Introduction

This report is a study of principles of   Strategic marketing management by considering

Primark. Primark Ltd is a subsidiary of Associated British Foods Plc (ABF) It operates stores in
the UK, and other European countries. According to Primark Handbook, (2006/2007),
Primark is a fashion retail store that was established in Dublin in 1969. Primark is a part of
the Associated British Food group (ABF) whose mission is to develop sustainable agricultural
practices. Primark has 237 branches across Europe with 156 outlets in the UK.
The company was established in Dublin in 1969, where it trades under the Penney’s brand.
Over the years Primark continues to expend and now employs over 27,000 this figure is
expected to increase to 30,000 by 2015.
Primark is the UK leading retailer in fashion with over 20 million people visiting their store
each week. The company is well known to provide low cost clothing and accessories for
women, men and kids.

Strategic marketing
Strategic marketing management is the process of formulation, estimation and
implementation of marketing strategy by an organization. Indeed a marketing strategy
aimed at differentiating the business in a positive way with respect to its competition
through satisfying customer needs.
According to Tony proctor (Strategic Marketing, 2000) a strategy is a plan that integrates an
organization’s major goals, policies, decisions and sequences of action into a cohesive
whole. It can apply at all levels in an organization and pertain to any of the functional areas
of management. Thus there may be production, financial, marketing, personnel and
corporate strategies.
Strategic management is about realizing marketing from the strategic perspective of
creating customers. The basic principles of Primark include respecting human rights and
setting a guideline for appropriate conditions of employment  in its suppliers, employees
and vice versa. The basic principle of strategic marketing is to strategically satisfy the needs
and demands of existing and potential customers.
The strategic marketing management involves understanding and applying marketing from
the perspective through creating customers. In performing this process a number of steps
are taken iteratively (Kerin et al, 2007) 
Section 1.1:  The role of strategic marketing in Primark
Marketing has been playing an important role in most organisations over the years.
Strategic marketing focuses on how to reach out to customers and how to gain a
competitive advantage over the competition. The goal set by the marketing department
should, by design, be in line with the company mission and vision; the marketing
department of a business needs to work closely with operations, research and development,
finance and human resources, Marketing is perhaps the most important activity in a
business because it has a direct effect on sales, profitability and sustainability.

Strategic marketing is a process by which organizations obtain what the customers need and
want by indentifying, value, communicating and providing it to them. The most important
concepts of marketing are customers, needs wants and values. Marketing is strategically
concerned with the direction and scope of the long-term activities carried out by the
organisation to reach its goals. The organization applies its resources within a changing
environment to satisfy customers needs while meeting stakeholder expectations.

The marketing strategy of Primark is to appeal to image conscious people between ages 16-
35 who would like to keep up to date with fashion by giving them the chance to buy high
fashion at a reduced price. Like most other business Primark’s main objective is to convert
customers to consumers. They were able to achieve this by offering their customers cheap
products without compromising the quality of their products. In order to achieve this the
7Ps must be taken into consideration, the marketing mix, Products, Price, Promotion, Place,
Process, Physical and People. 

Section 1.2: The process involved in strategic marketing

The graph listed above shows 10 steps a company can take to achieve their company
objectives. At this time we will only talk about 2 of the 10 steps. The 2 steps to be talked
about are the Company Mission, and the marketing objectives & Strategies, relating this to
Primark.

Mission
 The mission statement of Primark is to provide luxurious clothes to every citizen of the
country at a affordable price. The mission statement is the overall goal of the company that
direct the company decisions, employees and other associates need some smaller goals
which can be worked on for a short time span.

Marketing Objectives and Strategies

 According (Macmillan & Tampoe, 2000), Strategic implementation requires a firm to

establish annual objectives, devise policies, motivate employees, and allocate resources so
that the formulated strategies can be executed effectively.

Strategic implementation includes developing a strategy-supportive culture, creating an

effective organizational structure, redirecting marketing efforts, preparing budgets,
developing and utilizing information systems and linking employee compensation to
organizational performance.
Historically, the principal benefit of strategic management is to help organization formulate
better strategies through the use of a more systematic, logical and rational approach to
strategic choice.

According to Macmillan & Tampoe ( 2000), One of the potential benefits of strategic
management is it make sure that the organization only follows one direction or path
towards the achievement of its business mission, objectives and success. (Marketing -
Thinking Made Easy)
The marketing objectives of Primark can be summarized into the following.

