CASE ANALYSIS-

JUDO IN ACTION-”

TEAMMATES-
•AASHI GUPTA
•KANIKA CHOUDHARY
•NAINA SHARMA
•KHUSHBOO SINGH
•BHANU PRATAP SINGH
•KSHITIJ TYAGI
OBJECTIVES-

How to push or pull your competitors off balance by turning their

momentum to your advantage.

How can company’s strategy and assets can be liabilities.

How new companies /start ups can force their competitors to

reduce themselves or lose market share.
JUDO IN ACTION-
FOUR short stories about small business.
The 4 firms are-
• SOFTSOAP-Softsoap pioneers creates the liquid
soap market with little competition.
• RED BULL- dominates the energy drink market
with little competition from established early
beverage manufacturers.
• UK PETROL PRICE WAR- supermarket chains
are trying to enter the retail gasoline market, but
trigger an aggressive price response from the
integrated majors.
• FREESERVE VS AOL- Freeserve is making
great progress in the UK ISP market against
dominant incumbent AOL.
WHAT IS JUDO STRATEGY ?

A judo business strategy is a plan for managing a company by using

its speed and agility to mitigate the effect of its competitors.
The judo business strategy consists of three components:
•Rapid Movement
•Balance/Flexibility
•Leverage
•One of the major aspects of judo is using the size of a larger opponent
against itself.
•Small companies can use their firm footing with a core product and its
power to challenge a larger competitor.
MINNETONKA CORPORATION-
FOUNDED BY ROBERT TAYLOR IN
1964.

 IT SOLD A VARIETY OF SOAPS AND

OTHER PERSONAL CARE
PRODUCTS.

1977 -IT DEVELOPED A SOAP

MACHINE THAT COULD DELIVER
LIQUID SOAP INTO A
PLASTIC BOTTLE DRIVEN BY A PUMP.
• 1980 -Minnetonka launched
its liquid soap named
Softsoap
• $7 million- national
Advertising campaigns.
• Total revenue- $25 million.
(in previous year).
• Liquid soap marketing paid
off .
• Softsoap sales reached $39
million that year.
 INITIAL REACTION OF THE
MAIN COMPETITORS-
• There were only two pump manufacturers that could meet demand,
Taylor risked everything and bought the total annual production of both
manufacturers - 100 million pumps.

• The big players were unsure about the consumer’s enthusiasm for liquid
soap from pump-gun dispensers.

• Large soap manufacturers decided to conduct private trials of liquid

soap products rather than go for public launches.

• In fact, they decided to market the product under different names from
their top bar soap products.
• P&G For example, was marketing its liquid soap product under the
name "Rejoice".
MARKETING TOOLS
MARKET
CHANGE
RedBull
OVERVIEW

• Founded by DIETRICH
MATESCHITZ (Austria 1987)
• Initially nightclubs and bars
neglected Red bull because
they perceive it to be a Diet
product.
• This forced Dietrich to focus
on retail outlets and discos
where alcohol was prohibited.
EUROPE TO USA 
• Major competition were Coca Cola and Pepsi.
• Coca cola sales in USA was were $7.5 billion whereas red bull had
$483 million worldwide sales.
STRATEGIES
USED IN USA
MARKET CHANGE

• By 2001 energy drink industry in US

had increased to a $275 million
industry. 
• Red bull controlled about two thirds of
the energy drink market.
• But only 0.1% of carbonated soft drink
market
• Nevertheless red bull sales increased
by 118% compared to previous year
 FINDINGS-
• Soft drink was dominated by
big players in USA.
• Red bull entered as a niche
product and established its
own brand.
• Red bull defined the energy
segment although it was small
part in $50 billion market.
• At beginning big players did
not bother to fight in energy
segment and this gives red bull
a clear path to capture market.
UK PRICE
WARS-
1980s-the retail gasoline
stations were owned by three
types of companies: vertically
integrated oil companies,
supermarkets and independent
retailers.
MARKET CHANGE-

1990s- Supermarkets lowered gasoline

prices, increasing their market share from
6% inn1991 to 20% in 1995, while Esso’s
share fell from 21% to 16%

Market share- 1991[%]

Market share 1995 [%]
 REACTION OF THE MAIN COMPETITOR :

• 1995- Esso launched a program called Price watch in the north-east of England and
Scotland.
• It offered that prices at Esso sites would match the lowest price offered by supermarkets.
• In January it was extended to all of its 2100 fuel stations. This started the gasoline price
war in the United Kingdom.
• 1996-Esso took action nationwide with a public commitment to monitor prices every day
and to be among the lowest in the country.
PORTER’S FIVE FORCES MODEL-

THREAT OF NEW ENTRANTS-Chances are very

low due to high barriers to entry.
Reasons- THREAT OF SUBSTITUTED PRODUCTS-Low
High fixed cost Investments.
Large Market share of Big Giants. COMPETITIVE
RIVALRY
-SIGNIFICANTLY
INTENSIVE.
BARGAINING POWER OF BUYERS-
Relatively high.
BARGAINING POWER OF SUPPLIERS-
Significantly greater than the buyers. Reason-
Customers were more inclined towards CPR.
AOL vs FREESERVE-

• AOL -founded by Steve case in 1985.

• Offerings/Services- interactive news,
entertainment, information, shopping, buddy lists,
email service etc for under $30 a month.
• World's largest Internet service provider
membership base at 8.6 million members .
• After 10 years of serving it get ventured into
international scene and became the leading ISP in
the British market .
• September 1998 -Dixons (britain's leading
electronics retailer) launched freeserve a new free
ISP that enabled users to go online for just the cost
of a local telephone call.
REACTION OF AOL-
• AOL attacked freeserve saying that it masked the high charges that users
use to pay for telephone Technical Support it also highlighted that AOL
is far much better than freeserve because it provides added features .

MARKET CHANGE-
• AOL had around 8,00,000 subscribers but Freeserve had 1,000,000
customers and 8000 new subscribers were signing up each day and at
last it had 1.3 million subscribers .
COMPETITIVE STRATEGIES-
• AOL responded by cutting its British monthly fee from $27.00 to $16.25.
• It launched a free ISP service ,Netscape online to compete head-to-head
with freeserve.
Targeted at younger internet users
• Users started signups for Netscape online approx 4,00,000.
• U.K added -200,000 accounts
• Freeserve added-370,000 subscribers.
• In September 2008 AOL began offering unlimited online access via toll
free number for fixed monthly fee .
• Freeserve try to match AOL by charging an even a lower monthly fee but
unable to withstand the operating losses .
RECOMMENDATIONS-
• Proper Research and Development( R&D)
• Promotion Strategy.
• Focus on Specific Market /Niche Product
• Innovation.
• Focus on quality.
• Cheap Pricing Strategy.
 CONCLUSION-
• Softsoap -first to launch the liquid soap from pump gun dispensers

Competitive Advantage

Market Leader
• P&G didn’t have the technique to produce the soap machine and wasn’t even sure
enough of consumers enthusiasm and hence kept the incumbents from fighting back
aggressively.
• Redbull -highly focused specific market (niche product) own distribution
strategy stepping back of the incumbents initially.
• In the case of U.K petrol price war ,the supermarkets expected that the major retailers
will not join the price war but unfortunately integrated oil companies responded but
supermarkets being stable enough ,it didn’t let their market share down.
 • In the case of AOL vs FREESERVE ,the consumers who
were young and didn’t need any additional service and
To be were just dependent only and only on internet were totally
Continued- switched to Freeserve.
• The main preference of young customers was the low
price and hence it became suitable for them to stick to
freeserve.
THANK YOU