Introduction
Business Name
This business will be called the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy abbreviated as MMP. This business will be located at Glace Bay in the region of Sydney, NS, Canada.
Description of Business
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will offer mobile pharmacy services for the residents of Sydney, NS, Canada. The business will serve all medical prescription requests on a 24-hour basis for all days of the week.
Form of Business Ownership
The form of ownership of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will be through partnership. This choice is informed by the fact that the starting capital is relatively big. Besides, the business needs a lot of commitment from many managers. In addition, this option will reduce the risks that each owner may take in case of losses.
Ideal Customer
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy targets customers from the high, middle and low income ends. However, the standard prices for drugs across Canada, the business focuses to gain more customers through quality of services offers to each clients per visit. Specifically, the business targets customers in the age bracket above18 years since this group is allowed by the law to make drug purchases over the counter.
Our Advantages
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will be the first of its kind within the entire region of Sydney, Canada. Besides, the business intends to make sure that customers receive their medical prescriptions in the shortest time and most convenient way. Moreover, the business will introduce discount cards such as the premium, regular and ordinary cards to customers. Customers who get these cards will have to pay even lower for the services as long as the conditions within the cards are met.
Ethical Issues
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will follow the following principles as guidance for sustainable business;
- Honesty and integrity in handling the need and concerns of the customers and the business environment.
- Professionalism and respect to the personality and foundation of the relationship between the business and customers.
- Quality assurance and quick response to any request of the customers.
Mission and Goals
Mission Statement
The mission of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will function on being the leading business in pharmacy industry within Sydney, Canada. To be able to achieve the mission, the proposed Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business will require having a captivating position value statement and superior product strategy. In this case, the business’s positioning statement will be as follows;
We have the drugs that everyone wants, and at considerable prices. The moving pharmacy services are unique and of high quality. Those that subscribe to these services will have series of discounts and offers besides life membership. The prices are also considerable; one will get the best pharmacy requests and professional services for all the medical prescription.
Business Goals
Short-Term Goals
- The marketing goal will be to acquire an average of 100 clients per week for the first 12 months. With a typically well organized commodity pool, this business is geared to quickly increase its market share since the beneficial interests can distributed across the commodity users. This strategy will facilitate the restructuring effective sales and public awareness to develop product knowledge.
- One of the product strategies that the business will utilize is to make sure that it attributes the moving pharmacy services to convenience and affordability. The business will charge the pharmacy services at the same rate as the traditional stores as a strategy to attract consumers within the second quarter of the first years of operation.
- The business aims to expand its customer base to regions outside the Sydney by recruiting five sales persons who will double up as pick and delivery service providers, for special orders where the vehicles cannot reach, within the first six months of operation.
Long-Term Goals
- The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy intends to roll out a single mobile pharmacy each year within the next three years after capturing the Sydney market. When the plan is successful, the business will purchase more vehicles and roll out other moving pharmacies in the regions surrounding the targeted market.
- The business intends to franchise its operations to remote areas within the Sydney region in the next four years. If well merged with appropriate market mix, the strategy will secure a continuous quantitative increase of the market by constantly maintaining relatively fare prices of the services it is offering as well as the maintenance of up to per competition levels from other competitors.
Environmental Analysis
PESTLE Analysis
The business environment in Canada is transparent and predictable. The taxation regime and rules in the country are clear and concise. The political climate in Canada is also serene with no major problems. This environment will make it easy for the entry of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business.
Economic
Economically, Canada is recovering from the effects of the global financial crisis and it is yet to grow exponentially. The economic recovery offers the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy the potential for increased activity as many customers will embrace the mobile pharmacy services.
Social
The demographic nature of Sydney is that the region has a population of more than 2 million potential customers. Close to 90% of the population fall within the criteria that the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy is interested in.
Technological
Most of the technological innovations in Canada are connected to the online industry. The Technological environment in Canada is still very young. Most of the technology is imported from Europe, East Asia, and North America. Hence, there is a huge gap for introduction of technological advances in the moving pharmacy services. Since the proposed Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will be equipped with the best technology, the business is expected to penetrate the market within the shortest time possible.
Legal
The legal environment in Canada is relatively predictable. The kingdom does not have the porous nature of a democracy where laws are constantly changed. The country is more inclined to values than laws. Hence, the business will not have an unpredictable legal environment.
Environmental
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will operate in a business environment where major parameters are known. For example the competitors in the business environment are bounded by the code of conduct. Therefore, the business will find it easy to shape its environment.
