Technology Changes
Provide an example of an industry or company that has changed its strategy over time as environmental factors such as technology, competition, and consumer preferences have changed. Explain the changes in environment and in the industry’s or company’s evolving strategy.
Looking at this question automatically put me in mind of the automobile industry. However, as I was looking at my classmates responds, most of them talked about the automobile. These changes are clear and present, and are really easy for me to discuss. I on the other hand want to go in another direction from my classmates to keep the discussions fascinating. I am going to discuss the grocery business. I have been working in the grocery business for about 14 years. There have been many changes since this time. From the self-check out to item codes, these changes help make it faster and easier for customers to be serviced. There are also some behind the scene changes that have made it better for customers. I am speaking of the pallet system. Pallets are used to bring products to the stores. When a store orders product, the operators at the warehouse put the order together. Before, this was done by the use of forklifts. According to Witron Integrated Logistic Corp., “The Kroger Company is one of those industry leaders. About eight years ago, it began working with a systems integrator (Witron Integrated Logistics Corp., 847-385-6113,http://www.witron.com) to create a new design to automate its grocery distribution centers. The end result was a system that can receive and put away full pallets then break them down and rebuild them into store-ready mixed pallets according to how they will be put away on the shelves in a store aisle. It all happens with almost no human intervention: Operators typically touch a product once when lift truck operators unload pallets at the receiving dock and once again when they are loaded at the shipping dock for delivery to Kroger’s stores.” This type of technology has
Looking at this question automatically put me in mind of the automobile industry. However, as I was looking at my classmates responds, most of them talked about the automobile. These changes are clear and present, and are really easy for me to discuss. I on the other hand want to go in another direction from my classmates to keep the discussions fascinating. I am going to discuss the grocery business. I have been working in the grocery business for about 14 years. There have been many changes since this time. From the self-check out to item codes, these changes help make it faster and easier for customers to be serviced. There are also some behind the scene changes that have made it better for customers. I am speaking of the pallet system. Pallets are used to bring products to the stores. When a store orders product, the operators at the warehouse put the order together. Before, this was done by the use of forklifts. According to Witron Integrated Logistic Corp., “The Kroger Company is one of those industry leaders. About eight years ago, it began working with a systems integrator (Witron Integrated Logistics Corp., 847-385-6113,http://www.witron.com) to create a new design to automate its grocery distribution centers. The end result was a system that can receive and put away full pallets then break them down and rebuild them into store-ready mixed pallets according to how they will be put away on the shelves in a store aisle. It all happens with almost no human intervention: Operators typically touch a product once when lift truck operators unload pallets at the receiving dock and once again when they are loaded at the shipping dock for delivery to Kroger’s stores.” This type of technology has