Strategy Examples

Southwest

• Operated a single type of aircraft: By only using Boeing 737 jets, Southwest is able to streamline its operations and reduce the costs associated with maintaining a diverse fleet.
• Used secondary airports: Southwest often flies to airports that are located farther from city centers, which can be less expensive to operate from than more heavily congested primary airports.
• Kept flights short: Southwest primarily operates flights that are less than 2 hours in duration, which helps to reduce fuel costs and other expenses.
• Offered a no-frills experience: Southwest does not offer amenities like in-flight meals, assigned seating, or a loyalty program, which helps to keep costs down.

Ikea

• Manufactured its own products: By producing its own furniture and home goods, Ikea is able to control costs and offer lower prices to customers.
• Offered a self-service shopping experience: Ikea stores are designed to allow customers to browse and select products on their own, which reduces the need for sales staff and helps to keep costs down.
• Used flat-pack packaging: Ikea's famous flat-pack packaging allows customers to transport and assemble their purchases themselves, which reduces the need for delivery and assembly services and helps to lower costs.
• Offered a limited product range: Ikea only offers a limited range of products, which helps to keep inventory and storage costs down.

NWC

The NWC will trade with the native people of the Canadian north, taking furs in return for European goods. The trade will occur at posts established in the fur-bearing regions and the transport between the posts and Montreal will be provided by company employees using small watercraft. The trade goods will be obtained in Montreal and England, and the furs will be sold in London. The NWC will offer terms of trade that are better than the effective net ones coming from the HBC through the middlemen who are between it and the people actually collecting the furs. The NWC will also be more responsive to the customers’ needs than is the competition. Together, these will make it the preferred trading partner. This positional advantage and the savings from eliminating the middlemen will allow the NWC to serve its customers on terms that still leave a profit margin, despite the Company’s higher costs. It will be able to offer such terms and keep these profits as long as the HBC does not match its offer [which the established firm’s strategy, organization, and management initially prevented it from doing]. This will allow the NWC to achieve its goal of profitably dominating the fur trade in British North America.