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The case is written using secondary data sources (namely, research documents, press information, journal articles and published interviews). Publicly declared company information has further been leveraged to augment case facts. All information sources have been duly acknowledged in the reference section.

The case is written in the backdrop of COVID-19 pandemic and its effect on the Indian retail industry, revolving around scenarios in which a multinational retailer has to decide on its long- and short-term strategy in such an economic crisis. The case story has been developed around Marks and Spencer’s retail venture in the Indian market. With the COVID-19 pandemic impacting business at various levels, with countries moving to lock down and economies shrinking to recessionary levels, one of the worst affected sectors is retail. The teaching case builds upon Mark and Spencer’s initial decision of not entering and extending its food/grocery business in India. While it remained a dominant player in Indian fashion retail for almost two decades, it needs to re-think its decision of entering food retail owing to a pandemic situation affecting its offline sales/store footfall and increasing competition from global fashion brands such as Zara and H&M that had flooded the Indian fashion retail sector. The case provides a context for students to perform environmental factor and competitor analysis for a sector, with special focus on decision making in a changing crisis scenario.

This case could be used in undergraduate and MBA classroom programme, across subjects such as retail management, marketing management, international business, international business environment and strategic business management. This case fits while discussing topics such as business environmental factors, competitor analysis, decision-making under crisis, market entry decision, omnichannel retail strategy, consumer behaviour and brand management.

Marketing plan; virtual shopping; consumer behavior.

Undergraduate.

This case discusses the e-commerce plan of new online grocery company in Mexico, MexGro, which is planning to emerge as low-cost outlet as compared to the brick-and-mortar establishments in the market. MexGro is an online grocer with a round-the-clock call center to process phone-based orders and to provide customer support. The grocery online company is aimed at setting up a virtual grocery shop by the name of MexGro S.A de C.V to serve cross-cultural products to the Hispanic and Asian communities in Mexico. The MexGro, being a virtual shop, need not pay for checkout clerks; display cases, or parking lots, online grocers can drop prices below those of retail stores and remain profitable. This case explores online consumer-shopping behavior, the economics of online and offline grocery distribution, and the challenges of uniting a pure information business with a mundane package delivery service.

This case may be discussed towards learning developing effective online marketing planning strategy for the niche markets. The specific learning objectives of the case are: to analyze the virtual marketing planning constituents for developing customer-centric marketing within a niche and explore the possibilities of sustainable business growth to encourage strategic thinking towards developing online marketing plan and develop effective communications among the consumers and to address the critical online planning issues, such as what are the prospects for grocery shopping on the internet. The case allows students to grapple with the strategic and tactical decisions on planning for the online marketing companies. Students will also become familiar with key questions/issues raised by the various executives of the company in formulating the online marketing plan for ethnic grocery in a niche business environment: the case challenges students to think about how online grocer creates the most value for customers and how grocer will likely be able to overcome the competition from the brick-and-mortar grocers. Should Wal-Mart be aggressive in launching its grocery brand? The case raises issues to debate on how the organizational and system decisions are faced by managers in developing a virtual shopping culture in Mexico as the company has the goal to move among more efficient competitors in the supermarket industry, and How the online marketing plan can be implemented within a niche. This case study would take students through the rise of a private brand to the strategies of its sustainability in the competitive marketplace. This case illustrates the importance of using new variables in developing an effective marketing plan when companies reinforce their products in the niche markets. The discussion in the case allows students an opportunity to evaluate online marketing planning and their brands in a niche as well as in a competitive marketplace.

Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

This case focuses on valuation using various methods to price a firm. Students attempting this case should know the basics of how to value a company using discounted cash flow, comparable multiples and comparable transactions. Students will need to calculate the weighted average cost of capital using comparable companies and the capital asset pricing model and determine differences in value created by an acquisition vs a leveraged buyout (LBO). The case also discusses qualitative issues in mergers, such as fit between target and acquirer, integration issues, potential high debt from LBO.

This case was library-researched, using Amazon and Whole Foods public filings and business press papers.

