MKT500 - Individual Assignment #2 – Winter 2023 – S.

Chuang
For this assignment, you will be required to read the scenario below, select an appropriate
method for gathering the data, develop max 20 relevant survey or interview questions (depending
on the method you believe is appropriate), and provide an overall rationale for your choice of
questions and the order in which you place them.
Note: The scenario draws on factual information, but the brand, managerial decision and
research objectives are fictitious and any relation to actual people, events or operations is
unintentional.
Scenario: Fast fashion—inexpensive clothing produced rapidly to align with current trends,
essentially considered ‘disposable’—is a growth industry. Between 2021 and 2022, it grew by
$8bn USD with a CAGR of almost 9% (BusinessWire, 2022). Several companies are known for
adopting this business practice, including: Zara, H&M, Uniqlo, Forever 21 and many others.
With current inflationary pressures affecting housing, food, and other fundamental consumption
areas, fast fashion is arguably a benefit to consumers as it allows them to continue expressing
themselves through their clothing with minimal cost to their wallets.
However, this business model does come at a price.
• Fashion represents up to 20% of water pollution in producing countries, like Bangladesh,
as the waste from the dying process (including carcinogenic chemicals) often gets
dumped directly into rivers and streams (CNN.com, 2020).
• Workers who make the clothes frequently face exploitation, abuse, poor working
conditions and low wages. (Forbes, 2019).
• While some stores, like H&M claim to recycle your unwanted clothing, recent statistics
indicate that about 0.1% of clothing from such programs, and clothes collected by
charities, actually get recycled into new textile fiber, with the majority going to landfills
or being incinerated, increasing the environmental impact (Newsweek, 2016).
• The fashion industry as a whole accounts for approximately 10% of global carbon
emissions, and many materials (e.g., polyester) are a form of plastic, and are a prime
source of microplastic pollution (Bloomberg, 2022). The sheer volume of production in
fast fashion, due to the nature of evolving and changing trends, make it a major
contributor to these issues.
Upon recognizing the severity of these issues, one of the major brands known for their foray into
fast fashion is considering a major brand repositioning. Specifically, they are considering the
idea of a top-to-bottom shift in their business model that would incorporate ethical and
sustainable business practices throughout their supply chain. The result would be a better quality
of clothing, but would require charging a higher price and slowing the fashion cycle, in terms of
trends. While the marketing department believes that this could be a viable positioning strategy
and point of differentiation, it is unclear whether consumers would actually value this change,
and respond with their wallet.
Recent research indicates that about 15% of global fashion consumers are ‘highly concerned’
about sustainability in the fashion industry, though that number seems to be growing (Bain.com,
2022). But what about this company’s consumers? Are they part of the 15% or the 85%? Would
this change be good or bad for the company?
Therefore, the managerial at hand is as follows: would a shift towards a sustainable and ethical
business model be viable for this company, and useful as a positioning strategy?
Assignment Details
Due to constraints, you are developing a short survey (max 20 questions). You should carefully
choose these questions, and the order in which you ask them, in order to get the most important
information possible. Your submission should address the following points/questions, and must
use the exact headings as outlined in bold font below. You are welcome to have additional
subheadings.
• TARGET RESPONDENTS: From whom would you ideally get the information
required? Specifically, identify your target population of interest and rationalize your
choice in this context.
• SURVEY DEVELOPMENT: Explain how you put together the survey. Ensure that
your choice of questions follows best practices, as described in the course. Include any
relevant details about how the data will be collected (e.g., what is the scale?). There is no
specific formatting required for the questions (i.e., they do not need to ‘look’ like a
survey question, with radio buttons or the like).
• Example: “To what extent do you agree with the statement ‘I like bananas’? (7pt
scale; 1 = Disagree to 7 = Agree)” would be sufficient to indicate the question,
scale, and anchors.
• Example: If you are using specific labels, you should either list them all or give an
idea of how you might compose the list (e.g., ‘what is your favourite colour? (list
of all primary and secondary colours).
• Please DO NOT place your survey in the body of the report. It should be placed
in the appendix.
• QUESTION AND MEASUREMENT TYPE: Provide a rationale for your choices in
questions, from the overall perspective of how that information would directly inform the
