BA370 Harward Signet Jewelers Case Summary & Critical Analysis Report Signet Jewelers Case Summary – Critical Analysis ReportSignet Jewelers Case Summary –

BA370 Harward Signet Jewelers Case Summary & Critical Analysis Report Signet Jewelers Case Summary – Critical Analysis ReportSignet Jewelers Case Summary – Critical Analysis ReportSignet Jewelers Case Summary – Critical Analysis Report Write the paper about Signet Jewelers
1. Background
the picture
—read the short article and see
2. Problem Statement (one sentence)
3. Alternate Solutions (need 3)
—pick three on the picture
4. Recommendation (be detailed on why this will solve your problem)
5. Measures (3 that will show if your recommendation was successful) —-society measure with realistic and live
6. What I Learned—-two sentence
Solutions should solve the problem that mentioned in the problem statement.
Recommendation should be pick from those three solutions. Also, measures
should support those solutions.
The above should be used as headings on your paper and the paper cannot
exceed 3 pages.
You also need a bibliography page with at least two outside sources and the
case. I do not care what format you use. Wikipedia is not a source. I did a
quick search for Taco Bell, London, Beer and got over 1,000 hits.
The keys will be:
1. Is your problem statement succinct and clear?
2. Do your solutions solve your problem?
3. Does your recommendation solve your problem?
4. Do you justify your recommendation?
5. Are you providing measures or tactics?
6. Do your measures support your recommendation?
7. Did you follow these really clear directions?
Suggestions:
Article:
https://money.cnn.com/2016/05/26/investing/signet-tiffany-jewelry-earnings/index.html
Don’t shine on you crazy diamond? Jewelers slump
by
Paul R. La Monica
He didn’t go to Jared! Or Kay. Or Zales. Or even Piercing Pagoda apparently.
Signet Jewelers (
SIG), the company that owns these four shopping mall based brands, reported
disappointing sales Thursday and a tepid outlook. The stock fell 10% on the news.
The poor results come one day after high-end jeweler Tiffany (
TIF) also reported sluggish
quarterly earnings.
Shares of Signet and Tiffany have each plunged nearly 20% this year. An
analyst who follows
Signet and Tiffany thinks investors may be overreacting to the latest earnings reports
as well.
“People are worried about the short-term. It may be overdone though. These are solid
businesses,” said Paul Swinand, an analyst with Morningstar.
But Tiffany and Signet are not the only ones in the business of bling that are
struggling.
Richemont (
CFRUY), the parent company of Cartier, is also down almost 20%. Online jewelry
retailer Blue Nile (NILE) is down 30% as well.
The lone exception is Danish jeweler Pandora A/S (
PNDZY) — not to be confused with
the
online radio company. Pandora A/S is up 20% this year and the company reported
strong
sales and a solid outlook earlier this month.
All of the jewelry retailers could be in trouble if precious metal prices continue
to rally. Gold,
silver and platinum prices are up substantially year-to-date. It may be tough passing
on those
costs to consumers. Many may be tapped out. At the very least, they are being more
cautious -both in the U.S. and around the world.
“We attribute the overall lower sales to softness in domestic customer spending
in many U.S.
markets as well as lower spending by foreign tourists of many nationalities in New
York,” said
Tiffany vice president Mark Aaron on a recorded call for investors.
To be sure, shoppers are still spending to spruce up their homes, as evidenced by
strong earnings
from Lowe’s (
LOW) and Home Depot (
HD).
Deep discounters Dollar General (
DG) and Dollar Tree (
DLTR) also wowed Wall Street with
their latest earnings. Their stocks surged on the news. That could be a sign of how
nervous
consumers are though.
2
Many apparel retailers, many of whom are mall tenants just like Signet’s big
brands, are also
struggling. Gap (
GPS), Macy’s (
M), Nordstrom (
JWN), J.C. Penney (
JCP) and Target (
TGT) are
among the many big retailers to post lousy numbers recently. Sears (
SHLD) and teen clothing
retailer Abercrombie & Fitch (
ANF) also reported weak results on Thursday.
Many experts think that the rise of online retail — specifically the dominance
of Amazon (
AMZN) — is to blame for many of the troubling sales reports from brick-and-mortar
stores.
But for what it’s worth, Signet CEO Mark Light isn’t buying that argument.
“Signet is
relatively Amazon-proof as consumers have consistently shown a desire to touch
jewelry and get
educated by trusted and trained professionals before making a highly emotional
purchase,” he
said during a conference call with analysts.
A stock can be a highly emotional purchase too though. And right now many
investors seem
to be showing more fear than greed when it comes to Signet, Tiffany and other
jewelers.
Remember; write the format like these, you have to make perfect
English as long as the point is correct
Format:
Big Tobacco and the Advent of E-Cigarettes
Background
The U.S. tobacco industry is among the most heavily regulated and heavily taxed
industries in the United States (The Economist, 2014).
Medical evidence of the adverse
effects of smoking continues to grow, and the share of American adults who smoke has
declined markedly during the past fifty years, from 42% in 1965 to less than 18% in 2013 (CDC,
2013). But in spite of ever-increasing regulation and public wariness of the U.S. tobacco
industry, tobacco companies continue to thrive. This oligopoly industry, dominated by big
tobacco companies Altria, Reynolds American, and Lorillard, serves a shrinking but remarkably
loyal customer base. Critics are quick to point out that, despite extensive regulation of the
marketing practices in the industry, tobacco products remain highly lucrative, with sales of
over $66 billion in 2014 (Hargreaves, 2014).
