reinventing best buy case study pdf

The marketplace for case solutions.

Reinventing Best Buy – Case Solution

Best Buy Company, Inc. is the largest retailer of appliances and consumer electronics in North America. From 2010 to 2013, the company experienced declining store sales. This was mostly attributed to Amazon.com's showrooming practices. Amazon directs customers to look at products from any physical stores including Best Buy but customers are encouraged to buy them at lower prices online. CEO Hubert Joly grabbed this Amazon's strategy by coming up with competitive prices. As a result, a turnaround was experienced. Over time, CEO Joly concluded the "Renew Blue" program and is now planning on the creation of "New Blue" in the hope to curtail Amazon's advances.

​John R. Wells and Gabriel Ellsworth Harvard Business Review ( 716455-PDF-ENG ) March 31, 2016

Case questions answered:

What were the strategic challenges facing best buy in 2012 why was the company finding them hard to respond to, what did joly see as best buy’s key strengths and weaknesses do you think his assessment was accurate.

• Do the Renew Blue goals address the issues Best Buy was facing? Which initiatives in Renew Blue made a strategic difference?

Not the questions you were looking for? Submit your own questions & get answers .

Reinventing Best Buy Case Answers

This Reinventing Best Buy case study tackles how the company was able to make a turnaround despite the competition in the market, specifically with Amazon.com’s practices.

Best Buy Company, Inc. is the largest retailer of appliances and consumer electronics in North America. From 2010 to 2013, the company experienced declining store sales.

This was mostly attributed to Amazon.com’s showrooming practices. Amazon directs customers to look at products from any physical stores, including Best Buy, but customers are encouraged to buy them at lower prices online.

CEO Hubert Joly grabbed Amazon’s strategy by coming up with competitive prices. As a result, a turnaround was experienced.

Over time, CEO Joly concluded the “Renew Blue” program and is now planning on the creation of “New Blue” in the hope of curtailing Amazon’s advances.

The strategic proposition of Best Buy was to become one of the largest retailers of consumer electronics and appliances. The company seeks to improve the incapacity of managing its international business.

However, broad-based discounters like Walmart are growing. At the same time, companies with online sales business models, like Amazon, are scaling high.

With these competitors, Best Buy experienced an overall decline in its market share. This is one of the major challenges that this company faces.

Furthermore, Best Buy’s Marketplace program failed to capture an adequate share of online sales. The intense market competition of other platforms like Amazon.com and Buy.com allows customers to compare Best Buy’s store prices with their own products. This contributed to the failure of Best Buy’s program.

Nevertheless, the company struggled to face this new challenge. Added to this, however, are other internal management problems.

Best Buy management fails to do what they said they would do. Low customer satisfaction and poor price perception also contributed to the challenges.

During the 2007 and 2009 recession, the company continued to open new stores, which negatively affected the company.

Moreover, the company couldn’t adapt to other companies’ online business services due to inconveniences like offering the best experience for the customer or failure to deliver all the information about the electronic products they were selling.

Best Buy’s key strengths were strongly related to the leadership they had within the North American market, allowing them to continue their growth in the most important categories.

The company had a considerably large customer base, with millions of consumers belonging to the loyalty program. This was achieved thanks to the “unique and compelling” selling proposition (pg. 4) used as a strategy by the company.

This consisted mainly of a good advising service, competitive prices in a wide list of categories and products, support, and multi-channel service, all of which were framed in a productive model directed to increase sales and productivity.

The key weakness that Joly saw in Best Buy was…

Unlock Case Solution Now!

Get instant access to this case solution with a simple, one-time payment ($24.90).

After purchase:

• You'll be redirected to the full case solution.
• You will receive an access link to the solution via email.

Best decision to get my homework done faster! Michael MBA student, Boston

How do I get access?

Upon purchase, you are forwarded to the full solution and also receive access via email.

Is it safe to pay?

Yes! We use Paypal and Stripe as our secure payment providers of choice.

What is Casehero?

We are the marketplace for case solutions - created by students, for students.

• Case Studies

Strategy & Execution

Reinventing Best Buy

Write a review, are you an educator.

Register as a Premium Educator at hbsp.harvard.edu , plan a course, and save your students up to 50% with your academic discount.

Product Description

Publication Date: March 31, 2016

Source: Harvard Business School

On March 1, 2017, Best Buy Company, Inc., North America's largest retailer of consumer electronics and appliances, announced a third year of comparable-store sales increases and a 20.8% increase in domestic comparable online sales. These results were in marked contrast to four years of declining comparable-store sales from 2010 through 2013. The stock price rose 17% in March, and on April 20, 2017, it surpassed $50 for the first time since January 2008. When CEO Hubert Joly took over in September 2012, Best Buy was losing share to Amazon.com, which was encouraging consumers to view products at Best Buy and other physical stores and then buy them for a lower price online, a practice known as "showrooming." Undaunted, Joly had encouraged the practice, convinced that it presented an opportunity to sell to customers as long as Best Buy's prices were competitive. Joly had committed the company to a multi-channel strategy in North America and exited struggling international operations. Operating margins had increased as a result, but growth was still proving elusive. In early 2017, Joly announced that his "Renew Blue" turnaround effort was complete and that he was now intent on creating the New Blue. Would the new strategy be enough to stop Amazon's advances?