managerial decision. Why is that the most important information, given the decision to be
made? If you make any particular choices for a question (e.g., phrasing one way versus
another), explain that as well.
• CODE BOOK: Refer to chapter 8, include a code book in the appendix. In the body of
the report, explain how you put together the coding, and how you designed the coding
schema.
When creating your report, consider and apply the concepts from the course. This includes the
points raised in discussions, and an application of critical thinking. Grading of these assignments
is based on the quality of your thoughts and communication of your ideas, not on quantity.
Brevity in writing is an important skill, and communicating your ideas concisely is the goal here.
Stylistically, you may choose to use the above points to organize your response (e.g.,
subheadings), but it is not required to do so. Your target audience is the owner, so the overall
tone should be business professional, rather than academic. This means that your responses
should not be broad concepts from class about generic approaches, but instead, should be
specific and apply to the situation as described.
Your sample choices are worth three (3) marks, with the survey questions and rationale each
worth fifteen marks (15), with a quality of writing grade also worth seven (7) marks, for an
overall total out of forty (40). Read the rubric (below) to understand how you will be evaluated,
and you can use this also to understand your grade after you receive the marked assignment.
Details: 12 pt, Times New Roman font (or 11 in Calibri or Arial). Single-spaced, standard
1”/2.5cm margins. Maximum 3 pages (nothing will be read/graded from page 4 onward). Proper
sentences and paragraph writing is important, though in certain situations (e.g., listing
something), bullet points may be acceptable.
Sample and /3 There is no ‘right’ answer here, though some choices are better
Rationale than others. In order to receive full marks on this section, the
rationale needs to support briefly and explain the choices you make
in the context of the given situation.
Reasons for Mark Deductions:
- Missing component (-1)
- Choices do not align with given situation (up to -2 marks)
- Rationale does not make sense, given the context (up to -2
marks)
- Target population does not make sense, given the
information required (-1)
- Target population is unreachable without undue effort (-1
mark)
- Target population is too limited, given the context (-1 mark)
Questions / 15 With only 10 questions, you need to make them count. In this
section, you will be evaluated on the questions you choose, how
you word them, the order you place them in, and other question-
related factors (i.e., not the rationale)
- Wording mistakes (-1 per question)
- Improper (or not included) scale, anchors and labels, if
applicable (-1 per question)
- Does not reflect a ‘good’ choice of question (e.g., does not
fit with information required, seems like a ‘waste’ of a
question, does not follow best practices, etc.) (up to -1.5
marks per question)
- Unclear ordering of questions (up to -1 per question that is
in an unusual position)
- Use of known ‘problems’ with question design (-1 per
question)
Rationale / 15 In this section, you need to address two main areas:
 ‘Big Picture’ Overview (/5)
0 – 2 = Missing and/or very basic summary, does not include
details regarding choice of question order, use of logics (if
appropriate), generic responses, questionable alignment with
situation
3 – 4 = Clear thought went into choice of question order and choice
of data gathering techniques, strategic perspective on data that
could be gathered and why it would be helpful, aligns somewhat
with situation/context
5 = Above expectations, brief, clear communication showing
excellent application of course concepts.

Question Choice (/10)

0 – 3 = Missing and/or very basic explanations for choice of
questions, does not align with the situation, choice does not make
sense, no indication of how it would inform the decision making
4 – 6 = Some questions well-explained, others not; missing
components and/or poor support for choosing these specific
questions, limited indication of how it would inform the decision
making
7 – 8 = Overall, a good demonstration of critical thinking, factoring
in the 10 question limit, and support using concepts from the
course, clear alignment with the decision
9 – 10 = Above expectations, with a clear, logical, well supported
rationale for why these are the best 10 questions to ask, given the
method choice and context of the assignment
Quality of /7 0 – 2 = Overall writing is well below standards, with frequent
Writing mistakes/typos, lack of clarity, does not make sense, overly simple
3 – 4 = Writing is below standards, with several mistakes, clarity
missing in multiple responses, overly simple, several responses do
not make sense and or contain mistakes/typos
5 – 6 = Writing meets standards, few if any mistakes, fairly clear in
responses, few if any typos
7 = Writing exceeds standards, no real mistakes, clear, brief but
sufficient explanations, proper business writing style and tone
Total / 40