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IBUS305 Essay
Success factors
Supply chain
Supply chain is one of the factor that leads to the success of Ice Breaker nowadays. There is a huge amount of processess and members involved in Ice Breaker’s operations, beginning with the sourcing of raw materials to bringing finished products to customers’ hands in stores. First, the merino wool was shipped to China for top making. This process includes scouring the wool, carding, combing and washing. The next step of the supply chain is wool spinning. Previously, this process was done in Australia and Korea but Ice Breaker realized that was not effective, it only added more lag time and made the process more complex. Therefore, Ice Breaker decided to do this process in a big German-owned factory in China that could reuse the heat from its air conditioning system’s process. As a result, Ice Breaker has acquired enhanced and consistent quality, cut down the costs and extremely reduced the lag time.
Once the merino fiber is spun, the next process is clothing manufacturing. This process is done in two different locations in USA, the fibre used for producing socks is done in North Carolia and the fibre used for producing clothes is sent to textile and garment factory in Shanghai. Inspite of what products to be manufactured, they are all designed in Portland, USA.
By using three locations to manufacture its products, we can easily see that cost leadership is not Ice Breaker’s universal strategy certainly. What Ice Breaker has aimed is focusing on what Porter (1980) classifed as a segmentation strategy. By taking advantage from its uniqueness of the product on the subject of quality and innovation in relatively small markets. Moving the manufacturing process offshore may cost Ice Breaker more money but recently, the New Zealand texttile industry has been slowing down. As a result, overseas manufacturing factories has been more efficient in producing garments that also have better quality products than those in New
Success factors
Supply chain
Supply chain is one of the factor that leads to the success of Ice Breaker nowadays. There is a huge amount of processess and members involved in Ice Breaker’s operations, beginning with the sourcing of raw materials to bringing finished products to customers’ hands in stores. First, the merino wool was shipped to China for top making. This process includes scouring the wool, carding, combing and washing. The next step of the supply chain is wool spinning. Previously, this process was done in Australia and Korea but Ice Breaker realized that was not effective, it only added more lag time and made the process more complex. Therefore, Ice Breaker decided to do this process in a big German-owned factory in China that could reuse the heat from its air conditioning system’s process. As a result, Ice Breaker has acquired enhanced and consistent quality, cut down the costs and extremely reduced the lag time.
Once the merino fiber is spun, the next process is clothing manufacturing. This process is done in two different locations in USA, the fibre used for producing socks is done in North Carolia and the fibre used for producing clothes is sent to textile and garment factory in Shanghai. Inspite of what products to be manufactured, they are all designed in Portland, USA.
By using three locations to manufacture its products, we can easily see that cost leadership is not Ice Breaker’s universal strategy certainly. What Ice Breaker has aimed is focusing on what Porter (1980) classifed as a segmentation strategy. By taking advantage from its uniqueness of the product on the subject of quality and innovation in relatively small markets. Moving the manufacturing process offshore may cost Ice Breaker more money but recently, the New Zealand texttile industry has been slowing down. As a result, overseas manufacturing factories has been more efficient in producing garments that also have better quality products than those in New