Whole Foods Markets received a buyout offer from Amazon. Whole Foods could solicit offers from other firms, including firms more directly in the grocery business. Whole Foods also considered a management buyout or purchase by a private equity firm. Whole Foods had underperformed, with a falling stock price and reduced profitability. Amazon’s bid was attractive, a premium of about 40 per cent over Whole Foods’ pre-merger stock price. Whole Foods also wanted to consider issues such as culture. Whole Foods’ strategy was to sell organic foods at premium prices, while Amazon was a retail discounter with a largely online business.

This case is appropriate for graduate students at the end of their introductory course or for graduate or undergraduate students in a corporate finance elective, particularly a merger/restructuring elective. The case has been used in an advanced undergraduate finance elective, with a team presenting the case to the class, with remaining students in the class required to write case summaries and questions for the presenting group.

The instructor can use this for covering the concept of competitive advantage and valuation. To explore the relationship between superior profitability with business model and identify the source of competitive advantage. Determining the value of business through discounted cash flow (DCF) approach.

This case is based on the growth path of a retail chain company, DMart (Avenue Supermarket Private Limited), in the rapidly growing organized retail industry in India. It operates a unique business model that garners significant revenue growth with high profitability. The case covers the competitive advantages of DMart with respect to its peers and its valuation through the DCF model.

The case is suitable for teaching basic courses in corporate valuation and strategy at the post-graduate level. The following courses can also make use of this case: financial management, corporate finance and strategic management in emerging markets.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 1: Accounting and Finance.

International Strategy

Undergraduate or graduate capstone course in strategy or international management course.

Faced with increased competition at home, Sainsbury's decided to expand its international operations by entering Egypt. Sainsbury's initially created a joint venture with an Egyptian food retailer, but quickly increased its commitment by opening over 100 stores in Egypt. Sainsbury's dream of capturing the Egyptian food market faded as quickly as it was started. Due to declining profits, Sainsbury's eliminated its exposure in Egypt by selling its interests to its Egyptian partner. Sainsbury's first developing-country venture could be regarded as an object lesson in how not to operate. The company failed to properly investigate its market and its partners, and showed insensitivity to local conditions. Moreover, entering the Egyptian consumer business sector may have been ill-advised. Egypt, with a low gross domestic product (GDP) per head of about $1,300 and a population of 65 million, while having growth potential, is a daunting market. Why a poor and frequently disorganized country was perceived as having excellent growth potential was not addressed by Sainsbury's in its headlong rush to invest. The case should be interesting for students because it highlights a situation where a firm's international expansion efforts failed after the firm had success expanding internationally previously. Numerous reasons are presented in the case for Sainsbury's failure. The case highlights the multiplicity of issues which a company faces when it “goes global.” While Sainsbury's withdrew from Egypt, the case affords students the opportunity to evaluate whether they would have made the same decision by providing a discussion of the alternatives suggested by Sainsbury's Chairman.

The Sainsbury's case is capable of addressing several important teaching objectives: the case is an appropriate vehicle to demonstrate what can happen to a firm as it expands globally; students will gain more knowledge concerning why companies expand into foreign markets and the impact of cross-country differences in market conditions; the case presents the multifaceted complexities involved in globalization efforts and issues faced by companies concerned with global competition and global strategy; students should apply the concepts and tools of industry and competitive analysis; students should gain a better understand how to manage globally; students should gain an understanding of the challenges of globalization and global competition; students should gain a better understanding of the evolution of strategy as industry conditions change and new opportunities arise. As with any case study, students should learn to translate good analysis into appropriate recommendations for action.

Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

After completion of the case study, the students would be able to comprehend the crisis at hand for Milkbasket, why did it resist Reliance’s takeover in the first place, then to evaluate the pros-cons and future prospects for the organization post-acquisition; to evaluate from an ethical standpoint the process of mergers and acquisitions using ethical frameworks to understand how, when, to whom and through what processes do mergers and acquisitions qualify the test of being ethical; and to analyse different hostile takeovers, especially through tender offers, proxy contests and toehold bidding strategy in this case.