This beleaguered but very profitable industry must now deal with another, potentially very
disruptive innovation in the form of e-cigarettes.
This new product category, the modern
version of which dates from 2007, generated U.S. sales of $2.5 billion in 2014 (Richtel, 2014).
Although the e-cigarette sector is still relatively small, it clearly has the potential to disrupt
tobacco sales in the coming years. E-cig use is generally perceived to be less unhealthful
than cigarette smoking, and the e-cig habit is substantially less costly than consuming
tobacco cigarettes (Richtel, 2014).
Moreover, e-cigarettes are far less regulated than
tobacco products, without many of the marketing constraints.
The early success of e-cigarettes has not gone unnoticed by the big tobacco companies.
Lorillard was the first to enter this sector with the acquisition in 2012 of the Blu eCig brand
(Esterl, 2012). Since then, Altria and Reynolds American have indicated their intention to
introduce e-cig product lines (Richtel, 2014).
Problem Statement
Tobacco companies must address the advent of e-cigarettes in order to defend their
tobacco business and to identify business opportunities in the growing e-cigarette product
sector.
Alternative Solutions
In order to limit the impact of e-cigarettes on the sales of tobacco cigarettes, tobacco
companies can lobby for additional regulation of this new product category.
Increased
regulation will help to “level the playing field” and reduce the advantages enjoyed by e-cigs
as a consequence of their largely unrestricted marketing.
Among the areas for increased
regulation of e-cigarettes, the tobacco companies can lobby federal, state, and local
governments to ban television and radio broadcasting of e-cig advertising, prohibit online
sales of this product category, and proscribe e-cig use in public places.
These changes will
reduce some of the advantages of e-cigs over tobacco products, thereby presumably slowing
the market acceptance of this product category.
The tobacco companies can also lobby the federal government to regulate e-cigarettes
as an over-the-counter pharmaceutical. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would
then regulate product approvals and monitor the distribution of e-cigs across the United
States.
Compliance, in the form of application submissions, clinical testing, and pre-market
approvals, will be costly for applicants. This will likely limit the number of new entrants in
this market, and will therefore help to reduce the intensity of market competition.
In order to further blunt the effect of new entrants in the marketplace, tobacco companies
can acquire any promising e-cig brands in order to manage the marketing communications
and distribution of these products – or perhaps to simply discontinue these lines. Lorillard
acquired Blue eCigs and is seeking to grow this product without cannibalizing the sales of its
tobacco cigarettes. Similarly, Altria and Reynolds American could acquire existing product
lines in order to manage competition in the tobacco industry.
Recommendations
The best solution for dealing with the threat posed by e-cigs is to seek new legislation to
regulate this growing product category. By lobbying for new product clinical trials and premarket approvals, the tobacco companies will raise the cost of entry for new competitors.
Similarly, bans on broadcast advertising and online sales will reduce the advantages currently
enjoyed by e-cig marketers over tobacco marketers.
The advantage of these solutions to
the tobacco companies stem from their substantial existing capabilities for lobbying federal,
state, and local governments.
The tobacco companies would only need to shift their
lobbying emphasis from their tobacco products to the new e-cigarettes.
Program Performance Metrics
An intermediate metric to determine the effectiveness of any new regulatory legislation
is the number of new entrants in the e-cigarette product category.
If the newly erected
entry barriers reduce the number of entrants, this would provide an early indication of success.
Also on an intermediate basis, it will be possible to determine the success of newly
implemented marketing regulation of e-cigs by tracking current and potential customers’
awareness of e-cigarette brands prior to and following the enactment of such regulations.
There should be a statistically significant decline in awareness levels following the
enforcement of regulations.
A conclusive metric of the success of tobacco companies’ lobbying programs is the
goodwill premium associated with the market capitalization of e-cigarette companies. If the
entry barriers and marketing regulations are successful, the goodwill premium of these firms
should decline.
The resulting higher cost of capital will presumably reduce their ability to
compete in the market and thereby to take market share from the tobacco companies.
What I Have Learned from This Critical Analysis Exercise
The e-cigarette product category is a disruptive innovation because of its potential to
reduce demand for tobacco products. There are clear indications that tobacco companies
are taking the necessary steps to defend their very lucrative market, but these efforts are still
at an early stage.
We can expect further efforts by the tobacco companies to protect their
positions, perhaps by lobbying more intensively for the regulation of e-cigarettes.
Bibliography
Anon. (2014, January 5) “Running out of puff: Big tobacco firms are maintaining their poise,
but quietly wheezing” The Economist
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) (November 2013) “Cigarette smoking
among adults—United States, 2013”
Esterl, Mike, (2012, April 25) “Got a Light – er, Charger: Big Tobacco’s latest Buzz”, The Wall
Street Journal
Hargreaves, Rupert (2014, April 18) “Tobacco is Still an Extremely Profitable Business, and This
Won’t
Change
Soon”
The
Motley
Fool
,
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/04/08/tobacco-is-still-an-extremelyprofitable-busines-2.aspx
Richtel, Matt (June 17, 2014) “Why big tobacco companies are betting on e-cigarettes” The
New York Times

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