3.

SWOT analysis
3.1. Strength
- Budweiser is a long-standing beer brand so it has a strong position in the market
and is loved and trusted by many customers. This makes its brand awareness high.
- Budweiser beer brand has a global presence: Including Budweiser, Anheuser
Busch sells about 100 different brands of alcohol to about 80 countries around the
globe. They have a strong beer presence, and their top brands are Budweiser, Bud
Lite, Busch Beer, Stella Artois, etc.
- Reliable suppliers – Budweiser has a strong base of the reliable supplier of raw
material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.
- Promotion: The promotional campaigns, as well as public relations initiatives of
Budweiser, have been the strong reason for the success and popularity of the brand.
The beer sponsors key sporting events as well as sports teams such as the US
Olympics Team in 2014 which has helped the brand positively. Furthermore,
Budweiser highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.
- High level of customer satisfaction – the company with its dedicated customer
relationship management department has able to achieve a high level of customer
satisfaction between present customers and good brand equity among the potential
customers.
- Strong dealer community – It has built a culture among the distributor & dealers
where the dealers not only promote company’s products but also invest in training
the sales team to explain to the customer how he/she can extract the maximum
benefits out of the products. Over the years Budweiser have built a reliable
distribution network that can reach majority of its potential market.
3.2. Weakness
- Merging the top brands: With the merger between Anheuser Busch and Groupo
Modelo, it becomes critical that the two brands Budweiser and Corona merge.
However, this is a critical challenge for the companies since there is a huge cultural
disparity.
- Grabbing the millennial market: In comparison to the older generations,
Millennial prefer the craft beer and Budweiser are still to break into the millennial
market failing which its sustainability in the years to come will be a question.
- Not very good at product demand forecasting leading to the higher rate of missed
opportunities compare to its competitors. One of the reasons why the days
inventory is high compare to its competitors is that Budweiser is not very good at
demand forecasting thus end up keeping higher inventory both in-house and in the
channel.
- The marketing of the products left a lot to be desired. Even though the product is
a success in terms of sale but its positioning and unique selling proposition is not
clearly defined which can lead to the attacks in this segment from the competitors.
- High Day Sales Inventory: The time it takes for products to be purchased and
sold is higher than the industry average, meaning that Budweiser builds up on
inventory adding unnecessary costs to the business.
3.3. Opportunities
- Increased awareness of foreign brands: Online and social media marketing, as
well as increased exposure to the internet, has increased global awareness of
foreign brands of alcohol and current clients in pubs even in India and Malaysia
ask for Budweiser or Bud Light. This is helping such brands look for business in
Asia.
- E-commerce: There has been a new trend and a growth in sales of the e-
commerce industry. This means that a lot of people are now making purchases
online. Budweiser can earn revenue by opening online stores and making sales
through these.
- Social Media: there has been an increase in the number of social media users
worldwide. The three social media platforms; Facebook, Twitter and Instagram,
have shown the greatest number of increase in monthly active users. Budweiser
can use social media to promote its products, interact with customers and collect
feedback from them.
- Technological developments: technology comes with numerous benefits among
many departments. Operations can be automated to reduce costs. Technology
enables better data to be collected on customers and improves on marketing efforts.
- Globalisation: Increased globalisation does not restrict Budweiser to its own
country. It can extend its operations to other countries, entering into these markets
and making use of the opportunities that lie in these markets.
3.4. Threats
- Increasing competition: there has been an increase in competition within the
industry putting downward pressure on prices. This could lead to reduced revenue
for Budweiser if it adjusts to the price changes or loss of market share if it doesn’t.
- New entrants: there have been numerous players that have entered the market and
are gaining market share by gaining existing companies’ market share. This is a
threat to Budweiser as it can lose its customers to these new entrants.
- Changing consumer buying behavior from the online channel could be a threat to
the existing physical infrastructure driven supply chain model.
- Increased promotions by competitors have been a threat for Budweiser. On most
media, there is more clutter than ever, and customers are bombarded with multiple
messages. This reduces the effectiveness of promotional messages by Budweiser.
- Consumer tastes are changing, and this puts pressure on companies to constantly
change their products to meet the needs of these customers.