| The Khanid Bookstore Newsletter | |
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| Khanid Bookstore protests customer unfriendly rules in Khanid Kingdom | ||
| Published: October 15th, 2008 |
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The Khanid Bookstore today released the following statement: Strong competition focuses the mind and hones the entrepreneural instincts. A defty implementation of a well thought-out marketing mix is a vital part of establishing the position of a company in the market. Traditionally this marketing mix has been defined as the combination of decisions set by a company with regards to: * Product * Price * Location * Promotion * Service (admittedly that last one was added a bit later, but is generally accepted as being a full member). For a trading house like the Khanid Bookstore the choices are a bit limited. To go into that we will go into each of the elements of the marketing mix listed above Product Our products are clearly defined. We sell skillbooks. It is by no means a unique product or a rare one, so differentiation against competitors who also sell skillbooks is not possible. Price Pricing is a clear and easy instrument as our competitor has shown and as we ourselves have shown when we started operations. Offering the products at the lowest price (with all else being equal) will result in maximum sales. However, under the current market rules, even with all else not being equal, this will result in maximum sales. We will come back to this later. Location Offering a product where it is not offered by others was a clear element of the Khanid Bookstore's raison d'�tre. Lacking a university or other institute of higher learning, Khanid Kingdom did not have a government run store for skillbooks. Promotion The promotional options within the Kingdom are minimal. Station rules forbid the use of advertising posters and the prohibitive costs of paper make commercial folders not economically feasible. There was a time when containers dropped outside stations were used for promotional activities but that practice has been stopped for safety reasons. Service And for the sake of this discussion we will add less tangible means like goodwill, brand management and consumer retention strategies to this item as well. Striving for customer loyalty is a major part of every company's strategy. Gaining a consumer is one thing, making them come back is quite another and of vital importance in a -for the most part- high volume commodities market. Brands are clearly protected under Khanid laws as the recent court case has shown. But apart from that nothing exists in the current markets to implement this. When customers want to buy from us and are willing to pay the extra 0.01 ISK for that, the sale will still go to the competitor with the lowest price (although strangely enough the customer will still pay the higher price). This clearly is not right. We have the strange situation that someone comes into our shop for a book, and wants to buy that book from the Khanid Bookstore, but at the moment of transaction, our competitor supplies the book and receives the higher price for it. The Khanid Bookstore urges the lawmakers in the Kingdom to make the following change: If a customer selects a product from the market from a particular seller at the listed price for that seller, the sale should be from that seller and for the agreed price. We will keep you informed on developments in this matter. |
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