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Sustainable development (in under-developed rural communities).

Bachelor's degree.

The case follows six young adults from Quebec, who are mandated with a three-month agro-environmental project in the fight against desertification and poverty, in Kamaka, a village in the Sahel region of Mali. The project's central element is the development of a community garden that would ensure the diversification of the community's nutritional diet, and the rehabilitation of the environment. The mandate also consists of various environmental awareness workshops pertaining to efficient energy consumption, composting, and solar food drying techniques. The project, in its fourth year of collaboration between the Quebec organization and their local Malian partner, does not seem to have been yielding the desired results. The team is faced with the challenges of understanding the opportunities and limitations of the project so that they can try to succeed where previous teams have failed; while overcoming the organizational and logistical shortfalls that they faced prior to the start of their work, as they simultaneously struggled to adapt to their totally new context.

How to prepare for, approach, and carry out local community development projects – environmental and/or social – in under-developed regions such as Mali. Mainly, how to create a shared vision with the concerned community; build an effective multi-stakeholder network; and ultimately co-create sustainable value (as per the proposed Senge model).

Teaching notes and short documentary online link.

At the end of the case study discussion, students will able to state the importance of outsourcing with comparing pros and cons in business decision-making; review the value bestowed to the community in using sustainable raw material while at the same time conserving the ancient style of artwork particular to the area; discuss the utility of the products manufactured by “Flying Colours,” especially for the lockdown period which was because of the pandemic; and demonstrate and interpret the use of shark and mosquito bite matrix.

Arun Kumar Patni, 47, and his wife Neelima Patni, 43, are co-founders of Flying Colours, a start-up company based in Jaipur, in the state of Rajasthan, India. Their enterprise was engaged in the manufacturing and marketing of bird products and accessories, including bird feeders, bird houses, earthen water bowls, etc. In July 2020, post-lockdown, they were desperate to hire carpenters to restart their factory. However, COVID-19 posed a serious challenge, making it very difficult to replace their skilled carpenters, who had returned to their native places and had not come back. This disrupted production and order fulfilment. Keeping this situation in perspective in anticipation of the continuing pandemic crisis, Neelima was in favour of outsourcing basic production and designing the birdfeed decoration and artwork in-house. Meanwhile, Arun instead favoured continuing full in-house production as before, by hiring replacement carpenters. Yet for an in-house full-scale production, procuring raw material was a difficult task because of the lockdown. The situation had earlier taken a turn for the worse when Arun had advertised an exchange marketing policy to let customers return their old bird feeders for a 20% discount on a new one. This campaign was a huge success and resulted in a sales spike but unfortunately it caused a huge stock of returned products in their warehouse. Arun initially planned to repair and resell them as refurbished products. It now seemed impossible, because local carpenters demanded higher labour charges than the regular carpenters did. Flying Colours had provided skills workshops and hired external trainers to train unskilled carpenters prior to lockdown, so now all the training investment was in vain. Cash liquidity, sales, marketing, etc. were almost at a standstill.

This case particularly focuses on undergraduate-level students pursuing business or commerce programs, especially those studying core course: Entrepreneurial Strategic Management.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

Entrepreneurship and family business.

The case is suitable for BA and MBA levels and for courses focusing on family businesses, entrepreneurship, or small and medium-sized enterprises.

The Gomez family is the owner of Colchones Eldorado, a Colombian mattress company, in business for more than 50 years. Its founder and CEO Gumercindo Gomez, 75 years old, had no succession plan but he wanted to ensure the future of his business. Given the urgency of this situation and the complexity of the family structure, Martha Gomez, General Manager, hired a consultant to design the succession plan. To prepare this plan, the consultant must take into account: the preservation of stock ownership within the family, the company's sustainability under the new CEO family member, and the assurance of the family harmony.

These include: understanding the characteristics of a family business in the Latin American context; recognizing the stages of the family ownership; and identifying personal characteristics and roles of family members in order to design the basis of the succession plan.

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

The case includes issues in sustainable enterprises, marketing management, organizational development, organizational behavior, entrepreneurship, organizational leadership and small business management.

The Bahia Aventuras case may be used at both the undergraduate and graduate levels of study within most business school curricula (BSBA, MBA and MS). Potential courses may include building sustainable enterprises, marketing management, organizational development, organizational behavior, entrepreneurship, organizational leadership and small business management.

