Ruth, M. Owades Funded Calyx and Corolla Company

Introduction

Ruth, M. Owades funded Calyx and Corolla Company in 1988 which delivers flowers through an unconventional distribution channel. The flowers are delivered directly from growers to the consumers through Federal Express services, thereby allowing customers access to fresher flowers at a competitive price. Calyx & Corolla has achieved excellent growth in sales with exceed 10 million, has led to an increase in investor confidence in the company by infusion of fresh capital. Calyx and Corolla Company is considering a change in its strategy to deal with various externalities faced by the Calyx & Corolla in future due to arrival of technology as a very strong medium. Calyx & Corolla will have to spend specific amounts to capture significant market share to assess the financial implications of spending profoundly on the advertisements. Moreover, what should be the strategy to advertise is also an issue because the catalogue medium was already attractive results then would it be safe getting into aggressive indirect advertising.

Customer, Company, Competitor, Collaborator, and Context are framework has been employed to approach the case. Following the analysis of the strength and weaknesses of the company based on the inferences stated.

Customer

The U.S. flower market is currently at $9 billion and has a healthy growth of 7.7 percent. The customer based comprises mostly women of age 30-35 with a household income of at least $35,000 which comprises 43.2% of the local population. Besides that, the corporate clients are a potential opportunity to boost incremental sales. The characteristic demands of a customer in gardening business is freshness and longevity of the delivered flowers, promptly delivery date, a large variety for separate occasions and reliable customer support services. Moreover, a large number of customers are royal to the local traditional florists and do not utilize the mail order services.

Company

Calyx and Corolla Company has been in the business of selling fresh flowers by mail for about two and half year. Its sales revenue exceeded $10 million with 150,000 transactions and capital of $1 million was invested in 1990. Ruth Owades, a Harvard Graduate having experience of operating direct mail business, established the company with benefited from her previous similar venture "Gardener's Eden." The core competency of Calyx and Corolla delivered fresh flowers as advertised within duration of 3-4 days. The earlier chain of grower reduces delivery time and improving freshness of delivered flowers and reducing the overall cost of delivery.

The marketing tactics such as delivery of flowers in shielded boxes, hand written calligraphic message added the personalization dimension ensuring satisfaction of customers. Most essentially, calculated delivery of catalog containing