clothes are produced manually; hence the name, Handmade Knitwear.
Herein the key justification for the organization’s logo lies as well. It has been suggested that the organization should use the following phrase as its slogan: “Handmade Knitwear keeps you warm and fuzzy.” It is essential that the slogan should create positive emotions, making people think of comfort and coziness whenever they come across the company’s name or brand product. Therefore, an idiom was incorporated into the body of the slogan.
The same principle should apply to the creation of the organization’s logo. While it is necessary to refrain from using the corny clichés that are traditionally associated with catering to the audience’s need for comfort, such as the images of hearts, hands fold to display caring and love, etc., it will be required to retain a small touch of sentimentality. Thus, a simplistic design will be combined with warm color palette and an image of a clothing item (a mix between a dress and a shirt was chosen as the basic one that would appeal to all denizens of the target population) (see Picture 1).
It will also be reasonable that the principle of brand extension should be incorporated into the organization’s marketing strategy. Since Handmade Knitwear is going to not only provide products to the target customers, but also offer its services, including the repair of knitwear products, it will be reasonable to suggest that the brand extensions principle should be included into the overall framework of the company’s operations. Thus, it will be necessary to extend the current brand to the services involving handmade knitwear maintenance.
The rationale for the choices made above is rather basic. While being rather small at present, the organization will have to consider expansion into the global market at some point, which will require that the company should consider the needs and demands of a much wider audience (Banalieva & Dhanaraj, 2013). Consequently, the inclusion of the related services is the key to the organization’s successful growth.
A closer look at the target market will reveal that there are no basic competitors in the specified domain – quite on the contrary, the market lacks the organization that could represent handmade clothes (D’Innocenzio, 2013). Therefore, it will be comparatively easy for the organization to integrate into the target market and attract potential customers within a relatively short amount of time.
In the present-day environment, where an unceasing concern about global health issues dictates the demand of the customers in most industries, the organization that provides handmade knitwear will be viewed as the company promoting a wholesome product and, thus, taking care of its clients (Bingham & Davis, 2013). For the people buying knit clothes, Handmade Knitwear will be the beacon of hope for sustainability and healthy approach towards the choice of clothes. Moreover, the organization will put a very strong emphasis on the individuality of its customers, which the handmade knitwear products are bound to stress.
As far as the marketing strategy is concerned, it can be assumed that the company should incorporate both traditional and modern media as the basic tools for attracting customers’ attention. Seeing that the organization has a limited amount of financing options, it will be crucial that the marketing campaign should involve cheap options, such as advertising the product via social networks, sending e-mails to customers, etc. The specified approach is also necessary for attracting both young customers, who prefer modern media to traditional one, and the older ones, who, instead, are prone to following the messages from the latter more often.
The company’s mission statement concerns not only its customers, but also its key stakeholders in general. Handmade Knitwear’s mission is to achieve stakeholders’ satisfaction at all costs by taking the customers’ requirements and feedback into account when designing products, making sure that the needs of the company’s staff are met, facilitating the proper environment for promoting corporate social responsibility (Popa & Salanta, 2014) and striving for providing customers with the products of the finest quality, at the same time working on the improvement of the organization’s standards and the production process (Iç & Yıldırım, 2013).
As the perceptual map provided below (Picture 2) shows, the organization will need to focus on the provision of high quality clothes and make a very strong emphasis on providing two variations of each deign, i.e., the woolen and the acrylic ones. Moreover, it will be required to design both the clothes that are practical and the outfits that are fashionable and distinctive. Thus, the needs of all types of customers, including the younger and the older ones, will be satisfied.
A closer look at the customers’ market behavior will show that the specified strategy is fully justified. While handmade knitwear is, indeed, a rather rare kind of services to offer to the target audience; however, the customers may feel rather reluctant to the idea of buying handmade clothes. Their skepticism is quite understandable; the creation of handmade products does not presuppose a clockwork production process, which automated equipment has to offer.
Nevertheless, people are prone to trusting handmade products more for some reason: according to the recent statistics, the demand for handmade products has risen significantly over the past few years, leading to major changes in a range of companies, such as hiring the staff, who are capable of creating products manually and altering the production process significantly; the specified phenomenon concerns not only clothing, but also other goods: “The furniture retailer DFS has cranked up production levels at its three UK factories by 25pc in order to deal with growing demand for handmade furniture in the run-up to Christmas” (Ruddick, 2014, par. 1).
Based on the customer behavior within the target market, the promotion of the new product must be carried out by enhancing the benefits that the product has compared to manufactured knitwear items. It is expected that the Handmade Knitwear Company will become popular with the target audience and soon starts expanding into the global market.
Reference List
Banalieva, E. & Dhanaraj, C. (2013). Home-region orientation in international expansion strategies. Journal of International Business Studies, 44(2), pp. 89–116.
Bingham, C. & Davis, J. (2013). Learning how to grow globally. MIT Sloan Management Review, 53(3), 17.
D’Innocenzio, A. (2013). It’s incredibly difficult to prove that clothing is ‘ethically made’. Business Insider. Web.
Iç, Y. T. & Yıldırım, S. (2013). MOORA-based Taguchi optimisation for improving product or process quality. International Journal of Production Research, 51(11), 3321–3341.
Popa, M. & Salanta, I. (2014). Corporate social responsibility versus corporate social irresponsibility. Management & Marketing, 9(2), 137–146.
Ruddick, G. (2014). DFS boosts production to deal with demand for handmade furniture.Telegraph. Web.