This Product Also Appears In

Related products.

Showrooming at Best Buy

Best Buy in Crisis

Copyright permissions.

To obtain copyright permission to share this PDF with your team, purchase one copy per user.

Order for your team and save!

Product details

• Harvard Business School →
• Faculty & Research →
• November 2017
• Teaching Note
• HBS Case Collection

Reinventing Best Buy

• Format: Print
• | Language: English
• | Pages: 17

More from the Authors

• August 2021
• Faculty Research

Making UK Energy Smarter

• Making UK Energy Smarter  By: John R. Wells
• Waymo LLC  By: John R. Wells
• The NFL  By: John R. Wells

Transformation and resilience: An interview with Best Buy’s executive chairman Hubert Joly

In this episode of Inside the Strategy Room , we share an excerpt from a webcast interview with Hubert Joly, the former CEO and executive chairman of North American technology retailer and services provider Best Buy. The interview was recorded at the 2020 Global Business Leaders Forum, scheduled to take place in New York in early April but held virtually instead. In this session, Joly speaks with Becca Coggins, leader of McKinsey’s North America Retail Practice, about Best Buy’s organizational transformation and how the coronavirus pandemic is changing the key measures of performance. This is an edited transcript. You can listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , or Google Podcasts . For more on the Best Buy story, see the companion piece, “ Leading with purpose and humanity: A conversation with Hubert Joly .” See also Hubert’s forthcoming book provisionally titled, The Heart of Business .

Becca Coggins: As you know, Hubert, this conference explores the themes of transformation and resilience, so we would love to dial into your experience at Best Buy. Let’s start with the summer of 2012: you are the CEO of Carlson, the global hospitality and travel company, and you get a call about a certain iconic retailer that is coming off a $1 billion-plus loss. What drew you to the opportunity to lead Best Buy?

Hubert Joly: I got the call from a friend and I told him, “I don’t know anything about retail and the place is a mess.” So, before any interviews with the board’s search committee, I did an outside-in analysis on Best Buy and the sector. I did store visits, I read everything I could, and what I saw was that, of course, this was the all-you-can-eat menu of challenges. You had strategic challenges with Amazon and some of the technology companies vertically integrating. You had operational challenges with the service quality having gone down significantly. You had leadership challenges, since my predecessor had been fired, and you had shareholder challenges with the share price dropping significantly and the company’s founder and lead shareholder, Dick Schulze, trying to take it private.

But this outside-in diagnosis revealed two things. One, there were real strengths in the company. Technology is exciting but, for many of us, it’s a bit challenging, so there was a service-oriented role that Best Buy could play. There was also a role with the world’s foremost tech companies that needed a place to showcase the fruit of their billions of dollars of R&D investments. Two, all of the company’s problems were self-inflicted. The poor quality of service in the stores had nothing to do with Amazon. It was on us. So that gave me the confidence that we had enough to effect a turnaround.

Becca Coggins: So, you take the job in late summer 2012. How did you approach architecting the actual turnaround?

Hubert Joly: The problem with turnarounds is that we have this image of cut, cut, cut. Analysts were telling me, “You will have to close a lot of stores.” I have the opposite view. In a turnaround, and in business life more generally, you start with people. I learned many years ago that there are three imperatives in a company: the people imperative—you need the right people properly engaged and equipped; the business imperative—you need happy customers; and the financial imperative, which is the performance. You never start with finance, you start with people, so that is what I did.

I spent my first week on the job in the local store listening to the front-line workers and I learned so much more than I would have learned in a windowless conference room looking at spreadsheets. One of the associates told me, “Hubert, the website search engine is not working. Type in ‘Cinderella.’” And I typed “Cinderella,” and what I got was a bunch of cameras, not DVDs or CDs. Not very helpful. Nobody in headquarters would have told me this.

Also, I was able to observe the interactions between the associates and the customers. There was this phenomenon of showrooming, with customers coming to our stores, spending a lot of time with a Best Buy “blue shirt,” and then leaving empty-handed because they assumed the price online was lower. That’s where the idea of matching online prices came from. I also looked at the floorplan: there was a lot of room set aside for CDs, movies, video games that, in the digital age, didn’t make any sense. So, we focused on two things. Revenue was going down, and profit margin was going down. How hard can it be to solve two problems?

Subscribe to the Inside the Strategy Room podcast

Becca Coggins: You branded the turnaround Renew Blue. What were you trying to signal with that branding?

