Environment Analysis: Creative Confections

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Environment Analysis: Creative Confections

"I've always liked to be adventurous with food, especially desserts," said Lavonne Temple, founder of Creative Confections (CC), a small and emerging specialty bakery in Jacksonville, Florida. Starting with cake and candy recipe experimentation in 2002, Temple developed a tidy little business selling scrumptious specialty cakes and candies from a home-based operation. Increasing demand for Temple's upscale homemade confections recently poised CC on the brink of major expansion. In the next decade, CC can expect to encounter changing trends within the baking industry, each impacting the company's long-term environmental objectives in remote, industry, and operational contexts.

Remote environment

Labeling – Anticipated changes in food labeling legislation will determine the manner CC labels its cakes' nutritional content. Expanded labeling information requirements are expected in the future (Seiz, 2005). Strategic objective: CC must increase its knowledge of ingredient composition and related derivatives to provide improved labeling and to protect any allergy-prone customers from harm.

Nutritional issues - Consumer demand for reduced-fat, sugar-free, and nutritionally-fortified foods is not a fad, with 54% of consumers ranking nutrition as the primary factor that influences their food purchases (BakeryOnline.com, 2003). As attention to these attributes is expected to continue, building healthful elements into bakery products is a lucrative market. Offering tasty, nutritionally worthy cakes in CC's product line will attract health-conscious customers, which brings recipe adjustments into the realm of food science (BakeryOnline.com, 2004). Strategic objective: CC must incorporate ongoing nutritional research and development data gathering into its strategic plan.

Globalization - Globalization of specialty desserts is growing steadily due to Internet marketing (Global Monitoring, 2004). By marketing its business on the Internet, CC will reach and please a growing customer base. But first, CC must design an appropriate Web site, offering colorful, high-resolution photographs of the specialty cakes it produces so consumers can see how the cakes are designed (Global Monitoring). Leveraging emerging Web technology to its advantage, CC's Web site could offer an interactive feature, in which customers design a custom-made cake to suit a particular occasion by clicking a few buttons to visualize the design of the finished cake. Strategic objective: Add a range of cakes to CC's product line that can be distributed fresh or frozen, which will build an Internet customer niche based on CC's mission of quality and freshness.

Industry environment

Sweet tooth factor – Market research indicates indulgence will always factor into bakery purchases, regardless of diet or health awareness, i.

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