Sportswear Market Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Sportswear Market - Assignment Example This consumer demand has led to companies like ours, which exclusively cater to this segment of society, sell the sports product like hot cakes because sportswear has rapidly turned into an ever-growing and lucrative market. The youth form a majority of the total buyers of these products. Parry, 2004 has rightly stated that "There has been a significant change in the sports market over recent years driven by a number of key factors, including the high-profile media coverage of sport, the huge marketing budgets of the global brands and the increasing fashion appeal of sports clothing." Keeping in mind this global scenario I would like to bring to your notice that it is the best time to launch a product like our casual footwear. We are bound to be successful if we do the proper planning by using appropriate planning tools in order to develop our marketing objectives and strategies successfully. According to Ideas factory, "Market research pundits estimate that only 20% of all sports footwear will be used for the purpose intended, with the majority being flaunted as casual, fashion or even collector's items." Even fashion giants are trying to lure the local as well as international market segment with their sportswear products. It has rightly been mentioned by the Ideasfactory website that, "The trend has persisted since the mid-1990s when Jil Sander took a shine to Puma's King football boots and had them modified for the catwalk." Hence being a company that spealizes in sportswear, we have 100% potential to shine in the casual footwear for youth market. Only one thing that we should concentrate on is that today's market especially youth; not only get motivated by the comfort quotient but the fashion quotient too. So we have to belong to the fashion pack to avoid any bumpy ride in future. Use of planning tools Our company can make use of the following planning tools to be able to develop its marketing objectives and strategies to reach out to its target market. Boston Consulting Group's Product Portfolio Analysis: It is one of the best product portfolio analysis methods. According to this we have to first classify our 'Strategic Business Unit' (SBU) - our new product; the casual footwear on the following dimensions. 1.Relative market share (horizontal axis) - through this we will be able to derive the strength of our product in the market. 2. Market growth rate (vertical axis) - through this we will be able to judge the market attractiveness quotient. If we divide the matrix into four areas we will get four categories of SBU's from which we can choose the category of SBU our new product belongs to. These four areas have been named in the following ways: Stars: those products that are strong in the market in comparison to their competing brands. They need great investments because they are considered high growth ventures. Cash Cows: these products have low growth rate but their market share is very high. As they are well established and successful, they don't need much investment. But they need to be managed rigorously so that the profit continues, so that company can use this profit for heavy investments required by the 'star' category of products. Question Marks: The products that come under this category have low market share but they operate in markets that see higher growths.