Hubert Joly: I’m a big believer that a strategy needs a name. If you don’t have a name, you don’t have a plan because people cannot relate to it. Renew Blue was signaling two things. Blue, of course, is the color of the shirts at Best Buy, so there was a lot of strength in the history, the values. This was not about becoming somebody else; this was us. But we knew we needed to change. Years later, the team told me that I had conveyed that if we did not change, we would die. That tends to focus the mind. So, it was a clear invitation for us to build on our past but also reinvent the company.

Becca Coggins: You talked about starting with people. How did you go about getting the full company to have the energy and belief in the turnaround?

Hubert Joly: In a turnaround, you have to create energy. In physics, we learn that energy is a finite quantity. In business and organizations, it’s not. It is something you can unleash. A company is a human organization made up of individuals working together in pursuit of a goal. If this is your central idea, it has significant implications for how you lead. You are not trying to be the smartest person in the room—you are trying to create an environment in which you can unleash this energy.

So, we started by being very transparent. We shared the diagnosis with the entire team. We were also optimistic; people need optimism, including during this time of crisis. Realism, yes, but also optimism. I think as leaders, how we show up is probably more important than what we say. If you were to ask Best Buy people who were there in 2012, they will probably remember I was high-energy, and I had a sense of optimism. Do they remember exactly what I said? Probably not. But I conveyed that I saw the possibilities. Then you nurture the optimism along the way by looking for green shoots and communicating early wins.

In a turnaround, you have to create energy. In physics, we learn that energy is a finite quantity. In business and organizations, it’s not. It is something you can unleash.

Next was the co-creation of the plan. In the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s, you would create a plan, cascade it down and then roll it out. You put incentives in place and hoped things went well. That does not work anymore. The co-creation of the plan was really important. And you’re not looking for perfection—because of the activist investor interest in Best Buy, we had eight weeks between the day I joined and the day I presented the Renew Blue plan to Wall Street, which was great because it forced us to come out with the plan. There is a philosophy that the quest for perfection is evil. You can confuse perfection with performance. You don’t go for a perfect plan—you set the direction and then you apply what I call the bicycle theory. If you have tried to direct a bicycle from a standstill, it’s very hard; you fall. If the bicycle is moving, it may not be moving in the right direction but it doesn’t matter; you can course-correct.

There is this idea that the difference between great leaders and good leaders is not the quality of their decisions but the quantity of their decisions. It may not be true in capital-intensive industries with long cycles, but in most customer-oriented businesses, it’s a good approach. Then you focus on unleashing the human magic. I found defining what to do was usually not that difficult; it was mobilizing and doing it that was hard. How do you create the new mindset and new capabilities? That was the essence of the strategy.

The last thing I would say in terms of mobilizing the organization is about corporate purpose and stakeholder capitalism. You could say that this is something you focus on when everything is going well, right? No. This is something you do all the time. In fact, our 2012 Renew Blue presentation to investors had five pillars: the customers, the employees, the vendors, the communities in which we operate, and the shareholders. We were treating shareholders as important stakeholders but one of five stakeholder groups. That creates meaning for the organization, one where even during dark days people feel they are part of something to which they are ready to commit.

The difference between great leaders and good leaders is not the quality of their decisions but the quantity of their decisions. It may not be true everywhere, but in most customer-oriented businesses, it’s a good approach.

Becca Coggins: You also took some bold decisions, especially during the early years of Renew Blue, such as getting out of international businesses, and revamping the cost structure. Were some harder than others?

Hubert Joly: International was easy. I don’t believe that retail is a global business. It’s a local business. There are some exceptions, as when you are vertically integrated or a brand-driven business, but in a business like ours, there is no benefit to being global. The previous team had expanded in Europe and in China. We quickly reviewed that and decided to exit.

As for the performance improvement around cost, let me pause to explain something. In a turnaround, you don’t start with cutting heads. The first lever you go after is increasing revenue. So, as part of our turnaround plan, we put a lot of emphasis on our online business. We did the price match to take price off the table in customers’ decisions. We invested in the customer experience in the stores. We put emphasis on reigniting the growth engines. Now I’m a big believer that it is never either/or—it’s and . Revenue is number one; number two are non-salary expenses, which at most companies are 70 to 80 percent of the cost structure.

One example of this: today the biggest TVs are large and very thin, so they’re fragile. If we sell a lot of TVs, we will break many of them. We looked at the entire value chain to reduce damage, working with the vendors on the design of the TVs and the packaging, considering how we store the TVs, how we move them, the advice we give to customers when they install them, and we saw that as a $400 million opportunity. By now we have taken out $2 billion of costs and probably three-quarters is non-salary expenses.

The third thing you look at is optimization of competition and benefits. We implemented a host of new benefits for employees, including backup childcare and mental health support. But there are some costs of providing the benefits that you can go after—in particular, in healthcare by having wellness programs. Only if one plus two plus three is not sufficient do you go after headcount, and we did reduce that. We de-layered the organization, we de-emphasized several areas, we looked for efficiencies. If you do this as a last resort, you send the signal that human resources are not a resource, they are a source—an engine of the company. And when you do reduce headcount, there are different ways to do this. A couple of years ago we decided to close Best Buy Mobile’s stand-alone stores but instead of letting those employees go, we worked with them to offer them opportunities within the company. These were people with five or ten years of experience. They were a real asset.

