Growing Fast

Viewpoint by Andrew Flynn, Partner

All companies will eventually face moments in time when their business objectives outstrip their marketplace results. And while most companies strive to remain competitive in the face of the traditional external growth limiters — industry maturation, increasing intensity of competition, technology shifts, new entrants, etc. — few companies address the two major dynamics that they do control: maintaining brand relevance and developing a culture of willingness to change. Assuring that your brand is relevant to customers requires developing a brand strategy that spans multiple time horizons. As the marketers of Krispy Kreme, facing a low carb future, would surely tell you, relevance in the short run does not ensure customer commitment in the long run. If staying relevant over time is the objective, an enterprise-wide openness to doing things a new way — developing new marketing capabilities, pursuing a new business model, or learning from role models in other industries — is the critical path. To spur growth in an age of savvy customers, a manufacturer might do better to understand how to act like a specialty retailer than seek to extract another penny out of the supply chain.