International Marketing Plan

By Haram Iqbal

Name: Haram Iqbal

Student ID: 19800642

Unit: MKTG5002 International Marketing for managers

Unit Day & Time: Thursday, 6-9 pm

Lecturer: Dr. Vimi Jham

1. Summary:
this report contains an international marketing plan for Al-Baik which is a Saudi
based company that sells fried chicken items such as nuggets, chicken sandwiches and
beverages. The international marketing plan is designed to strategies their entry into
the USA as a franchise. The report contains a customer analysis that describes the
consumer profile in America such as the market segment in the USA for fast-food
chains like the demographic, geographic, psychographic and behavior segmentation.
It further elaborates on Al-Baiks competitors (KFC) strategy where they primarily
engage in using the 4P’s where they use bundled pricing, public relations, have
multiple franchises across the world and operate online as well. The report provides
information of the United States of Americas macro environmental analysis including
Americas economic, socio cultural, political, and legal environment, including
information based on taxation policies such as income tax, value added tax, corporate
tax and sales tax.

It further showcases the culture in the west which belongs a low context culture and
an individualistic society. it includes a SWOT analysis of Al-Baik and marketing
objectives for the next 3 years. The report then analyzes and recommends a product
strategy for Al-Baik to use their Halal products to target the Muslim American
population that KFC and other fast-food chains are unable to target due to the inability
to provide halal products, it provides a pricing strategy that uses psychological pricing
methods and value based pricing strategy. Distribution strategies that include a
distribution channel drawn for Al-Baik that displays how it can avoid costs and
reduce expenses by directly supplying halal chicken in the USA, it then provides a
promotional strategy that involves using viral marketing, public relations and social
media influencer to advertise their products due to the recent trends and previous
success with Al-Baik advertising on TikTok and Instagram that lead to the success of
their franchises in UAE. Finally, it will showcase a budget plan that will be
implemented in the next 2-3 years that includes cost of transportation, advertising
cost, franchise cost, raw materials cost etc.

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2. Introduction:

United States of America is the host country, it is the world’s most dominant
economy and largest influencer with regards to western culture and social media. The
USA has one of the largest land areas covered, nearly (10 million sq km) 2 nd country
with the most natural resources such as copper, natural gas and gold, as well as oil
valued more than 40 trillion dollars. It is the home of the largest industries that have
majority of the market share globally, some of the industries include the technological
industry for e.g., Apple and Microsoft. It is home to the biggest fast-food industries
that run numerous franchises globally such as, KFC, Popeyes, Burger king and
McDonald’s.

The selected company for the following report is Al-Baik which is a Saudi based fast-
food store that sells variety of fried chicken items and other fast-food items like KFC
and Popeyes. Al Baik was founded in the late 1970’s by Shakour AbuGhazalah it was
mainly in the cities of Saudi Arabia and had continuously expanded throughout the
years, recently in 2022 they had opened their first store in Dubai Mall, UAE with a
huge successful marketing campaign they were able to open 4 more branches in the
UAE in cities of Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah. Al-Baik has multiple franchises in
the GCC and has no on-going operation in the United States of America. This report
will analyse the 4P’s including pricing, product, promotion, and distribution strategies
to recommend the best possible strategy for Al-Baik to enter the USA.

3. Customer Analysis & STP

The United States of America is one of the biggest consumers of fast food, the
industry generates around 22000 billion US dollars and the average American
consumes fast-food at least 2-4 times a week (Kovalskys, Rigotti, Koletzko, Fisberg
and Gomez 2019). Fast-food is a mass market that has hundreds of thousands of
customers weekly.

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 Demographic- the demographic of the USA specifically for the fast-food chains like
Al-Baik, KFC, McDonald’s includes children, women and men of all ages, it has a
total population of more than 330 million people. 60% of the population classify as
“white” 18% of the population is Hispanic, 5% of the population is Asian and the
remaining amount up to African American and Arabs (Census, 2023).

Geographic- the USA has one of the largest lands in the world after China and Russia,
with a total of 50 states having more than a million people per state, California, Texas,
and New York having the largest population of almost 30 million (Census 2023).

Psychographic- USA is more masculine on Hofstede’s cultural dimension meaning

that they value success and materialistic objects that provide status. the public belongs
to a middle to high income level, having one of the biggest economies the consumer
expenditure amounted up to 66,000 dollars per person annually (Marshall 2019).

Behavior- Americans are quite influential where their favorite celebrity or sports
player can affect their purchasing decisions, they have high consumption rates of fast
food also having the highest obesity rates in the world (Hopkins 2019), they are loyal
to American based products and services.