SWOT Analysis
Strengths
The majority of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy’s potential competitors rely on local customers. The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business will have an advantage since it will create consumer awareness through its promotions and advertisements. Besides, the business will move the pharmacy services closer to customers. The business will use strategies like consumer education on how to get the best from the services by acquiring the loyalty card since it has the capacity to quickly expand its network.
Weaknesses
The customer base for the business is narrow since it targets to serve a small geographical area of Sydney. Besides, competition from established business may make it difficult to win clients who have established loyalty to other businesses offering the same services, since the field of pharmacy services depends on customer preference and trust. The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business depends on 16 persons, with each pair working on shifts in each vehicle, as the workforce hence may not maximize its gains in the market. The business has the disadvantage of unreliability in service delivery since this team will have to do all the work. Apparently, they cannot keep up with the demand even if they work for more than 60 hours per week.
Threats
The services offered by this company are very sensitive to changing client preference. For instance, a bad report or an unfortunately incident during a visit to the moving pharmacy such as wrong drugs may alter the perception of its clients. This may discourage them from visiting the business in the future. Thus, the business must create a waterproof public relations exercise to survive in this industry.
Opportunities
With a typical well organized commodity pool, this business is geared to quickly increase its market share since the beneficial interests can be distributed across the commodity users. This strategy will facilitate the restructuring effective sales and public awareness to develop product knowledge. If well merged with appropriate market mix, the strategy will secure a continual quantitative increase of the market by constantly maintaining relatively fare prices of the services it is offering as well as the maintenance of up to per competition levels from other competitors.
Summary of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy’s SWOT
Market Share Analysis
In order to establish the potential market share for the proposed business, a research survey was rolled out for potential clients and the results are summarized in the table below.
Consumer Analysis
The business targets to reach 6,000 customers in the first year, 9,000 customers in the second year, and 12,000 customers in the third year totaling to 27,000 successful orders and deliveries at the end of the third year in the Sydney market. The business will target three types of customers, which are the aged, middle-aged, and the youthful segments. Further, the customers will be segmented into regular clients and the first time clients in order to ensure that the needs of these segments are customized on the basis of the level of loyalty.
The main value drivers that the business will use in reaching out to the three customer segments are the current demand for flexible, fast, affordable and easy to use methods of placing prescription and buying drugs. Besides, the business will consider specific needs of customers in terms of convenience and customer service to create a need-based marketing strategy through proactive customer participation in information search and product acceptance (Dagnino & Rocco, 2009).
Competitor Analysis
Since the market is relatively underdeveloped, there is no major competitor that may threaten the existence and survival of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy. However, if the business ideal becomes a successful venture, there might be local and international competition from companies within the Sydney community and beyond. In order to survive the potential threat of competition in the future, the business will adopt the product and market positioning strategies such as multiple-pricing and high quality of services.
The multiple-pricing strategy will be applied through differentiating the moving pharmacy services by grade and assigning different prices for each category of customers. This means that the company will serve the high-end, mid-end, and low-end customers without locking any potential client out. Besides, the business’ website will have series of services that customers can choose from in placing their prescription (Blythe, 2006). This means that the business will create an environment of own competition by locking out any competitor who might want to benefit within the unexploited customer segment.
Risk Factors
The business may fail to attract potential customers. Given the unique customer preference in the pharmaceutical environment and increased possibility of new entrants into the market, the business may fail to attract reasonable quantity of clientele that would enable it sustain growth in returns. However, the firm has identified potential primary target market that will provide distinct competitive advantage. The business may face unavailable or scarce pharmaceutical products. Most of the drugs that the business plans to sell will be imported in case they are not available locally. The process of procuring the products from abroad will increase expenses, which in turn augment the cost of services provided (Cone, 2011).
Human Resource Management
Personnel
In the process of successfully managing an establishment of the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy magnitude, it is imperative for the business owners to establish a strong human resource management strategy. The management team will consist of the operations director, marketing director, and supply chain director. All the directors are owners of the business. Under the directors, there will be supervisors will manage the sixteen moving pharmacy attendants. In addition, the business proposes to have a standby marketing team consisting of two employees. Basically, the business will adopt the inverted triangle management model whereby the employees will have to take most of the responsibilities with the directors limited to leadership and goal setting.