Bahia Aventuras is an ecotourism company in Costa Rica. A local entrepreneur, Walter Brenes, started the company in 2007 to specialize in marine tours, including whale watching, bird viewing and snorkeling. However, the founder had no business training and confronts both internal and external challenges to achieve sustainable success, both financially and environmentally. Internally, there were few financial control systems in place and as a result Walter's ability to accurately account for revenues and expenses was limited. Bahia Aventuras and Walter also faced external challenges. Construction of a new highway was likely, and that could bring more competition, including hotel chains such as the Marriott and Sheraton. Government regulation cut both ways for the company. He was the classic small businessperson, who needed help in moving to the next stage of development for his small business. Thus, a small ecotourism business was caught in the middle of rapid economic development, a growing national infrastructure and increasing pressures to preserve and protect the coastal ecosystem and rainforest of south central Costa Rica. He was just trying to figure out how to “stay alive” as a business. The case has a tragic ending for the owners. Both Walter and his partner, along with one of their tour guides, died in a car accident. But family, friends and the community has kept Walter's vision alive, and Bahia Aventuras continues to day.

outcomes Upon completion of the Bahia Aventuras case, each participant will be able to: Describe the economic development and growth prospects of ecotourism within Costa Rica. Evaluate the socio-economic challenges which confront Costa Rica as a developing nation within the Central American region. Describe how Costa Rica's environmental regulations have affected the continued growth and development of ecotourism within the country. Describe the complex set of relationships that may exist between small business owners, their employees, regulatory agencies and the local community. Apply management skills and competencies to analyze and propose feasible solutions to organizational performance problems. Explain how the implementation of sustainable business practices may serve as a catalyst for the creation of shared value for organizational stakeholders as enabled through economic growth, attainment of social equity and preservation of the environment.

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

Andreas Stihl AG is the world's leading manufacturer of chain saws and other outdoor handheld power equipment. Based on marketing challenges in its high-volume retail channel—mass merchants such as The Home Depot and Lowe's—Stihl's U.S. unit has narrowed its distribution system to a single channel: independent retail dealers specializing in yard maintenance equipment. This risky and highly publicized decision has proved extremely successful, raising profits, attracting more dealers into exclusive relationships with Stihl, and strengthening the brand's top-quality positioning. But Stihl management are concerned that this channel system may not fit tomorrow's demographics, dominated by homeowners from the so-called Generation X and Generation Y. The case outlines Stihl's business and channel systems and customer needs, then poses a series of questions that management believes must be answered to determine whether to maintain or move away from reliance on its specialty retailers and how to adapt its system.

To understand issues related to retail channel strategy development in fast-changing consumer markets, as well as the challenges of adapting legacy routes-to-market systems to changing consumer service output demands.

Strategic marketing, Business strategy, Product diversification strategy and/or Market entry strategy.

This case is useful for undergraduate and postgraduate students who are pursuing majors in marketing, business management and/or strategic management.

The Emirates Dates Factory commenced operations in 1989 in Ras Al Khaimah, United Arab Emirates (UAE), as a 100 per cent equity held by Mr Abdullah Al Shamsi. Over time, it has become one of the best and renowned factory for date production and processing. Emirates Dates derives its strength from its own plantations in Ras Al Khaimah and Al Ain, as well as from a wide variety of date products that it develops, including date syrup, dates in different packing and stuffed dates. The company seeks to be the leader of dates production and processing in terms of sales. However, the management is facing issues pertaining to determining the area of growth that it should pursue. This case study illustrates the growth options that Emirates Dates could pursue along with its opportunities and challenges that the firm faces.

This case study expose student to Ansoff growth matrix in general and the application of the market penetration strategy in specific. Accordingly, the case illustrates how one could develop other growth strategies to improve its revenues through product diversification and/or market development.

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

CSS 11: Strategy.

Upon completion of the case study, the students will be able to analyze the brand equity construct through the associative neural network model for decision-making; identify prospective scenarios through the Delphi method for the construction of strategic plans in organizations; and propose the innovation of a product by applying creativity techniques to enter international markets.

Cafe Galavis was one of the leading family businesses in industrial development and had the highest business recognition, with a century of experience in producing and commercializing roasted and ground coffee in Cucuta, Colombia. In 2015, the diplomatic crisis between the governments of Colombia and Venezuela led to the indefinite closure of the Colombian–Venezuelan border, which caused an increase in income from smuggled coffee. In addition, the presence of different competitors and traditional brands negatively impacted the level of sales, which considerably affected financial stability. Likewise, internal difficulties of family nature and administrative management led to the change of senior management. By 2016, Juan Yáñez was appointed chief executive officer (CEO) and was in charge of avoiding the company’s closure. In January 2023, he received feedback from his consulting team, and upon evaluation of the new market challenges with his collaborators, he realized a great challenge that merited the search for a priority alternative solution. How to design a new product considering the loss of brand identity in the face of the generational change of its consumers? These were some of the challenges posed by the CEO that consequently required starting a strategic management process of innovation.

