The Man Brewing Company Case Summary

Mountain Man Brewing Company is one of many local companies that has been threatened by large corporations. This case focuses on a family-owned, local company threatened by decline in sales. The new marketing operations manager, Chris Prangel, has been faced with the challenge of product innovation to help the company improve sales. The introduction of a lighter beer is the solution Prangel landed on while deciding the company’s future. With many doubts from many company employees including the company owner and Chris’ father, Oscar, he was determined to make this new product a success.
Several concerns came to light as Chris was researching the new product and the target market it would serve. He found MMBC to be mostly desired by 45-54 year-old males with low to medium income level. Small percentage of blue-collar customers were found to have the highest customer loyalty with largest sales percentage. Even though the results of this research showed strong brand loyalty and support of “anti-big-business” values, Chris knew that MMBC would need to capture more customers in order to stay competitive and improve sales. Research showed that early to late twenties population preferred light beer to any other. This would also be more attractive to female customers who prefer light beer to any other. Even though Chris
This makes customers feel like what they are drinking is special and not just another beer from a factory of ten different ones; it feels like one of a kind. However, low advertising efforts and the lack of grass-roots marketing makes the brand lose its intimate feel that many customers like. It is also not up to date with the younger generation of light beer drinkers, which can gain a large market share increasing sales. However, entering light beer market may come with many threats of large competitors with a well-established light beer brand that comes with a very high marketing price causing sale price to