Business Cafe - March 2012

The latest edition of Business Cafe, our case-study digital magazine for Level 2 and Level 3 business studies courses, is now available to subscribers. An outline of each new case study is provided below.

Tesco – Job Creation or Job Exploitation?

It has been an interesting two weeks for Tesco. On 18th February , there were large-scale protests against the company, which closed a store in central London and then on 5th March, there was the announcement by the retailer that it would be creating 20,000 new jobs within the United Kingdom.

Is it the end of the Chapter for Book Shops?

Book shops are facing increasingly difficult trading conditions. They face growing competition from supermarkets, online retailers and even charity shops. In addition, changing technology and social trends is leading more of us to read from portable devices – ereaders.

Rain, Rain, Go Away…

In actual fact, as the rain poured down at the end of last month, we were told that these words from the old nursery rhyme were the last thing that was needed. A few days of even the heaviest rain is apparently not going to alter the fact that after two dry winters in a row, many areas of the UK are officially facing drought conditions in the near future; rivers and reservoirs are drying up with potentially difficult consequences for businesses and consumers.

Low Cost with Care + Convenience

All large businesses produce documents which are a review of their Corporate and Social Responsibility. Easy Jet is no exception. Their annual document proudly declares that the business is reducing the emissions, investing in its people, prioritising safety and engaging in charitable activities. None of this can be disputed and easyJet will have worked hard to ensure these improvements.

Kodak

Think ‘soft drink’, think ‘coca cola’. Think computers, think ‘Microsoft’. Think photography, think ‘Kodak’ - but not for much longer…

Retrenchment – Short-Term Pain for Long-Term Gain?

We usually expect businesses to be actively trying to grow due to the advantages that being large can bring, e.g. economies of scale, increased market power and increased profits. However, there are situations when firms actively seek to shrink and become smaller. Retrenchment is the term which describes this process. It involves a business reducing the scale of its operations by either reducing capacity (Burberry closing a factory), withdrawing products (Kodak leaving the digital camera market), withdrawing from markets (Tesco leaving Japan), and de-merging (HMV selling off Waterstones). What is it that causes this strategic change and does it negatively affect the businesses’ prospects and stakeholders?

The Stone Group

From a small start in the market town of Stone, Staffordshire, The Stone Group is now a major provider of all types of IT equipment to the public sector, supplying to schools, colleges, universities and local government in particular. In the past 20 years, the company has achieved revenues of over £630 million and custom built 800,000 PCs.