Al-Baik should use an undifferentiated marketing strategy, as it is fast-food and male

or female of all ages can consume the product, Al-Baik has options on their menu
such as kid’s meal, value meals and family meals. Fast-food does not require a niche
marketing or concentrated marketing strategy as it is not an exclusive product with
high prices, Al-Baik caters to every individual with low to high income levels and low
to high consumption rates of fast-food.

The positioning strategy of the Al-Baik is quality and price, Al-Baik offers quality
fried chicken, nuggets and sandwiches with lower prices than their competitors
globally. For e.g., KFC would charge $5-20 on average for their meals whilst Al-Baik
offers $3-12 dollars on average. Al-Baik’s products are also Halal where the Muslim
population and the non-Muslim population can both consume unlike KFC and other
fast-food chains that do not offer halal options for the Muslim population in the USA

Haram Iqbal
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 that makes up more than 3 million Muslim Americans. Al-Baik has a foreign
consumer culture positioning strategy since it’s a Saudi based company and was only
available in Saudi Arabia, until 3 years ago when they started expanding globally and
is now known as the famous Saudi fried chicken fast-food chain. In terms of cross
cultural analysis, Al-Baik’s products were made by western influence since they offer
similar items like KFC such as, Fried chicken, French fries, burgers and nuggets that
match the taste with the western culture and taste such as BBQ flavored sandwiches.

Al-Baik would not have a problem with regards to the items offered on their menu
since it is made based on western taste and western cultured food, they do offer
middle eastern cuisine options like falafel and hummus which Americans consume as
well especially in New York where the demand is huge. Al-Baik will primarily be
targeting the entire demographic and people of all ethnicities as it fits the American
consumers profile for taste, and using their positioning strategy to market their UVP
of quality and low price products to gain a competitive advantage in the market.

4. Competitors Strategies
KFC is a key competitor of Al-Baik as KFC has the same target segmentation as Al-
Baik. they target all ages and genders from kids to adults. Geographically they are
available world-wide in more than 50 countries with hundreds of franchises available
in different cities around the globe. KFC is an American based fried chicken shop that
is well-known and developed a prominent brand globally. KFC targets individuals of
all lifestyles, low to high income, except individuals who prefer a healthy meal who
have very limited options such as a salad or corn from KFC. The brand does have
loyal customers who consume their products monthly or sometimes weekly,
especially in America since it is a has a local consumer culture positioning.

KFC’s brand positioning statement is “It’s finger lickin’ good” representing American
food culture that was made by Colonel Sanders the man behind KFC secret recipe and
invention, KFC guarantees taste and quality as well as maintaining the consistency
throughout the years in every fast-food chain available. They offer their products

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 quickly and freshly prepared where consumers can expect the meal to be ready in 2
minutes.

KFC’s product strategy is to use their “original recipe” that was made by Colonel
Sanders including the 11 secret spices that are a trade secret and uses that as their
unique value proposition, they focus on product innovation by providing new flavors
such as “spicy lime wings” and “rizo rice” to continuously attract consumers. Their
pricing strategy is to offer low priced value items and combo deals to attract
consumers, they often display discounts on their websites to gain the attention of
consumers by providing them a deal, including options for individuals, groups or
families. Their distribution strategy is company owned stores as well as multiple
franchises throughout the globe, online ordering app and self-serving kiosks in stores.
Their promotional strategy is mainly social media and public relations, using their
Instagram and online app to display new items and promos to attract consumers, they
also use personal selling at their drive-thru and sales promotions in store such as 1-4
pm lunch deals.

5. Macro environmental analysis

The United States of America follows capitalism which is sometimes known as a free
market system, a market where individuals and businesses allocate resources and
produce goods depending on the demand of consumers (Majewski 2022). USA’s GDP
is one of the world’s leading GDP of more than 22000 billion dollars, and around
19,000 dollars GDP per capita (Kovalskys, Rigotti, Koletzko, Fisberg and Gomez
2019). It also has numerous taxation policies such as, franchise tax, import tax,
income tax, sales tax and service tax ranging from 4% to around 10%. The United
States is one of the countries with the lowest tariff rate of less than 2%. This is an
advantage for Al-Baik as they will have to pay less tax if they export their raw
materials like chicken and spices. The USA has a high inflation rate currently at
around 8.2% which can cause fall in the purchasing power for consumers whilst the
prices of commodities will rise.