Becca Coggins: That’s an interesting thread. Can you tell us a bit about the vendor program?

Hubert Joly: When we decided that our prices had to be competitive, one reaction I got from investors and the media was, “Before, you were going to die because your prices were too high, and now you will die because your costs are too high.” Because we are a more service-oriented organization, we had higher costs than Walmart or Amazon. But that was without accounting for our idea of partnering with the world’s top tech companies.

In 2012, we already had a small Apple store within our stores but for Samsung, there was nothing meaningful. The CEO of Samsung Electronics visited us in December of that year. He had heard from the Renew Blue presentation that we were open to these partnerships and over dinner we did a handshake deal. In a matter of months, Samsung had 1,000 Samsung stores within Best Buy, where highly trained staff could showcase their products just across the aisle from the Apple store within our store. It was good for the customer, because they could see and compare. It was good for Samsung, because how long would it have taken them otherwise to build 1,000 stores in the US? And it was good for us. Then we did a similar partnership with Microsoft, and we expanded the partnership with Apple. We did it with Sony, LG, Google, and Amazon.

Now Amazon was the company that was supposed to kill us back in 2012. Some retailers were refusing to sell Amazon’s hardware such as the Kindle tablets. We had always sold Amazon products and over time we added an Amazon store within our stores. Then we did something else: we partnered with Amazon whereby Amazon gave Best Buy the exclusive rights to its Fire TV platform to be embedded in smart TVs.

I feel there is too much focus on zero-sum games. Sometimes, when companies develop strategies, they say, I want to be number one. Of course, there is only room for one number one, and when you are number one, where do you go? It is much better to be inspired by your purpose and then see how you can partner with others in pursuit of that goal.

Becca Coggins: In late 2017 you unveiled a new chapter in the transformation. Can you help us understand what was different about this shift to New Blue?

Hubert Joly: In 2016, one of our board members said, “Hubert, you need to declare the turnaround officially over and enter a new chapter.” In the turnaround, we had to focus on growth, but that had to be a somewhat risk-averse strategy. The purpose of this next chapter was about growing the business and becoming the best version of Best Buy we could be. So, we did customer research, market segmentation, but we also focused on our purpose. We declared that our purpose was to enrich lives through technology. We are not in the business of selling TVs or computers. And we are not fundamentally a retailer. We are in the business of enriching lives by addressing key human needs, whether it’s entertainment, health, productivity, or communication.

This purpose has the benefit of vastly expanding what we can do for customers. The key is to make it the bedrock of the strategy. Let me make it come to life with a couple of examples. One is our entry into the healthcare space. There is a global trend of aging populations and a big movement toward helping seniors stay in their homes longer because it is better for them, it is better from a healthcare cost standpoint, and it is certainly better in the context of the current crisis. So, we did a series of acquisitions and now have a business focused on that. One of the things we do is put sensors into seniors’ homes and, using artificial intelligence, we monitor their daily activities. Are they drinking, are they sleeping well? We have care centers that are alerted if any concerns emerge. That service is sold through insurance companies and it’s a high-growth opportunity for us. And we would never have thought of it if we had just looked at the business in a traditional way.

This presentation was recorded on April 3, 2020. The situation surrounding COVID-19 is evolving daily. For the most current information and insights on the implications of COVID-19 for your business, please visit Coronavirus: Leading through the crisis , a regularly updated collection of McKinsey briefing notes.

Becca Coggins is a senior partner in McKinsey’s Chicago office.

Explore a career with us

Related articles.

Leading with purpose and humanity: A conversation with Hubert Joly

Demonstrating corporate purpose in the time of coronavirus

Purpose: Shifting from why to how

Don't have an account? Sign up now

Already have an account login, get 10% off on your next order.

Subscribe now to get your discount coupon *Only correct email will be accepted

(Approximately ~ 0.0 Page)

Total Price

Thank you for your email subscription. Check your email to get Coupon Code.

Reinventing Best Buy Case Analysis and Case Solution

Posted by Peter Williams on Aug-09-2018

Introduction of Reinventing Best Buy Case Solution

The Reinventing Best Buy case study is a Harvard Business Review case study, which presents a simulated practical experience to the reader allowing them to learn about real life problems in the business world. The Reinventing Best Buy case consisted of a central issue to the organization, which had to be identified, analysed and creative solutions had to be drawn to tackle the issue. This paper presents the solved Reinventing Best Buy case analysis and case solution. The method through which the analysis is done is mentioned, followed by the relevant tools used in finding the solution.