Ø  Primark target specific kinds of audience and potential buyers for their clothing material.
They devise marketing strategies which are applicable and directed to specific audience
only; aiming right at the correct direction.

Ø  The output of the productivity should be measurable in terms of quantity and quality. The
amount is important because it will measure the profit the company has made and the
 other intangible benefits and will determine how much the company has boosted after
applying such techniques.

Ø  All of their strategic marketing process are realistic; hence, can be applied in reality and
implemented before it is too late. As the competitors of Primark are in constant hurry to
gain an advantage over the company, Primark has to execute the devise strategies on time
in order to maintain their success in the market.

Ø  The data used in the analysis of deciding strategic marketing planning processes should be
accurate and authentic. Any mistake could result into a heavy loss for Primark. Not only
would it result in monetary loss, but also the goodwill of the clothing garment retailer would
highly be affected.
Section 1.3: Evaluate the links between strategic marketing and corporate strategy at
Primark and its link with ABF.

A company is diversified when it is in two or more lines of business. Strategy-making in a

diversified company is a bigger picture exercise than crafting a strategy for a single line-of-
business. A diversified company needs a multi-industry, multi-business strategy. A strategic
action plan must be developed for several different businesses competing in diverse
industry environments. (Strategies for Managing a Group.
ABF, PESTLE Analyses, contributes to the Primark co-operative strategy.  Setting corporate
strategy objectives means setting those measures of actions and methods which will help
the company to achieve its overall mission in a certain timeframe. Corporate strategies are
the most basic planning tools underlying all planning and strategic activities (Hamel &
Prahalad, 1994). Through sharing its value ABF and Primark establishes strong relationships
with its stakeholders that have led them to have an encouraging feedback on the latest
annual report about the audit conducted on ethical trade (Hamel & Prahalad, 1994)
The corporate mission of Primark is as follows:
Ø  sourcing products efficiently
Ø  making clothes with simpler designs
Ø   using local fabrics and trims
Ø  focusing on the most popular sizes
Ø  buying in volume
Ø  Not spending heavily on advertising. (Introduction - Providing consumers with ethically
sourced)
In order to facilitate such corporate strategy with strategic marketing plans, Primark has
devised such marketing schemes that are:

1.      Low in budget and effective

As it doesn’t want to spend high amount of money for advertising its products, minimal
money will be spend in this department.

2.       Merchandising
Properly combining colours, styles and visually displaying new season products to catch
passers - by attention.
3.       Bulk purchasing
Buying product in large quantity will be cost effective as the cost of producing one garment
will be low. Also, the supplier will be happy to work with Primark in future and maintain a
strong relationship bond of work with them.
Need of the customer
Primark uses CRM (Customer Relationship Management), a software that enables them to
detect high demand products in order to produce large quantities of them to satisfy the high
demand while generating Hugh income for the company.
SWOT Analysis

The Success of SWOT analysis is mainly based on how the firm fits its strategy with respect
to its environment. The SWOT analysis of Primark attempts to interpret the information
they have with respects to its environment that affects the ability of the business to meet its
strategic goals (Leigh, N.D). The external analysis of Primark includes the opportunities and
threats encountered by the organization and the internal analysis covers strength, weakness

Strengths
v  It has an organized business structure providing its customers with what they want and when
they want. By volume Primark is now the second largest clothing retailer. 
v  Primark offers high street quality clothes for cheap prices. The fashion scheme of Primark is
solely based on the people between 16- 35 years.

v  Primark has a very strong work force behind them.  Who are well trained to have good
knowledge of the products and to offer high customer service.  Primark has over 27,000
employees working for them on daily base, with each individual strategically positioned for
optimum performance.

v  Primark has 237 branches across Europe with 156 outlets in the UK; The Company is part of
the ETI (Ethical Trading Initiative) which focuses on worker’s rights.

v  Use cheap and skilled labour for the supplying of product.

Opportunities
v  Primark is expanding rapidly with the opening of 47 new stores in the UK and other part of
Europe.  Primark will see the door of the 48 store opened in Tottenham court road in
September 2012. They also has an opportunity to share their high quality products and
services overseas.

v  The opening of the 7 new stores in Spain to battle along its competitors like Zara and other
retail out in Spain, Primark is now providing high quality clothes to fashion conscious
people.

v  Day by day the demand for latest design with low price are increasing ,this demand opened a
Huge marketing opportunities around the globe for Primark.