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 The western culture is one of the most dominant culture globally, it has influences all
over the world in countries like Japan, Korea, India and various other countries,
English is spoken all around the world and is the first language in America. The
Americans refer to themselves as “foodies” a term to describe an individual with the
love for food where more than 45% of the country refer themselves as “foodies.”
Fast-food culture is the most dominant food preference in America, they consume
fried items like fried chicken, French fries, and fizzy beverages with a low tolerance
of spicy food, Americans consume fast food nearly 2-4 times a week, the average
expenditure is more than 2000 dollars per head and 13.00 dollars is the average
expenditure for a meal. USA is a nation that has a lower power distance, every
individual’s importance matters especially with regards to social power that is
mandatory to be equally distributed. Most Americans have qualities of an
individualistic person where the interest of ones self is prioritized. They adopt a
masculine and low certainty avoidance approach, earning money, assertiveness and
success is important whilst being comfortable with taking risks. This will not affect
Al-Baik’s sales as having certain characteristics may not be that relevant when it
comes to food, other aspects of low tolerance of spice needs to be considered whilst
offering their products and a high consumption of fast food can be quite beneficial for
Al-Baik when selling their products in the western market.

The United States is known to have some bad relationship with the middle east due to
9/11 where vast amount of Americans discriminated Saudi Arabia and other Muslim
population holding them responsible for the tragedy that occurred. However, it has
been more than 10 years to this incident, but Al-Baik should be cautious of any uprise
of discrimination from certain individuals. America is also known to have protests
and riots against fast food industries, vegans would try to damage fast food chain
stores, hold signs and protest outside their restaurants which can make other
customers uncomfortable from entering the restaurant. Al Baik needs to ensure they
have insurance for any damages before setting up the restaurant, and try to avoid any
unexpected legal issues, protect themselves with confidentiality contracts to secure
trade secrets.
6. Advanced (SWOT)
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Strengths Weakness 6|Page

High Reputation Product lines that are limited

 Opportunities Threats

Al Baik has quite a good opportunity
entering in the USA, such as, a favorable
demographic profile, demand for market
growth and government policies that are in
their favor. However, executing it can be
difficult due to intense competition as it is a
middle eastern brand and entering a market
with a western majority can be risky as they
might not like the products served or the
flavors of their sandwiches might not be
aligned with the western taste.
Although the USA does have numerous
substitutes and high rates of inflation. Al
Baik has a high reputation and a loyal
customer base, but Al-Baik’s biggest
advantage that can help them grow is that
they are the cheapest alternative compared
to most fast-food chains, during inflation
consumer would want to reduce their
expenses, Al-Baik being the cheapest
alternative can still attract them whilst they
enjoy having fast food at the same time.
Their price ranges from $3-15 US dollars
whilst other competitors range up to $5-25
US dollars.

7. Marketing Objectives

Specific- Acquiring 100,000 American-Muslim population as customers and 300,000

American customers.

Measurable- offering value based pricing in the host country by keeping a range of $5.99-
19.99 US dollars for meal prices.

Achievable- Ensuring all products are halal and are high quality to be consumed by
anyone.

Relevant- setting up a store where there is low competition but easily accessible to the
public.

Timely- Implementing the strategies within 1-2 years.

8. Marketing Strategies Product- Al Baik is a fast-food chain that sells fried

chicken which is not a usually healthy meal, it is also not a necessity and is more to
fulfil the consumer's desire which is a want, Therefore, using Maslow’s hierarchy
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 would be inefficient as basic needs for survival are basic foods like bread, rice,
vegetables and
not fast-food. Americans do crave fast-food a lot and there is a huge demand for fast
food, as mentioned previously, they consume it 2-3 times a week. Al Baik can build
their brand by using their unique value proposition of offering halal products, it can
do this by labelling it on its packaging like McDonald’s and KFC does in Saudi
Arabia and the UAE. This can help attract the 3.5 million Muslim American
population as they are aware of the products being Halal (Mohamed 2018). Secondly,
Al Baik will need to change their name as “Al Baik” is an Arabic word that means
choose or select and the American population will not understand it, the brand name
cannot be translated to English either as “Choose or select” might not be the most
attractive name, this approach was adopted by Carls JR. who named their brand as
Hardees in the UAE (Kovalchik 2015). the products that Al-Baik offers do fit the
category of western taste as they offer fried items just like KFC and flavours that the
American public enjoys such as BBQ, ranch etc. in terms of product development Al-
Baik can introduce newer flavours that provide more options for the American taste
such as options for cheese, American and cheddar cheese, cheese sauces. the logo
and symbol of Al-Baik can be as it is in the home country since it represents an
“animated chicken” that most fried chicken stores have. Thirdly, Al-Baik can provide
nutritional information on their packaging like McDonald’s to make the consumer
aware of how many calories they consume, America has one of the highest obesity
rates and therefore the vast population are health conscious but still love to consume
the food they love (Seidell and Jutka 2016), doing so can help Al-Baik in being
transparent with consumers and have nothing to hide from them which can help gain
their trust as a new brand.