The case solution first identifies the central issue to the Reinventing Best Buy case study, and the relevant stakeholders affected by this issue. This is known as the problem identification stage. After this, the relevant tools and models are used, which help in the case study analysis and case study solution. The tools used in identifying the solution consist of the SWOT Analysis, Porter Five Forces Analysis, PESTEL Analysis, VRIO analysis, Value Chain Analysis, BCG Matrix analysis, Ansoff Matrix analysis, and the Marketing Mix analysis. The solution consists of recommended strategies to overcome this central issue. It is a good idea to also propose alternative case study solutions, because if the main solution is not found feasible, then the alternative solutions could be implemented. Lastly, a good case study solution also includes an implementation plan for the recommendation strategies. This shows how through a step-by-step procedure as to how the central issue can be resolved.

Problem Identification of Reinventing Best Buy Case Solution

Harvard Business Review cases involve a central problem that is being faced by the organization and these problems affect a number of stakeholders. In the problem identification stage, the problem faced by Reinventing Best Buy is identified through reading of the case. This could be mentioned at the start of the reading, the middle or the end. At times in a case analysis, the problem may be clearly evident in the reading of the HBR case. At other times, finding the issue is the job of the person analysing the case. It is also important to understand what stakeholders are affected by the problem and how. The goals of the stakeholders and are the organization are also identified to ensure that the case study analysis are consistent with these.

Analysis of the Reinventing Best Buy HBR Case Study

The objective of the case should be focused on. This is doing the Reinventing Best Buy Case Solution. This analysis can be proceeded in a step-by-step procedure to ensure that effective solutions are found.

• In the first step, a growth path of the company can be formulated that lays down its vision, mission and strategic aims. These can usually be developed using the company history is provided in the case. Company history is helpful in a Business Case study as it helps one understand what the scope of the solutions will be for the case study.
• The next step is of understanding the company; its people, their priorities and the overall culture. This can be done by using company history. It can also be done by looking at anecdotal instances of managers or employees that are usually included in an HBR case study description to give the reader a real feel of the situation.
• Lastly, a timeline of the issues and events in the case needs to be made. Arranging events in a timeline allows one to predict the next few events that are likely to take place. It also helps one in developing the case study solutions. The timeline also helps in understanding the continuous challenges that are being faced by the organisation.

SWOT analysis of Reinventing Best Buy

An important tool that helps in addressing the central issue of the case and coming up with Reinventing Best Buy HBR case solution is the SWOT analysis.

• The SWOT analysis is a strategic management tool that lists down in the form of a matrix, an organisation's internal strengths and weaknesses, and external opportunities and threats. It helps in the strategic analysis of Reinventing Best Buy.
• Once this listing has been done, a clearer picture can be developed in regards to how strategies will be formed to address the main problem. For example, strengths will be used as an advantage in solving the issue.

Therefore, the SWOT analysis is a helpful tool in coming up with the Reinventing Best Buy Case Study answers. One does not need to remain restricted to using the traditional SWOT analysis, but the advanced TOWS matrix or weighted average SWOT analysis can also be used.

Porter Five Forces Analysis for Reinventing Best Buy

Another helpful tool in finding the case solutions is of Porter's Five Forces analysis. This is also a strategic tool that is used to analyse the competitive environment of the industry in which Reinventing Best Buy operates in. Analysis of the industry is important as businesses do not work in isolation in real life, but are affected by the business environment of the industry that they operate in. Harvard Business case studies represent real-life situations, and therefore, an analysis of the industry's competitive environment needs to be carried out to come up with more holistic case study solutions. In Porter's Five Forces analysis, the industry is analysed along 5 dimensions.

• These are the threats that the industry faces due to new entrants.
• It includes the threat of substitute products.
• It includes the bargaining power of buyers in the industry.
• It includes the bargaining power of suppliers in an industry.
• Lastly, the overall rivalry or competition within the industry is analysed.

This tool helps one understand the relative powers of the major players in the industry and its overall competitive dynamics. Actionable and practical solutions can then be developed by keeping these factors into perspective.

PESTEL Analysis of Reinventing Best Buy

Another helpful tool that should be used in finding the case study solutions is the PESTEL analysis. This also looks at the external business environment of the organisation helps in finding case study Analysis to real-life business issues as in HBR cases.

• The PESTEL analysis particularly looks at the macro environmental factors that affect the industry. These are the political, environmental, social, technological, environmental and legal (regulatory) factors affecting the industry.
• Factors within each of these 6 should be listed down, and analysis should be made as to how these affect the organisation under question.
• These factors are also responsible for the future growth and challenges within the industry. Hence, they should be taken into consideration when coming up with the Reinventing Best Buy case solution.

VRIO Analysis of Reinventing Best Buy

This is an analysis carried out to know about the internal strengths and capabilities of Reinventing Best Buy. Under the VRIO analysis, the following steps are carried out:

• The internal resources of Reinventing Best Buy are listed down.
• Each of these resources are assessed in terms of the value it brings to the organization.
• Each resource is assessed in terms of how rare it is. A rare resource is one that is not commonly used by competitors.
• Each resource is assessed whether it could be imitated by competition easily or not.
• Lastly, each resource is assessed in terms of whether the organization can use it to an advantage or not.

