Creating Value for Target Customers

   Mr Lee Soak Chuang and his beloved spouse established Lee Biscuits in 1990 and they began operating their store in their home, which was situated in Gunung Rapat, Ipoh.  The unique taste of their core product, traditional coconut cookies, which lies in its traditional method of baking, its fragrant coconut filling and crispy skin has made them well known among the locals. Throughout the years, the company has reformed the custom-made bakery process into partially programmed creation and dexterously preserve the traditional tastes and texture of the coconut cookies. Today, its traditional coconut cookies are frequently sold to local bakery stores, wholesalers and exporters. Lee Biscuits also earned a few supermarket entries at Ipoh, Penang and Kuala Lumpur.

    All these years, Lee Biscuits use mass marketing strategy to sell the coconut cookies. In fact, changes in the marketing environment have made mass marketing increasingly difficult in today’s business world. Changes in consumer preferences is one of the factors that can bring about changes in marketing environment. If consumers start preferring less sugar cookies from other companies, it will be extremely hard to change their preference. Besides that, peoples’ needs and wants do differ. This implies that if individuals of a specific geographical region like to consume coconut cookies, consumers from other geographical regions may not want even to hear about coconut cookies. Consequently, if the company channel its marketing efforts to marketing this product in all geographic areas, this may wind up losing more than gaining.

To develop a target marketing strategy, it is very important for Lee Biscuits to identify various market segments. Firstly, Lee Biscuits should target women because as indicated by the author of Marketing to Women, Marti Barletta, women are the primary decision-makers for consumer goods in 85% of households and they make 81% of the decisions about groceries. Moreover, they are enthusiastic about offers and rebates to be profited. Secondly, the company should also target tourists. Lee Biscuits is situated in Gunung Rapat, which is a tourist spot in Ipoh. Tourists usually go there to have food craving and buy souvenirs for their family or friends. During peak tourist season, there are even more tourists will visit Gunung Rapat. Therefore, it is a good opportunity for the company to expand its business and make Lee Biscuits a must visit place.

    As Lee Biscuits’ consultant, I suggest Lee Biscuits should produce and sell a variety of cookies instead of just traditional coconut cookies to the target audience. As stated above, women are the main decision makers for groceries and most of them are housewives. They have to satisfy all family members’ needs and wants. Therefore, the company may develop and produce healthy cookies which is less sugar and low fat for kids and senior citizens. Moreover, the company must keep the price reasonable all the time and they may have promotions during some specific occasions to attract more women to purchase. Price is an important factor that affects purchase decisions made by housewives.