Introduction

One of the first consultancy projects I was engaged for was for a company specializing in the distribution of quality hardwoods, softwoods and panels products in Saudi Arabia.  ITCO has 13 branches across the kingdom providing a variety of woods for the application used in construction, joinery, industrial packaging and interior decoration.
Their distribution sales team engages with retail, wholesale and corporate customers.

Challenges

In a competitive market such as Saudi Arabia, the challenge that the company was facing was that it needed to think and grow their existing business and generate more revenue from an existing product portfolio.

How can you grow and scale up the business by creating more value and complementing the existing business model in your organization by leveraging your customer database without cannibalization of your existing clients?

Action plan

As a result of creative thinking and my extensive work experience in retail, building products and in my in-depth understanding of the local market place, I put together a working plan which is outlined below:

I met with the business owners to learn about their business and challenges and then presented the following:

1. Developed a strategic framework for the who, what, how and why to identify any gaps in the market place.

2. Analyze the 5 forces Portal to determine his competitive advantage.

3. Developed a business plan with a five years feasibility study on where we are heading and how we were going to get there

Results

As a result of the action plan, I have managed to:

• Implement the business plan to open up 15 new showrooms in prime areas and cities within 5 years, selling all types of building materials serving the end-user and small contractor with their day to day need across Saudi Arabia.

• Create a new brand identity to re-position ourselves in the marketplace. This was designed to differentiate ourselves from our competitors while at the same time not to risk cannibalizationof the existing customers.

• Conduct a market study and research on MVP and customer needs to understand our product portfolio range.

• Identify and negotiate with suppliers on delivery, payment, product costing terms

• Redesign their existing retail shops and re-merchandize display to sell consumer goods to leverage on the existing walking customers.

• Recruit new employees for the new business models division

• Train and coach all the existing sales team on the new product portfolio.

• Develop and implement policies and procedures based on the new business model system from the ERP system to supply chain management.

• Develop and implement a marketing plan ranging from catalogs, e-commerce web site, loyalty card programs to increase customer satisfaction and retention rate.

• Setting up a support team to supervise, operate  and monitor the new business model

Our consultancy aim is to make a detailed assessment and analysis of your existing business model and come up with the best solution that will fit your objective and business goals to innovate and scale-up. Each business faces unique challenges. Our success is in the planning and then the execution of the working plan.

Please contact us for a free consultation for your tailored-made solutions that will meet your requirements.