The analysis done on the 4 dimensions; Value, Rareness, Imitability, and Organization. If a resource is high on all of these 4, then it brings long-term competitive advantage. If a resource is high on Value, Rareness, and Imitability, then it brings an unused competitive advantage. If a resource is high on Value and Rareness, then it only brings temporary competitive advantage. If a resource is only valuable, then it’s a competitive parity. If it’s none, then it can be regarded as a competitive disadvantage.

Value Chain Analysis of Reinventing Best Buy

The Value chain analysis of Reinventing Best Buy helps in identifying the activities of an organization, and how these add value in terms of cost reduction and differentiation. This tool is used in the case study analysis as follows:

• The firm’s primary and support activities are listed down.
• Identifying the importance of these activities in the cost of the product and the differentiation they produce.
• Lastly, differentiation or cost reduction strategies are to be used for each of these activities to increase the overall value provided by these activities.

Recognizing value creating activities and enhancing the value that they create allow Reinventing Best Buy to increase its competitive advantage.

BCG Matrix of Reinventing Best Buy

The BCG Matrix is an important tool in deciding whether an organization should invest or divest in its strategic business units. The matrix involves placing the strategic business units of a business in one of four categories; question marks, stars, dogs and cash cows. The placement in these categories depends on the relative market share of the organization and the market growth of these strategic business units. The steps to be followed in this analysis is as follows:

• Identify the relative market share of each strategic business unit.
• Identify the market growth of each strategic business unit.
• Place these strategic business units in one of four categories. Question Marks are those strategic business units with high market share and low market growth rate. Stars are those strategic business units with high market share and high market growth rate. Cash Cows are those strategic business units with high market share and low market growth rate. Dogs are those strategic business units with low market share and low growth rate.
• Relevant strategies should be implemented for each strategic business unit depending on its position in the matrix.

The strategies identified from the Reinventing Best Buy BCG matrix and included in the case pdf. These are either to further develop the product, penetrate the market, develop the market, diversification, investing or divesting.

Ansoff Matrix of Reinventing Best Buy

Ansoff Matrix is an important strategic tool to come up with future strategies for Reinventing Best Buy in the case solution. It helps decide whether an organization should pursue future expansion in new markets and products or should it focus on existing markets and products.

• The organization can penetrate into existing markets with its existing products. This is known as market penetration strategy.
• The organization can develop new products for the existing market. This is known as product development strategy.
• The organization can enter new markets with its existing products. This is known as market development strategy.
• The organization can enter into new markets with new products. This is known as a diversification strategy.

The choice of strategy depends on the analysis of the previous tools used and the level of risk the organization is willing to take.

Marketing Mix of Reinventing Best Buy

Reinventing Best Buy needs to bring out certain responses from the market that it targets. To do so, it will need to use the marketing mix, which serves as a tool in helping bring out responses from the market. The 4 elements of the marketing mix are Product, Price, Place and Promotions. The following steps are required to carry out a marketing mix analysis and include this in the case study analysis.

• Analyse the company’s products and devise strategies to improve the product offering of the company.
• Analyse the company’s price points and devise strategies that could be based on competition, value or cost.
• Analyse the company’s promotion mix. This includes the advertisement, public relations, personal selling, sales promotion, and direct marketing. Strategies will be devised which makes use of a few or all of these elements.
• Analyse the company’s distribution and reach. Strategies can be devised to improve the availability of the company’s products.

Reinventing Best Buy Blue Ocean Strategy

The strategies devised and included in the Reinventing Best Buy case memo should have a blue ocean strategy. A blue ocean strategy is a strategy that involves firms seeking uncontested market spaces, which makes the competition of the company irrelevant. It involves coming up with new and unique products or ideas through innovation. This gives the organization a competitive advantage over other firms, unlike a red ocean strategy.

Competitors analysis of Reinventing Best Buy

The PESTEL analysis discussed previously looked at the macro environmental factors affecting business, but not the microenvironmental factors. One of the microenvironmental factors are competitors, which are addressed by a competitor analysis. The Competitors analysis of Reinventing Best Buy looks at the direct and indirect competitors within the industry that it operates in.

• This involves a detailed analysis of their actions and how these would affect the future strategies of Reinventing Best Buy.
• It involves looking at the current market share of the company and its competitors.
• It should compare the marketing mix elements of competitors, their supply chain, human resources, financial strength etc.
• It also should look at the potential opportunities and threats that these competitors pose on the company.