Weakness
v  One of the main thing for which Primark is criticized of is using child labour
v  Primark has being very successful in capturing the low income earners due to low pricing but
they do not have enough checkout point and fitting rooms, hence, customers  end up
walking away due to the long queues at these places.
v  Primark do not have security tags on their products, this failure has seen an increase in
customer theft, though the CCTV operators security officers try their utmost best to reduce
it to the minimal.
Threats
v  Primark’s major threats come from its competitors which are big names in the market with lot
of resources like Zara, forever 21, Top shop Next and H&M.  Will it match the needs of the
customer in terms of fashion and uniqueness?

v  Complex and volatile business environment customer’s needs and wants are changing and
the competition is likely to increase.

v  Increasing labour and raw materials cost can see an increase in Primark pricing structure. 

2: The various tools used to develop a strategic marketing strategy

The graphs below shows the various tools use by companies to develop good marketing
strategies. Every company operates differently and would have to adopt the tool that best
suit their company marketing strategies.
Primark more favors the PESTLE (Political, Economical, Social-Cultural, Technological, Legal
and Environmental and the SWOT Analyses (Strengths, Weakness, Opportunity and Threats.

The identification of these tools has helped Primark to adopted to the changing
environment and the continuous changes in human needs and behavior.

According to (Hawes & Crittenden, 1984), states that as a brand, loyalty bond get stronger
and they
Are able to expand more and create more demand of their products in the market.

Primark strategy is to keep their customers by keeping their prices low. They were able to
achieve by out sourcing 90% of their products to developing countries like Bangladesh,
India, China, Turkey and some part of Europe. The major role of strategic marketing starts
from planning, analyse, interpreting, implementing and evaluating. 
 PESTLE
Ø  Political, Economical, Social-Cultural, Technological, Legal and Environmental

7Ps Marketing mix

Ø  Product , Price, Place, Promotion, People, Process, Physical evidence
SWOT
Ø  Strength, Weakness, opportunity, Threats
ENTREPRENEUR JUNIOR (2011)
Porter 5 forces theory
Ø  Supplier Power, Buyer Power, Competitive Rivalry, Threat of Substitution, Threat of New
Entry
According to (freelancerconsulting.com, 2012)

Section 2.1: Access the value of models used in strategic marketing planning, Identify the
models used by Primark towards its marketing strategy.

Strategic plan for strategic model provides a long- term plan for success and the framework
for clear communication of what is important and what is not. It is a key leadership
instrument providing direction for implementation of operational and tactical planning to
decide what the company should do.

Developing competency models is crucial to accelerate the growing need of an efficient and
effective process of an organization. Strategic success model is a software aided process
developed by Haves and Associates to describe the competencies that are very important
for success in a given market. Out dated model needs to be replaced or revised and even a
new model can be redeveloped using the strategic model building process if it produces
unsatisfactory results.

According to (Phillip Kotler, 2007), Model building started with a card-sort process that is
facilitated with competency cards and sorting pads for participants.
There are various models that companies can use. Every organisation will use the model
that best suit their service in regards to Primark I will discuss Porter 5 forces theory.

Supplier Power

Primark has out sourced 90% of the manufacturing to developing countries like Bangladesh,
India, china, Turkey and some part of Europe. Primark does not rely on only one big supplier
rather Primark has multiple suppliers across various countries. This is a strategic move by
Primark, this strategy reduce the bargaining power of the suppliers therefore the bargaining
power of the suppliers are very low.

Buyer Power

In today’s competitive market with raising prices and the rapid downsizing of companies,
consumers are forced to cut back on their expenditure. Customers are now looking for
cheap products, Primark is able to price their items lower than the competition, hence,
more and more customers are now coming to Primark to get value for their money. The
buying power of the customers is very high, there are a lot of competitors in the market
none of which can compete with Primark when it comes to pricing.

Competitive Rivalry

Competitive rivalry is very high, Primark has to stay focus and ensure their pricing is in line
with the customer’s needs. There are a number of similar size players in the market like
Topshop, Zara, Forever 21 and H & M. These players are offering similar type products like
Primark, each of them are aiming to be the market leader.

Threat of Substitution

Threat of substitutes is very high because there are lots of companies in the market offering
similar products at competitive prices, H & M for example. Customers can switch from one
product to the other as in today fashion conscious world customers are becoming more and
more choosey.

