Those two stores are in-fact the two biggest full-service supermarkets in Denmark, with MENY having 118 stores in its fleet, followed by Kvickly with 76 functioning throughout the whole country. 3.1.
Target group and marketing channel3.1.1. Target groups and segmentationThere are two ways to approach the market: by making product’ segments, or by introducing one standard product that fits for everyone. According to Hollensen, market segment is “a homogeneous group of costumers with similar needs, wants, values and buying behavior” (2010). As mentioned before, Yakult has some characteristics that make it difficult to enter the Danish market: non-flavored, processed and wasn’t produced in Denmark. Besides that, it is also a premium product. Thus, market segmentation is probably the best option for Yakult.
3.1.1.
1. B2C market(Picture from NIKKEI ASIAN REVIEW – taken from: https://asia.nikkei.com/Markets/Tokyo-Market/Yakult-eyes-another-record-profit-in-fiscal-2015)For the B2C – business to consumer- market, the five steps model portraited the ideal customer’s characteristics for Yakult. However, furthered secondary data is needed to support the opinion. Conzoom is applied as a tool to identify our segmentation. This database distinguishes between nine different groups: well-founded homeowners; comfort and coziness; life in the country side; wealth; urban diversity; know and prosperity; seniors; young on the way and provincial life.Mapping out Yakult’s desirable costumer, the group that fits the best the image is group F -“outlook and prosperity” ; which represents more than the 6% of the population.
Their household income is generally over DKK 739.999 per year, a part of the middle to upper-class. They usually work from 30 to 40 hours per week, even more for some case. Compared to the whole Denmark mean, the older person in the household is usually younger.
However, the most common age is among 40 and 49, followed by people in their fifties. They are mostly single or couples without kids. Owning a car is not their goal, public transport or bicycles to move around the city. Referring to their preferred grocery stores, they buy more than the average in supermarkets as Irma, Netto, Fotex or Meny.
They make use of the social media, being above the mean when talking about LinkedIn, Twitter and usage of e-mail. Interested in politics, nutrition, health and pollution; the activities they usually do involve going to the cinema, doing sports, reading fiction literature and visiting friends and family. In the image above, we can see that his group is community-oriented. First, because they state that more should be done for the weak and the elderly.
Second, they also think that having a social security network is necessary. In the other hand, they are self-oriented, meaning they want to be successful in life, and they want to pump themselves. Is easy to see this pattern also in the disagreements, for example, they are not scared of the globalization and don’t think that Denmark should take care of itself. Health is one of their main worries, they buy more organic food than the average and they disagree more in allowing smoking in public spaces. The wealthy people – Group D- are, in some points, part of our target. Even though, they live mostly in the country side, the 37% of them do it in a metropolitan region.
Moreover, the 88% has at least one car. They are members of the upper class and middle-upper class. Most of them have kids, and work among 30 and 40 hours per week. They are not scared about globalization and don’t think that Denmark should take care of itself. This group buys mostly in Netto, but prefers Kvickly, Irma, Fotex and Meny above the average. In conclusion, we are focusing on the upper-left side of the matrix made by ConZoom. Meaning that they are modern and community oriented at the same time. The main aspect is the willingness to try new products and recommend them after.
The group E doesn’t of our goals because of their lower income, which obstructs the buying process if we consider the high price of the product. The main difference between our desired target and the one we actually have is the family type.We expected to have families as customers, in order to enforce the positioning of “caring”. However, losing this characteristic is not a problem, our main groups are in their twenties or thirties, they are not afraid of trying new products and care about others.
Looking at the family cycle described by Dent (cited by Hollensen, 2010), the groups are positioned in their way to be “starter homes”. Thus, them being the early adopters of our product is an opportunity to the company, they will start their own family soon and can influence the scared traditional groups to try Yakult.
