Vermont Teddy Bear Essay
1. How would you describe Vermont Teddy Bear’s business model (the products and services it sells, target market/s to whom it sells them, the value proposition it offers, and its financial model)?
Business model Most of the business of Vermont Teddy Bear (VTB) happens during major holiday seasons (Christmas, Mother’s day and Valentine’s day) and hence the business is primarily seasonal. Also, the demand in this gifting industry is uneven and unpredictable Target segment
Vermont Teddy Bear has always been targeting holiday seasons during when the business is usually at its peak. And Vermont Teddy Bear aligns directly with the idea of gifting. The three types of products which VTB cater to different market segments
• Teddy Bear -- kids …show more content…
Finally- At a time when "cash reserves were limited," Bob Stetzel wants "an efficient, well organized enterprise IT architecture that could serve as a robust platform for the company's changing business requirements." Given your analysis in response to the previous questions, and any other aspects you consider important to this case, what specific, actionable, and cost-effective advice can you suggest?
Short term solution
Demand management is one of the major problems facing the industry and predicting and catering to the exact customer preferences goes a long way in building the company. Stetzel should use the senior employees who have technical expertise to start working on analytics architecture to gain more insights about the market and especially customer preferences. This leads to better product designs and hence customer delight. Thus, even with lesser products in the store, VTB will have better understanding about the demand and can scale up production accordingly.
As regards to the shortage of employees, Stetzel can hire additional less experienced persons to take care of the software bug fixes currently being faced. However these people will be working continuosly under the guidance of the senior technical experts thus making use of the scarce resources i.e employees
Business model Most of the business of Vermont Teddy Bear (VTB) happens during major holiday seasons (Christmas, Mother’s day and Valentine’s day) and hence the business is primarily seasonal. Also, the demand in this gifting industry is uneven and unpredictable Target segment
Vermont Teddy Bear has always been targeting holiday seasons during when the business is usually at its peak. And Vermont Teddy Bear aligns directly with the idea of gifting. The three types of products which VTB cater to different market segments
• Teddy Bear -- kids …show more content…
Finally- At a time when "cash reserves were limited," Bob Stetzel wants "an efficient, well organized enterprise IT architecture that could serve as a robust platform for the company's changing business requirements." Given your analysis in response to the previous questions, and any other aspects you consider important to this case, what specific, actionable, and cost-effective advice can you suggest?
Short term solution
Demand management is one of the major problems facing the industry and predicting and catering to the exact customer preferences goes a long way in building the company. Stetzel should use the senior employees who have technical expertise to start working on analytics architecture to gain more insights about the market and especially customer preferences. This leads to better product designs and hence customer delight. Thus, even with lesser products in the store, VTB will have better understanding about the demand and can scale up production accordingly.
As regards to the shortage of employees, Stetzel can hire additional less experienced persons to take care of the software bug fixes currently being faced. However these people will be working continuosly under the guidance of the senior technical experts thus making use of the scarce resources i.e employees