Threat of New Entry

The threat of new entry is very low for Primark because of high setup cost involved. Primark
dominate the UK and Europe market by offering very low cost, anyone who is thinking about
entering into the market has to think about Primark and the existing competition of
Primark. 

Section 2.2: Discuss the links between strategic position and marketing tactic with to
Primark
According to (Wisegeek, 2012) Market positioning is the manipulation of a brand or family
of brands to create a positive perception in the eyes of the public. If a product is well
positioned, it will have strong sales, and it may become the go-to brand for people who
need that particular product. Poor positioning, on the other hand, can lead to bad sales and
a dubious reputation. A number of things are involved in market positioning, with entire
firms specializing in this activity and working with clients to position their products
effectively. When a product is released, the company needs to think beyond what the
product is for when it comes to positioning. It also should think about the kind of people
that would wants to buy the product.

The act of designing the company’s offering an image so that they occupy a meaningful and
distinct competitive position in the target customer’s minds (Phillip Kotler 1997).

Primark Targets

Primark marketing targets are women, men and kids with 50% of their products targeted at
women wear. They mostly target low income earners, fashion conscious people and also
customers from outside of the UK.

Demographic Targets
 60% of Primark sales revenue comes from outside the UK. Most of Primark customers are
from Europe and the Arab Nation, with a marginal amount coming from the B.R.I.C Nations.

Primark has positioned itself very well in the mind of the customers and the consumers;
over the years Primark has been converting more and more consumers into customers.
Consumers across the globe knows that they can always find a good bargain at Primark,
Primark slogan is “Look Good, Spend Less” and they have managed to live by their slogan
this is what their customers are expecting from them.

In order for any business to survive they first need to understand their competitors and the
market they are competing in. A number of tools can be used to access the market and
understanding the competition better the company has to use the tool that best fit them. 

Tools

ü  SWOT,
ü  PESTLE,
ü  STEEP,
ü  7PS,
ü   PORTER 5 FORCES
ü   PEST

The above mentioned tools are vital and will help Primark maintain a very strong position in
the near and for future. A successful retailer like Primark must use effective marketing
strategies to deliver what the customers want; the strategic positioning enables Primark to
analyze all the factors of the market and continue to be the market leader for cheap
products.

Primark has a lot of big competition competing with them; these big players would like to
gain better market position. Primark is trying to control the market by flooding it with cheap
products; their competitors are unable to keep up with Primark pricing method. These big
players are Forever21, Next, M & S, Top shop, New Look, Zara, H & M and many more. What
does this mean for Primark? This means Primark can’t afford to fall behind. The Primark
team has to be on top of the new market trend and stay focus on the strategies they have
set. 

Section 2.3: Analyze the merits of relation marketing in a given strategic marketing
strategy. Reflect the role of RM at Primark.
Relationship Marketing
According to Zeithaml and Bitner (2000) Relationship marketing is a philosophy of doing
business, it's a strategic device that focuses on keeping and improving current customers
whole acquiring new customers. According to Coviello's (1997) states, Relationship
Management is an ‘integrative activity involving functions across the organization, with
emphasis on facilitating, building and maintaining relationships over the time.
Relationship marketing is a new phenomenon which is a step ahead of traditional
marketing. The emphasis here lies on ‘Relationship' between a customer and a product, a
customer and an organization (b2c), an organization with other organization (b2b). The
overall purpose of Relationship Marketing is to facilitate and maintain customer
relationships, which leads to changed focal points and modification of marketing
management process. RM tends to provide a superior relationship between a customer and
an organization which in return gives an organization competitive advantage.
Primark is a billon pound retail industry and is a part of an even bigger organization
“Associated British Food (ABF) there are a lot of companies listed under the ABF group of
companies and Primark is the most successful company listed with ABF. Primark  success
start from  picking the right manufacturer for the raw material, processing the raw material
into finish  products packaging and distributing it to the Primark's stores. Primark has to
have a good relationship with their suppliers to ensure consistent quality, service, deliveries
on time, and other inward and outward logistics. 

Conclusion
One of the basic principles of Primark is to ensure that it provides its customers with values
for money and maintaining the ethical manufacturing standard. In doing so some extra cost
are involved but Primark believes that this will enable their business to operate in a
sustainable and well managed way.  Sustainability is one of the features of Primark all due
to the strategic marketing method that’s has been implemented dissolved in its business
practices. By establishing the strong relationships with stakeholders consumers believe that
their valued appropriately. 

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