Teaching note for product 9B20A061.

In July 2019, the uncertainty that had been surrounding Brexit since the public referendum in June 2016 had led to a crisis for Owen Barry Inc. (Owen Barry), a luxury goods manufacturing enterprise in the United Kingdom. The company’s finance and production manager had voted in favour of Brexit but was hardly prepared for the deadlock that followed. He was now weighing different options for navigating a way out of the company’s predicament. His three .....more

In February 2019, the chief executive officer (CEO) of the Daily Bread Food Bank (Daily Bread) in Toronto, Ontario reflected on the charity’s strong performance in the past year. Despite Daily Bread’s success, the CEO felt there were opportunities to do more. Toronto’s food insecurity rate had been rising in recent years, and food banks across the city had been struggling to meet demand. The CEO had several potential ideas for contributing to the .....more

Teaching note for product 9B20A052.

In 2019, a small investor was reviewing her portfolio mix, which included quick-service restaurants. During her research, she learned of new-product launches by two companies: Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat. Both companies produced plant-based products that simulated meat, and both were distributing their products not only in grocery stores but also in quick-service restaurants. Both also used innovative marketing, such as insisting that their products .....more

In March 2018, Snap Inc. (Snap), based in Venice, California, and commonly known as Snapchat for its application that allowed users to send photos that disappeared, was looking for ways to grow its user base in the competitive social media platform industry and to differentiate itself from the other major platforms. To do this, it was trying to position itself as a “camera” company and to become relevant to a larger target market: adults aged 25 and .....more

Teaching note for product 9B19A023.

To avoid extinction in the Age of Disruption, managers need to know that many evolutionary concepts are misapplied when used to illuminate business strategy

Teaching note for product 9B18E012.

In 2016, a luxury cosmetic company approached BEworks Inc. (BEworks), a management consulting firm based in Toronto, Ontario, to gain a better understanding of its customers in an effort to develop better-tailored communications. BEworks was the world’s first management consulting firm to specialize in solutions for real-world challenges by applying behavioural economics—an emerging field that sought to understand human behaviour in the context of .....more