Organisation of the Analysis into Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Solution

Once various tools have been used to analyse the case, the findings of this analysis need to be incorporated into practical and actionable solutions. These solutions will also be the Reinventing Best Buy case answers. These are usually in the form of strategies that the organisation can adopt. The following step-by-step procedure can be used to organise the Harvard Business case solution and recommendations:

• The first step of the solution is to come up with a corporate level strategy for the organisation. This part consists of solutions that address issues faced by the organisation on a strategic level. This could include suggestions, changes or recommendations to the company's vision, mission and its strategic objectives. It can include recommendations on how the organisation can work towards achieving these strategic objectives. Furthermore, it needs to be explained how the stated recommendations will help in solving the main issue mentioned in the case and where the company will stand in the future as a result of these.
• The second step of the solution is to come up with a business level strategy. The HBR case studies may present issues faced by a part of the organisation. For example, the issues may be stated for marketing and the role of a marketing manager needs to be assumed. So, recommendations and suggestions need to address the strategy of the marketing department in this case. Therefore, the strategic objectives of this business unit (Marketing) will be laid down in the solutions and recommendations will be made as to how to achieve these objectives. Similar would be the case for any other business unit or department such as human resources, finance, IT etc. The important thing to note here is that the business level strategy needs to be aligned with the overall corporate strategy of the organisation. For example, if one suggests the organisation to focus on differentiation for competitive advantage as a corporate level strategy, then it can't be recommended for the Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Solution that the business unit should focus on costs.
• The third step is not compulsory but depends from case to case. In some HBR case studies, one may be required to analyse an issue at a department. This issue may be analysed for a manager or employee as well. In these cases, recommendations need to be made for these people. The solution may state that objectives that these people need to achieve and how these objectives would be achieved.

The case study analysis and solution, and Reinventing Best Buy case answers should be written down in the Reinventing Best Buy case memo, clearly identifying which part shows what. The Reinventing Best Buy case should be in a professional format, presenting points clearly that are well understood by the reader.

Alternate solution to the Reinventing Best Buy HBR case study

It is important to have more than one solution to the case study. This is the alternate solution that would be implemented if the original proposed solution is found infeasible or impossible due to a change in circumstances. The alternate solution for Reinventing Best Buy is presented in the same way as the original solution, where it consists of a corporate level strategy, business level strategy and other recommendations.

Implementation of Reinventing Best Buy Case Solution

The case study does not end at just providing recommendations to the issues at hand. One is also required to provide how these recommendations would be implemented. This is shown through a proper implementation framework. A detailed implementation framework helps in distinguishing between an average and an above average case study answer. A good implementation framework shows the proposed plan and how the organisations' resources would be used to achieve the objectives. It also lays down the changes needed to be made as well as the assumptions in the process.

• A proper implementation framework shows that one has clearly understood the case study and the main issue within it.
• It shows that one has been clarified with the HBR fundamentals on the topic.
• It shows that the details provided in the case have been properly analysed.
• It shows that one has developed an ability to prioritise recommendations and how these could be successfully implemented.
• The implementation framework also helps by removing out any recommendations that are not practical or actionable as these could not be implemented. Therefore, the implementation framework ensures that the solution to the Reinventing Best Buy Harvard case is complete and properly answered.

Recommendations and Action Plan for Reinventing Best Buy case analysis

For Reinventing Best Buy, based on the SWOT Analysis, Porter Five Forces Analysis, PESTEL Analysis, VRIO analysis, Value Chain Analysis, BCG Matrix analysis, Ansoff Matrix analysis, and the Marketing Mix analysis, the recommendations and action plan are as follows:

• Reinventing Best Buy should focus on making use of its strengths identified from the VRIO analysis to make the most of the opportunities identified from the PESTEL.
• Reinventing Best Buy should enhance the value creating activities within its value chain.
• Reinventing Best Buy should invest in its stars and cash cows, while getting rid of the dogs identified from the BCG Matrix analysis.
• To achieve its overall corporate and business level objectives, it should make use of the marketing mix tools to obtain desired results from its target market.

Baron, E. (2015). How They Teach the Case Method At Harvard Business School. Retrieved from https://poetsandquants.com/2015/09/29/how-they-teach-the-case-method-at-harvard-business-school/

Bartol. K, & Martin, D. (1998). Management, 3rd edition. Boston: Irwin McGrawHill.

Free Management E-Books. (2013a). PESTLE Analysis. Retrieved from http://www.free-management-ebooks.com/dldebk-pdf/fme-pestle-analysis.pdf

Gupta, A. (2013). Environment & PEST analysis: an approach to the external business environment. International Journal of Modern Social Sciences, 2(1), 34-43.

Hambrick, D. C., MacMillan, I. C., & Day, D. L. (1982). Strategic attributes and performance in the BCG matrix—A PIMS-based analysis of industrial product businesses. Academy of Management Journal, 25(3), 510-531.

Hill, C., & Jones, G. (2010). Strategic Management Theory: An Integrated Approach, Ninth Ed. Mason, OH: South-Western, Cengage Learning.

Hussain, S., Khattak, J., Rizwan, A., & Latif, M. A. (2013). ANSOFF matrix, environment, and growth-an interactive triangle. Management and Administrative Sciences Review, 2(2), 196-206.

IIBMS. (2015). 7 Effective Steps to Solve Case Study. Retrieved from http://www.iibms.org/c-7-effective-steps-to-solve-case-study/

Kim, W. C., & Mauborgne, R. (2004). Blue ocean strategy. If you read nothing else on strategy, read thesebest-selling articles., 71.