The strategy the Al-Baik can adopt product extension communications adaption
strategy, as the products being offered in Saudi Arabia and the USA will be the same
as mentioned above, Al-Baik offers fried chicken products that are similar to the
western taste, with no product changes it can reduce the expenses of the company
when entering the market, and the product will serve the same needs. Al-Baik will
have to concentrate or rather spend more on advertising and promoting their brand to
communicate to the American population, ensuring that Americans can consume halal

Haram Iqbal
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 products as well, communicating their products are fresh and high quality with no
hormones in the chicken being served.
9. Pricing Strategy- The fast-food Industry is highly competitive, especially in the
USA, competition is on the rise as fast-food chains like McDonald’s, KFC and Chick-
Fil-A are constantly competing and trying to maximize profits higher than their
previous years' revenue. Al-Baik’s market entry method was to enter as a franchise in
the USA giving an American who is more aware of the western market and culture to
run the store as a franchisee. the most influential factor that can affect Al Baik’s
pricing strategy is tax and inflation, as mentioned previously, the USA has a rising
inflation rate of 8% which will affect the purchasing decisions of the consumers, Al
Baik needs to worry about the sales tax, income tax, corporate tax and value-added
tax which range from 4-10% (Kovalskys, Rigotti, Koletzko, Fisberg and Gomez
2019). Al Baik will also need to consider the cost of goods, if they are to deliver raw
materials from Saudi Arabia to the USA, this is crucial as it is hard to get Halal
chicken in the USA but quite easily accessible in Saudi Arabia.

Al Baik's unique value proposition is a value-based pricing strategy where they use
their high-quality products and set lower prices than their competitors to enter every
new country as a franchise, they can adopt the same strategy which has worked very
well in countries like UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain. KFC and other fast-food
chains had increased their prices by 10% due to inflation bringing the average price
per meal to $7-31 US dollars and an average expenditure of $5-20 US dollars (Koop
2023). Al Baik can match them using competitive pricing by setting their prices close
to their competitors but lower enough to provide a competitive advantage against
them, Al-Baiks prices range from $3-15 on their menu with an average expenditure of
$5-10 US dollars, they can increase it to $4.99-19.99 US dollars this way they are
closer to KFC and can keep up with inflation, using a penetration pricing strategy may
showcase that the products offered are of cheap quality due to low prices, Thus,
competitive pricing strategy is a good option for Al Baik. They can use psychological
pricing strategy by pricing their products to $5.99-19.99 US dollars making the
consumer feel they are spending much lesser compared to KFC which does not adopt
psychological pricing. the taxation factors are unavoidable, Al Baik will have to
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 charge slightly higher as mentioned above from $3-15 to 5.99-19.99 dollars to help
with taxes and inflation. Exporting raw materials from Saudi Arabia won’t be much of
a problem for Al Baik as the USA has the lowest tariff rate of 2.9%, this is necessary
as the Halal products of Al Baik are their UVP and help target the 3.5 million Muslim
target audience that KFC and McDonald’s are unable to target since they cannot
produce halal options.

10.Distribution strategy- Al-Baik will be operating as a franchise in the USA by

providing the franchisee with the rights to open an Al-Baik franchise and rights of
control. There can be distribution issues during this process especially in an
international market, issues of control can occur as one of the downsides of
franchising is that the franchisor may not have as much control or a close relationship
with the franchisee, they may not be able to monitor them closely since they operate
in a different country, if the new franchise fails it can affect Al-Baiks reputation as a
whole in different countries and discourage other franchisees from opening their
franchises in their respective country.

The distribution channel for Al-Baik will be to find a supplier of halal products in the
USA, as flying or shipping products such as chicken or meat that is perishable and can
affect the quality of its freshness, Al-Baik will have to find a certified halal supplier
who can solve this issue for them. This will also help in reducing the costs that Al-
Baik would have faced if they decided to ship their products such as Airway costs,
shipment costs and documentation. Al-Baik will primarily be using a local trucking
service to deliver their products, which will be reliable, fast, easily accessible and an
easy of tracing, the cost would vary depending on how many shipments go through,
considering that it is a fast-food chain that requires huge batches of supplies, it is safe

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 to assume that the cost will be moderate to high. Al Baik will also have to invest in
inventory management to ensure that there is enough stock and does not have
inventory issues such as excessive stock to avoid waste and expenses. Then finally
will be distributed to Al-Baik stores to cook and serve the customers with Al-Baiks
quality items.

