How well does our system work? You can use the numerical index to check our blogs from the last big recession.
Much of the world suffered a severe recession from 2008 to 2011. During that time, we wrote more than 250 blogs using publicly available information and our Strategystreet system to project what would happen in various companies and industries who were living in those hostile environments. In 2022, we began to update each of these blogs to see what later took place and to check the quality of our conclusions. To date, we have completed the first 175 of our original blogs. You can use these updated blogs to see how well the Strategystreet system works.
When should a strong Standard Leader competitor allow a lower priced competitor to take share from it. Only under unusual conditions. This industry is not living in unusual conditions. Instead, an industry challenger is using low price to gain share against locally stronger industry leaders. Not a good idea. Posted 4/6/09 In StrategyStreet terminology, a Standard Leader is a company who sells the majority of its products at the most common industry price point. The most common product we call the Standard Leader product. At the high end of the market are those companies…
Read MoreNew Price Leader competitors entering a market usually do so under a comfortable price umbrella set by the industry’s Standard Leader competitors. If left unchecked, these competitors can pose significant pricing challenges to the industry leaders. Here is an example of how they start and develop. Nothing to see here… Until there is. Posted 4/2/09 In our terminology, a Price Leader product is a low-end competitor in the market place. It competes against both other Price Leader products and against Standard Leader products, which are the industry leading products. There are two types of Price…
Read MoreIt is normal for a market to consolidate, where just a couple of competitors come to dominate an industry. This Blog describes how that happens and explains some of the fallout for the remaining industry competitors. It is not usually a pretty picture. Posted 3/16/09 A Leader’s Trap occurs when an industry leader, usually the first or second company ranked by market share, holds prices high in the face of declining industry prices. The industry leader expects that its customers will remain loyal despite lower cost competition. This decision is virtually certain to fail. Eventually,…
Read MoreAncillary fees saved the margins of the legacy airlines while they were in Overcapacity and in the fight of their lives against discounters. But the worm has turned. In 2026, these ancillary fees are helping the ultra-low-cost airlines survive. Margins are high in the airline industry. The top four airline competitors simply do not compete against each other on price. In fact, if there is a price difference from one top competitor to another, the gap is a defensible premium. Posted 3/23/09 For the most part, the airline industry has been in overcapacity and hostile…
Read MoreMost of us would assume that, once a competitor enters bankruptcy, it would no longer be a significant challenge to the rest of the competitors in the industry. That is certainly true for many bankruptcies, but not for all. In some, very specific, industries bankruptcy can create an advantage for a company. It emerges from bankruptcy to continue causing havoc on its competition. This Blog explains how. Posted 3/5/09 Not too many of us today would like to be in the retail clothing business. Fine retailers world-wide are suffering a dismal decrease in demand.…
Read MoreAs long as business has existed there has been a constant challenge of competitors offering low prices to the customers of competitors offering a fuller product at a higher price. This blog describes several of those confrontations and suggests some rules for the higher priced defender to follow. Posted 3/2/09 For the last several years, most landline telephone companies have offered special discount deals to customers who threaten to cut their landline service. But the trickle of customers leaving landline service, and depending solely on cell phones, has turned into a stream. Verizon believes it…
Read MoreAmazon is a dominant and exceptionally unusual market leader. It dominates the two industries in this blog and follows the same strategy in both. The first industry is in overcapacity but is not Hostile. You will rarely see that. The second industry has some formidable competition and grows slowly. Still, the competition finds it difficult to mount a significant challenge to Amazon. This blog outlines Amazon’s strategy and the keys to its success. Posted 2/23/09 Recently, Amazon introduced Kindle2. This e-Book reader is thinner and faster than its predecessor, which itself is only about a…
Read MoreWill a price increase help or hurt the business? Many price increases work well. Others are much more problematic. This blog describes a few cases where companies had to decide whether to increase prices in a tough market, where demand was declining. The answers that each company found suggest a simple rule for us to follow. Posted 2/16/09 The world’s largest manufacturer of home appliances, Whirlpool Corporation, has seen a substantial decline in revenues and unit sales in the last few months. The company, as well as the rest of the industry, has responded with…
Read MoreAt one time, three capable companies fought each other for control of a market category. Their primary weapon Price. That was a disaster for all three companies. Over the last several years, each company has moved away from the others. One has moved exceptionally well, producing a hot brand with growing market share and high returns. This Blog tells the story of this impressive turnaround. Posted 2/12/09 In a Leader’s Trap, an established industry competitor maintains a price umbrella and gives up market share to a discounting competitor. (See the Perspective, “The Leader’s Trap” on…
Read More15 years ago, the imposition of ancillary fees on top of the base product price seemed an easy way to improve margins without jeopardizing the customer relationship. In the intervening years, ancillary fees have exploded and customers have become much more sensitive and distrustful of companies imposing them. Still, there are clear examples where customers will accept the fees even though they do not like them. Posted 1/22/09 In the early 1990s, I was involved with a company that faced a very competitive price environment. The company felt it could not increase the prices on…
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