Kotler, P., & Armstrong, G. (2010). Principles of marketing. Pearson education.

Kulkarni, N. (2018). 8 Tips to Help You Prepare for the Case Method. Retrieved from https://www.hbs.edu/mba/blog/post/8-tips-to-help-you-prepare-for-the-case-method

Lin, C., Tsai, H. L., Wu, Y. J., & Kiang, M. (2012). A fuzzy quantitative VRIO-based framework for evaluating organizational activities. Management Decision, 50(8), 1396-1411.

Nixon, J., & Helms, M. M. (2010). Exploring SWOT analysis – where are we now?: A review of academic research from the last decade. Journal of Strategy and Management, 3(3), 215-251.

Panagiotou, G. (2003). Bringing SWOT into Focus. Business Strategy Review, 14(2), 8-10.

Pickton, D. W., & Wright, S. (1998). What's swot in strategic analysis? Strategic Change, 7(2), 101-109.

Porter, M. E. (2001). The value chain and competitive advantage. Understanding Business Processes, 50-66.

Porter, M. E. (1985). Competitive advantage: creating and sustaining superior performance (Vol. 2). New York: Free Press.

Porter, M.E. (1979, March). Harvard Business Review: Strategic Planning, How Competitive Forces Shape Strategy. Retrieved July 7, 2016, from https://hbr.org/1979/03/how-competitive-forces-shape-strategy

Rastogi, N., & Trivedi, M. K. (2016). PESTLE Technique–a Tool to Identify External Risks in Construction Projects. International Research Journal of Engineering and Technology (IRJET), 3(1), 384-388.

Rauch, P. (2007). SWOT analyses and SWOT strategy formulation for forest owner cooperations in Austria. European Journal of Forest Research, 126(3), 413-420.

Warning! This article is only an example and cannot be used for research or reference purposes. If you need help with something similar, please submit your details here .

9416 Students can’t be wrong

PhD Experts

Moritz Brian

Will be pleasant if this service supplies me with some further discounts. The writer responds to me every time within seconds.

Gained the highest score on the paper that was composed by this service. Will be here soon because prices are reasonable.

Mason Lucas

The project was straight to the points and rich in depth. I’m thankful for a well-referenced paper!

Noha Ceadric

The paper was well-written and this service made me secure good grades. Thank you so much!

Calculate the Price

(approx ~ 0.0 page), total price €0, next articles.

• Huayi Brothers: Strategic Transformation Case Analysis
• Searching For A New CEO: TiVo 2016 Case Analysis
• The Pelayo Family Plays Roulette: The Prequel Case Analysis
• WMS: Revenue Model Innovation For Gaming Solutions Case Analysis
• The Rise And Fall Of The Circus Case Analysis
• Full Psycle: Getting Somewhere By Going Nowhere (B) Case Analysis
• The Asylum: Mocking Their Way Through Hollywood Case Analysis
• Zynga And The Launch Of FarmVille Case Analysis
• Wanda Studios Qingdao Case Analysis
• Full Psycle: Getting Somewhere By Going Nowhere (A) Case Analysis

Previous Articles

• Legal And Profitable? Spotify: The Challenges Of An Online Music Service Case Analysis
• The Marvel Way: Restoring A Blue Ocean Case Analysis
• Lotus F1 Team Case Analysis
• The Walt Disney Studios Case Analysis
• Amazon.com, 2016 Case Analysis
• SGFE Cambodia (B): High Energy Char Briquettes For The Bottom Of The Pyramid Case Analysis
• Multistrada Agro International: Non Market Strategy In Indonesia Case Analysis
• The Hain Celestial Group Case Analysis
• Flying Beavers: An Innovative Approach To Wildlife Conservation Case Analysis
• SGFE Cambodia (A): High Energy Char Briquettes For The Bottom Of The Pyramid Case Analysis

Be a great writer or hire a greater one!

Academic writing has no room for errors and mistakes. If you have BIG dreams to score BIG, think out of the box and hire Case48 with BIG enough reputation.

Our Guarantees

Zero plagiarism, best quality, qualified writers, absolute privacy, timely delivery.

Interesting Fact

Most recent surveys suggest that around 76 % students try professional academic writing services at least once in their lifetime!

Allow Our Skilled Essay Writers to Proficiently Finish Your Paper.

We are here to help. Chat with us on WhatsApp for any queries.

Customer Representative

Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Solution Analysis

by HBR Fifteen

Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Solution & Analysis. Get Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Analysis & Solution. Contact us directly at buycasesolutions(at)gmail(dot)com if you want to order for Reinventing Best Buy Case Solution, Case Analysis, Case Study... More

Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Solution & Analysis. Get Reinventing Best Buy Case Study Analysis & Solution. Contact us directly at buycasesolutions(at)gmail(dot)com if you want to order for Reinventing Best Buy Case Solution, Case Analysis, Case Study Solution. John R. Wells, Gabriel Ellsworth Less

• Related publications
• Add to favorites