The teaching case is aimed at students of postgraduate academic programs in the areas of knowledge of innovation, product design, industrial design, marketing or MBA. In the modules of marketing, strategic management, brand management and strategic foresight, the case allowed for the orientation of the concepts of brand value or branding as well as the analysis of the value chain for the implementation of strategies that promote competitive advantages of companies. Similarly, in the modules of product or service design, creativity and innovation and complex thinking, the case allows one to approach a complex problem and apply creativity techniques for its solution.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS: 8 Marketing.

Established in 2010, Mellower Coffee has 40 exquisite chain stores and three branches, namely Mellower Coffee Sales, Mellower Business Management and Shanghai Mellower Roasting Factory. Positioned as a premium coffee brand in China, Mellower Coffee has realized the integrated operation and management of the whole industrial chain from raw coffee trade, roasting factory, coffee retail products, specialty coffee chain, office coffee to coffee academy. It has a vision to attract and cultivate more and more coffee lovers by constant innovation coffee culture promotion.

Strategic management, operation management, health and safety

The authors have been developed the case to be applied for a diploma, undergraduate students and it might help the students in the postgraduate. The case is appropriate for courses in the area of strategic management, operation management and health and safety.

The learning outcomes are as follows: to understand the importance of animal disease prevention and the correct procedures for dealing with disease outbreaks in an animal facility; to reinforce the importance of adherence to strict procedures and chain of command by Life Sciences and Conservation sections in preserving the health of animals, zoo staff and visitors; to recognize the importance of disease monitoring and control in wildlife conservation; and to understand the importance of concrete experience in related positions to provide leaders like Director Mark Craig with the skills to handle such a big responsibility. Al Ain Zoo has such leaders along with a dedicated and resourceful management team that has proven capable of placing the institution among the best conservation parks in the world.

Large collections of animals of diverse species found in zoos and animal parks present a considerable challenge to facility managers in developing and implementing programs to prevent and control the spread of animal diseases. One need to only think about the nightmare consequences of an illness that could decimate a population of animals in a public setting such as a zoo and, in a worst-case scenario, spread to staff, visitors and even the public at large. Biologists have clearly shown how certain types of animals can act as reservoirs for disease viruses, for example, chimpanzees harboring the simian immunodeficiency virus that mutated to HIV or chickens and ducks spreading avian influenza virus to poultry workers and then to the public. Thus, disease control in zoos is an issue of the utmost importance, and managers and operators neglect it at their peril. The reputation and indeed the very existence of an animal park rests in the hands of a dedicated group of managers, veterinarians and technical staff, as well as zoo workers who must strictly follow procedures to prevent and contain animal-borne diseases. This case study focuses on the work of one man in a large internationally known facility to develop, implement, test and evaluate an innovative program for animal disease control. So, what would you do if you were the director of a large metropolitan zoo and your staff veterinarian came to you and said that there was an outbreak of a serious viral disease among a group of animals? Could you have prevented the disease? How will you treat the sick animals and stop the disease from spreading? Is there a risk of the zoo staff contracting the disease from handling sick animals? What about zoo visitors? These are all questions that are addressed in this new and intriguing case study focused on managing animal diseases in the setting of a zoo or wildlife park. Mark Craig, Director of Life Sciences at the Al Ain Zoo in the United Arab Emirates, has plenty to say about the planning, science and management skills necessary to insure that a large population of diverse wild animals remains healthy and thriving. The Al Ain Zoo is the largest of its kind in the Middle East, and while he has been in charge of the animal welfare program for more than six years, there have been few incidents of disease and all have been contained. What can be learned from his effective strategies and leadership skills is clearly discussed and illustrated in this unique real-world case study.

The authors have developed the case to be applied for a diploma, undergraduate students and it might help the students in the postgraduate. The case is appropriate for courses in the area of strategic management, operation management and health and safety.

Teaching notes are available upon request for educators only. These teaching notes should be shared solely with the instructor and students should not have access to. Please contact your library to gain login or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 11: Strategy.

The case of Bertelsmann China: Supply Chain for Books (A) focuses on one the world's leading media companies to illustrate a widespread problem in the supply chain strategy in extremely fast growing markets. Students learn about the basic challenges of supply chain strategy in an international context. The case covers important fields of management theory. Supply chain designs well as cost and performance drivers are revised by the use of frameworks.