Founded in 2015, Milkbasket was a micro-delivery start-up based in Gurugram (near New Delhi), India. Milkbasket would let its subscribers order till midnight and deliver groceries, milk and other everyday essentials to its subscribers before 7 a.m. next day. It had burnt a lot of cash and was facing difficulty in getting investors; as such they were engaged in discussions with many companies. Two of them – Reliance Retail Venture Limited and BigBasket – were not accepting the proposed valuation, but Milkbasket got term sheets from other two companies.

This case study can be used for graduate courses on strategic management, business ethics and corporate governance. This case study can also be used in corporate finance course to highlight the importance of making ethical/responsible judgements to protect stakeholder interests.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

The case study offers interesting learning possibilities and offers the following learning opportunities to the learner. assess and conduct a macro- and micro-environmental analysis, comprehend the nature of the competitive landscape and how it changes when one looks at a digital-only versus an omnichannel marketplace, examine the product mix and policy of the firm and evaluate how it delivers customer value and analyse the pros and cons of growth strategies available to a firm and arrive at a viable and actionable future business and product strategy.

The short case study presents the story of a young start-up called Country Delight. The firm began operations in 2011 and was the brainchild of Chakradhar Gade and Nitin Kaushal. The direct-to-consumer firm addressed urban consumers’ non-articulated, latent need to get “fresh and uncontaminated” milk to their doorstep. Country Delight delivered farmer-to-consumer fresh cow and buffalo milk and milk products based on a well-designed and efficient value chain where the supply chain was either wholly owned or quality monitored by the firm. The firm began operations in India’s National Capital Region and was spread across 15 metro cities. Slowly, over the years, Gade and Kaushal added more product categories.Country Delight had a subscriber base of around 500,000, and the ambitious duo wanted to double their subscriber base and reach one million subscribers by financial year 2025. The firm was looking at various paths to achieve this number. Should Country Delight expand into new geographies? Or look at adding to the existing product portfolio? Diversification into agritourism, like the Pune-based vineyard – Sula, also looked attractive to build consumer engagement. Would taking the consumer to the farmers from whom they sourced the milk and vegetables contribute additional revenue to Country Delight and their farmer-suppliers? As the firm got ready to raise another round of funding, it needed a well-articulated growth strategy that was exciting and profitable for all stakeholders.

This case study presents the dilemma entrepreneurs face as they look at the next phase of growth. Thus, this case study serves as a learning opportunity for a graduate-level course in management and as a sounding board for those who aspire to enter the start-up space. Though this case study has the potential to illustrate basic concepts such as value chain and macro- and micro-environment analysis, the protagonist’s dilemma and the problem statement make it apt for integrated discussions that are critical in advanced electives in marketing management.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing.

Financial results and conditions vary among companies for a number of reasons. The differences in industry characteristics, company policies, management performance, and responsiveness to the macroeconomic environment are reflected in the financial statements published by publicly held companies and can be highlighted through the use of financial ratios.

This case challenges students to review a series of corporate financial metrics and to match them to one of the 13 labeled and listed industries. It is suitable for MBA and undergraduate students ready to expand their basic understanding of financial metrics.

BigBasket.com, an online supermarket established in December 2011 in Bangalore, India, had become one of the major players in the Indian online grocery market by the end of March 2016.₁ Run by Innovative Retail Concepts Private Limited, BigBasket.com was operating in more than 23 cities across the country in 2016. The online grocery market in India was in a stage of growth and transformation, fuelled by India's large urban population who sought a lifestyle of convenience and ease. It had also attracted many entrepreneurs who competed fiercely with each other in a market characterised by thin margins. Intense competition ensured that only a few companies were able to survive and sustain themselves. One of these companies was Big Basket, which succeeded in spite of the competition, attracting Series D_a funding worth USD 150_b million from the United Arab Emirates-based Abraaj Group in March 2016.₂