Going Global Fast

Case 3:   Starbucks – Going Global Fast
Starbucks, like any other company that makes the decision to go global, is going to experience growing pains by entering into this unknown territory.   The decision to go global requires a lot of effort, research, funds, and planning.   And once you’ve gone global the effort doesn’t stop there, you need to continuously revaluate your business process.  
The controllable elements are firm characteristics, price, product, promotion, channels of distribution and research.   Starbucks ultimately has control over their corporate actions which lead to how people perceive the firm, price, products they are offering, how they promote their products, the distribution channels they are using to get their products to the consumer and the research they use to determine their business decisions.  
The uncontrollable elements fall into two categories, domestic environment and foreign environment.   The uncontrollable domestic environment elements are political/legal forces, competitive structure and economic climate.   The uncontrollable foreign environment elements are economic forces, competitive forces, level of technology, structure of distribution, geography and infrastructure, cultural forces and political/legal forces.   Some of the uncontrollable elements that Starbucks has to contend with are the culture forces against large multinational corporations, the downturn in the economic climate following 9/11, how the high saturation rate of branches in many cities effects the competitive structure, the changing cultural preferences not just with the younger coffee drinkers in the US but also with affluent works in other countries like Japan, and the legal woes they’ve encountered with they’ve employee pay and real estate practices.  
Starbucks really needs to take a good hard look at some of the major sources of risk they could be facing down the road.   Starbucks hasn’t done a good job of courting the younger coffee drinker.   And as... [continues]

Read full essay