Reference no: EM132169462

FERRERO Case Study (Partial)

Your group have to conduct a macro environment analysis (Task 1) and micro environment analysis (Task 2) to assess the marketing environment for FERRERO. This will highlight the strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats: SWOT (Task 3). For each task your groups will present your key findings on A3 paper/A4 visualiser to everyone.

FERRERO Case; please read a few minutes and understand the challenges for FERRERO in the paragraph below.

The UK market for chocolate and sweets – the third largest in the World (Euromonitor, 2016) – is coming under intense pressure from all sides. The costs of raw materials – especially cocoa (ft.com, 2016) – have soared, meaning that the manufacturers face the choice of decreasing margins, increasing prices or decreasing the size of the products (This is Money, 2016). The environmental lobby is increasingly questioning the sustainable sourcing of raw materials such as palm oil (Ethical Consumer, 2015) and there is just not enough Fairtrade cocoa in the world to satisfy demand (The Guardian, 2014). Governments and consumers are examining the sugar content of snacks to try to tackle a so-called ‘obesity epidemic’ (Keynote, 2015 and 2016). Within the confectionary industry there is intense competition between the ‘Big Three’ – Mars, Nestlé and Mondelez (aka Cadbury) – who between them have 60% of the market. Their share of the market, though, has been static for the past 5 years, as has the share taken by Private label at just under 10% (Euromonitor, 2016). This does not leave much room for speciality, niche or smaller players to gain market share. Furthermore, Ferrero reviews its brands on an annual basis to improve their product recipes, competitiveness through alliances, communication and positioning in the FMCG fast moving consumer good markets.