Green Cat (consulting)

FINAL PROJECT
2015

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BY:

Tristan Bly, Rahul Rajamani Ashok, Adrien Garnier, Raphaelle Stekelorom

& Raphael Hollis

DAY 1: Description and important questions

Mario is a commercial director. He works in a company of white labels detergents. He has a meeting in 2 weeks with Armando, an ex-trader that launched a shop of cat litter 7 years ago. Armando has a shop in the centre of Milan, where he sells some ecological cat litter “Chat Vert” or "Green Cat" that takes the smell away. He wants to enter the UK market for his son but he does not speak English (even if he really enjoys the Beatles). He has sold its ecological cat litter for 10 euros per (20L) since 2 years. He produces its product in a plant located in Mantua using 2 machines that runs 5% each, so the production is only at 10% of capacity.

Several questions must be asked to Armando when meeting up in Milan. Here is a list of what it is interesting to know.

About the client:

• What is the name of Armando?
• How old is he?
• What is its professional career?
• What about its previous projects?
• What are its motivations to run this business?
• Is he aware of the market perspectives?
• Does he speak English?
• What are its beliefs and expectations?
• Why does he want to enter the UK market?

About the business:

• What sort of business does he want to launch?
• What is the current organization?
• What about what he thinks are the requirements to launch a business in the UK?
• Why does he want to enter the UK market?
• Are there any suppliers?
• Does he want to be the supplier or only the seller?
• Does he want to import the products from Italy or produce it in England?
• Does he want to open a shop or a delivery service via a website?
• Is he aware of the competitors strategy?
• How to test the product in the UK market?
• What about the patent in the UK?
• What is the current turnover of the shop?
• What are its funding means?
• How does he finance his plans?
• What is its long term strategy?

About the product:

• What is the main competitive advantage?
• How ecological is it and why?
• Have you ever done a benchmarking analysis?
• Do you have personal concerns about the project?
• What are the processes of production?
• What do you think about the production capacities?

DAY 2 : 4 P’s Analysis

Price:

Pricing is a very important aspect in pushing some products to its consumers. Hence coming out with the best possible price is the best solution to people buying the product. Elasticity in price can be dependent on the fixed cost and the variable cost. Since the cat litter is manufactured in Italy it needs to be exported to the UK and over here the exchange rates can play a role in the pricing as well. If the cat litter is priced at over 10€ in Italy, with the changes in the exchange rate it will cost 7.20 £, however with other cost such as transportation and taxation it will cost around 12-15£.

GDP per Capita

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Comparing the GDP per capita of France and Italy, it is evident from the graph that the GDP per capita of France is much greater than that of Italy. Proving that in UK people have a much higher spending power over the people in Italy. This also proves that since U.K has a very high GDP per capita, Green-Cat cat litter can be priced high considering the various USP (Unique selling points) it has. Being ecological, biodegradable, anti-odour, anti-scratch on floor, safe, disposable, clump able and the barley and yeast content make it unique over its competitors. It is also patented making it to have a distinct advantage over the other in terms of ingredients and speciality of cat litter. Hence pricing it high with a clear description of all its USP’s can attract people to spend big on green-cat cat litter. Initially assuming the pricing to be between 12-15£, XYZ Limited can increase the price further based on the increase in demand.

Reminder: 1 GBP (£) = 1.41 Euros (€)

Product:

Before getting into the details of the products we would like to know where the majority of cat owners in Europe let their cats, either indoor or outdoor.

Comparison - Where Pets and Their Owner Spend Their Time

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The cats when they are grown up they spend 53% indoors, 26% equally indoors and outdoors where as only 21% of the cats spend their time outdoors. Since majority of the cats spend their time indoors, it’s necessary that people often go for the best cat litter. Green-cat cat litters are ecological, disposable in toilets, safe and has anti-scratch protection which don’t creates scratches on floor. This cat litter contains (Barkley + 5 yeast), making it easily clumpable, flushable and disposable, also the cereal contains in the cat litter makes it to absorb the odour very easily. This make is easy for the European cat owners to choose the best product and Greet-cat having all the characterises of a good cat litter, give it an advantageous position over other products available in the market. However, Client can be advised on what kind of information can be added during packing the cat little, i.e. Logo, how to use, advantages and benefits (Unique Selling Point), 100% Natural label (ecological & bio-degradable) and picture of cat litter

For more information, please visit the following websites:

http://www.petsinthecity.net.au/you-don’t-have-keep-pets-same-way-when-you-were-child-1
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26327114
http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2013/03/04/the-causes-of-italys-recession/

Placement

Before we begin to define where the company should plan on selling its product, let's start with a quick overview of the pet industry worldwide.

Global Pet Spending Breakdown by Region (2014)
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As we can observe in this study from Euromonitor International, Europe is the biggest spender on cat food in the world (almost 50% in Eastern Europe and a little less than 40% in the west) which gives a good representation of the importance of cats in the European cats industry.