11.Promotional Strategy- Al Baik can use viral marketing as a strategy to enter the
USA, this strategy was adopted before their entry into the UAE that helped them
attract thousands of customers daily with long queues for 2-4 hours waiting time, they
advertised on social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram using well-known
influencers in Dubai like K9 unit, MoVlogs and many others (Khan 2022). This
strategy enabled them to open more stores due to the rising demand and within a year
they opened 4 branches in the UAE due to this specific strategy (Khan 2022). Al-Baik
can adopt the same strategy before entering the USA and paying American social
media influencers to advertise their products and influence other consumers to try
them out. Al-Baik should also use Muslim social media influencers like Hoda Katebi
and Manal Chinutay both having 100k+ Muslim American followers, advertising Al-
Baik as serving halal products so that they can target the Muslim population in the
USA. This will help build brand awareness extremely fast as the message is being
delivered instantly through social media platforms.

The USA is a low-context culture that requires messages to be direct and to the point
so that it is easily understood. Al-Baik will have to remove the Arabic language

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 present and brands name to English so that consumers recognize the brand name, they
may change it to something similar to the picture on the right where it is in English
and describes the origin of the restaurant. A standardization strategy as 46% of males
and females aged 20-39 consume fast food the most and have very similar
consumption patterns. Culturally there would be no issues since advertising Halal
food has not been an issue in the USA, Halal guys are evident in the statement made
since Halal guys are a food cart that serves halal products and is consumed by a
majority of the public, it has been quite successful with opening stores in the UK and
other states of USA where their demographic is Muslim, African and Asian
Americans (Simpson 2022). Al-Baik will primarily focus on public relations
specifically through social media with the use of influencers to market their products.

12.Implementation and Budget Plan

Objectives Strategy Responsibility Cost Performe Targe Where

d t

Opening a Finding a Franchisee 700,000 Franchisee By USA

franchise in a Franchise US 2023-
location with location Dollars. 2024
more Muslim
population,
where
competition is
low.

Transportatio Ensuring Supply chain 1,000- Franchisee By USA

n all items management/Franchise 2,000 US 2023-
are e dollars 2024
transported
without
risking
quality.

Storage Ensuring Supply chain 10,000 Franchisee By Online

products do management/Franchise US 2023- and in

Haram Iqbal
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facility not go to e dollars 2024 UAE
waste and markets
avoid
incurring a
loss with
raw
materials

Changing product Product manager 0.50 Al Baik/ By USA

packaging Strategy cents US Franchise 2023-
(adding dollars 2024
“Halal per
certified” and package
nutritional per unit
information
10,000
units=
5,000 US
dollars

Finding a Distributio Supply chain 10,000 Halal By USA

supplier for n Strategies management/Franchise US Chicken 2023-
halal certified e dollars supplier 2024
chicken.

Using Pricing Finance manager 0 Al Baik/ 2023- USA

Psychological Strategy Franchise 2025
pricing and
value-based
pricing

Using, Public Promotion Head of marketing or 100,000- Social 2023- Online

relations, strategies product manager 300,000 Media 2025 social
influencers, K Influencer media
and social s platform
media to (US s
advertise Dollars)
(TikTok and
Instagram)

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TOTAL 800,000-
COST 1,027,00
0 US
dollars

Haram Iqbal
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https://www.census.gov/popclock/

Hopkins, Daniel J. 2019. "Response to Thomas K. Ogorzalek’s Review of

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Khan, Abeer. 2022. “PSA: All the places you can get your Al Baik fix in the UAE”
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Kovalskys, Irina, Attilio Rigotti, Berthold Koletzko, Mauro Fisberg, Georgina Gómez, Marianella
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muslim-population-continues-to-grow/

Seidell, Jacob C. and Jutka Halberstadt. 2016. "Obesity: The Obesity Epidemic in the USA -- no
End in Sight?" Nature Reviews.Endocrinology 12 (9) (09): 499-500.
doi:https://doi.org/10.1038/nrendo.2016.121.

Simpson, Fiona. 2022. “From Food Cart to Global Franchise: The Halal Guys Continue Rapid
Expansion Plans” Forbes. https:// www.forbes.com/sites/fionasimpson1/2022/11/09/from-

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food-cart-to-global-franchise-the-halal-guys-continue-rapid-expansion-plans/?
sh=3191f38a2f04

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