Operations and Financial Information of Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy
Income statement. For the three year period
Balance sheet
Cash flow
Year 1
Year 2
Year 3
Break-Even Analysis
Total revenue (P * Q) = total cost [Variable (VC * Q) + fixed cost]
- 1.46 * Q = (0.46 *Q) + 75.66046
- 1Q = 75.66046
- Q = 75.66
Thus, the break-even number of units is 75.66. The break-even amount of sales is €110.75. The break-even annual sales total to €1329.02.The estimated annual revenue for the year 2015 is €7,759.11. This shows that the business is profitable.
The Balance Scorecard for the Business
The balanced scorecard for this business summarises the internal processes, customer, fianancial, and strategies for growth as summarised in the table below.
Sources of Financing
Bank loan/Overdraft
Under a bank loan option, the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy will be in a position to receive funding that is fixed over a period of time. The loan(s) will attract different interest rates, depending on the type and amount that the business will borrow. Reflectively, bank loans are repaid over a longer period of time and repayment schedules is fixed. Besides the bank loan, the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy has the option of acquiring financing through bank overdraft (Cone, 2011).
Marketing Plan
Industry Analysis
The market size for the pharmaceutical retail business in Canada is estimated to be worth more than one billion dollars. The company targets to capture 5% of this market within the four years of operation since competition are still not very stiff. Since this type of business is relatively new in Canada, the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business will be among the first key players and may reap the benefits of being the market leader (Blythe, 2006).
Market Analysis
Market dynamics determine effective sales and public awareness to develop product knowledge to clients in the Sydney region in Canada. Besides, the plan will offer a variety of different distributions channels that will be vital in the attraction of new customers, especially from the low and high economic ends (Scarborough, 2012). The Canadian market is strategically located and can offer the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy s series of services such as proper infrastructure and relatively big target market base.
Competitive Analysis
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business is strategically located to benefit from the expansive target market. Reflectively, this type of business has low operational costs and high returns. The success is directly proportional to the level of trust and loyalty that customer have on the establishment. Since this business plans to establish a strong business network and reliable customer support services to its online customers, there are high chances of survival and business sustainability (Cone, 2011). Besides, the business has the potential of growth beyond this region.
Competitive Advantage of Products and Services
Due to a fair pricing mechanism for services, competition factors will positively skew to the advantage of the moving pharmacy product proposed by the Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy. With competitive prices for its products and uncompromised trust and reliability of services, this strategy will have the capability of making the company’s operations in Sydney economically feasible and sustainable, while at the same time winning a greater percentage of the market share (Cheverton, 2004).
Image of Products/Services
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy business will adopt multiple branding strategies to ensure that customers are in a position to distinguish each product segment to avoid confusing when making online prescription orders. For instance, the business will clearly indicate its scope of operations and type of moving pharmaceutical services for each package offered to customers. The business’ product multi-branding as a positioning strategy will enable it to survive competition.
Product/Service Strategies
The Mobipharm Moving Pharmacy’s product line objective will be to provide quality and reliable moving pharmaceutical services at the convenience of the clients. The services offered by the business will include online payment, online purchasing order, and free online consultancy. This will ensure that the business has a product or service to any one and expand to other regions due to its customer-centricity business model (Kotler & Keller, 2012).
Location/Distribution Strategies
The business will be located along the strategic street within the Sydney region. The business will establish a single central location of operation and a reliable physical address to win the trust of potential customers, despite the proposal to adopt the mobile pharmaceutical store business model (Scarborough, 2012).
Promotional Strategies/Tactics
The business will adopt a flexible and proactive advertisements meant to appeal to each customer segment. Besides, the business will have series of after sales services such as discounts, coupons, and rewards to customers who make the highest number of monthly shopping orders. The business will use direct, online and database marketing through its Business-to-Consumer (B2C) and e-commerce models (Shapiro, 2005).
References
Blythe, J. (2006). Essentials of marketing communications. New York, NY: FT/Prentice Hall.
Cheverton, P. (2004). Key Marketing skills: strategies, tools, and techniques for marketing success. London, UK: Kogan Page.
Cone, S. (2011). Steal these ideas: Marketing secrets that will make you a star. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.
Dagnino, G., & Rocco, E. (2009). Competition strategy: theory, experiments, and cases. New York, NY: Rutledge.
Kotler, P., & Keller, K. (2012). Marketing management (14th ed.). New Jersey, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.
Scarborough, M. N. (2012). Effective Small Business Management: An Entrepreneurial Approach. NY, New York: Pearson Education.
Shapiro, A. (2005). Capital Budgeting and Investment Analysis. New Delhi, India: Pearson Education India.