Modern Management

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 1

MKT 500 – RANDELL ORNER

Assignment 2 – Part B: Your Marketing Plan

By: Deborah Hughes

February 8, 2018

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 2

Branding Strategy- Name, Logo, Slogan and Product Extension

The Slice Bakery is a local, small-scale individually owned bakery shop located in

Granby, Colorado. Slice bakery specializes in a variety of baked items ranging from cakes,

cupcakes, and pastries of different varieties. The bakery will also run a small café for on the spot

serving that will be used to grow the brand of bakery delights offered at Slice. The bakeries and

pastries offered at Slice target all the age groups of the Granby population of young children,

youths and the old. Slice bakery serves the best cakes, cupcakes, and pastries of different flavors

including vanilla, red velvet, carrot, chocolate, blueberry cheese, strawberry jam, walnut, and

orange-chocolate with amazing frostings and toppings that may be customized to the clients’

liking (Gehlhar, Regmi, Stefanou, & Zoumas, 2009). Therefore, if you are looking for new

experiences in bakeries and pastries, Slice is the place to visit. To make sure our customers are

sure of what flavor suits them the best before they make a purchase order, we give them free

samples of all the available flavors at the tasting bar.

Since the company works to promote the spirit of sharing and community development,

its slogan goes like “share the slice, promote the community.” Slice bakery has a uniquely

exceptional logo that is conspicuous and recognizable by anyone. The sight of the logo

immediately revamps the feelings having to have a bite of what meets the eye. The logo is both

appealing and attractive. It has an easy to remember graphical user interface displaying its

products. Here is the logo;

Since Slice Bakery is in the franchising business, it has developed its product extension

plan which aims to expand its business by opening franchises in nearby towns and states. The

product extension plan will be effected after we have gained a foot regarding resources and

market share in Granby. Slice Bakery uses a variety of quality and natural ingredients sourced

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 3

from the best producers to acquire great and unique tastes in the flavors we offer. This is the

distinctive factor that differentiates us from our competition (Martinez & Pina, 2003). The vitals

we use to give us the leverage to control the uniqueness of our flavors from the common.

Furthermore, we are dedicated to introducing at least one new flavor each month, a feature that

all the bakeries in Colorado lack. This keeps the customers curious about what flavor will be

introduced and makes them keep checking as they savor on the existing flavors of their choice

(Martinez & Pina, 2003).

Assembling a Marketing Strategy with Implementation Timelines

Slice’s marketing strategy will be assembled and developed to revolve around its target

market segment that is the whole Granby town population of approximately 2000 people. This

includes people of all ages, whose attitude towards our bakery delight is incredible.

Promotion

The marketing strategy of Slice Bakery will be launched 1 st February 2018. This will allow for

enough time for promotional activities during the winter and summer periods when there are

more tourists in Colorado (Vraneševic & Stančec, 2003). This will be the best time to market the

products of Slice Bakery to both its primary and secondary markets. The promotional activities

will include:

a) Offering free samples of all our cake flavors and pastries to the audiences, giving away

free gifts and branded T-shirts during the grand launching day of the marketing strategy.

This will be coupled with one-on-one customer interviews and survey which will be used

to collect customer feedback that will be used to improve the quality of flavors.

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 4

b) Partnering with the tour and travel companies and work out on how to incorporate Slice’s

marketing material in the tourist orientation guides during their touring period. In the

marketing material will be a list of all cake flavors and pastries with an attached “first

time” coupon expiring before the end of the summer or winter seasons, and directions to

our location (Park, Eisingerich & Pol, 2013).

c) Slice bakery will also take advantage of the internet marketing through social media,

including Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and YouTube to promote our products, services,

and location. These sites will be used to post Slice’s upcoming events calendar, the

introduction of new flavors and occasional offers on our products.

More promotional activities for the next six months will include:

a) The Slice bakery will engage in intense local advertising through banners, branded

wrappers, television and radio prime time adverts. This will help reach out to customers

who are mostly confined indoors (Vraneševic & Stančec, 2003).

b) The company will also active improve its public relations to effectively promote its

products and services in Granby and its localities. This will be accomplished by

sponsoring public events, visiting and donating complimentary gifts to the needy and

taking part in developmental community activities.

c) Slice bakery will seek partnership with a leading local newspaper and TV station to do a

story on their various cake flavors and book a spot in a newspaper column. These

partnerships will help in advertising the company’s upcoming events and offers.

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 5

d) By the end of the year, we will organize our first tasting contest during the winter season

to ensure full attendance by locals and the tourists (Park et al., 2013). We anticipate that

by this time, we will have amasses ourselves loyal followers locally and internationally.

Positioning Statement

In Granby, Colorado, there are several but not too many bakeries that serve the common

cake flavors and pastries. Some of them include Rise and Shine Bakery, Blue Water Bakery,

Blue Moon Bakery, Carver’s Bakery Café, Butterhorn Bakery & Café and New Moon Bakery

and Café among others. In all these, you will get served with the common cake varieties and

flavors as well as pastries, but none of them will give you a completely new experience with the

bakeries like Slice Bakery which offers unique cocktails and a wide variety of cake flavors and

designs. Slice bakery delights will simply satisfy your quest and make you want to share the slice

while leaving you asking for more (Blankson & Crawford, 2012). The Slice Bakery! We are the

only bakery and café that has a new flavor in every item on our menu.

Perceptual Map

According to the data provided on the existing bakeries and cafés in Granby and its

locality, most of them have discrepancies in their pricing strategies, product or service quality,

and their nature. The main ones include Blue Moon Bakery, Rise and Shine Bakery, and

Carver’s Bakery Café. These bakeries will offer a range of cake and pastries flavors and variety,

but with shortcomings in either quality or price. The perceptual map illustrated below puts the

above statement into perspective.

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 6

Relevant consumer behavior for Granby Town and the relevance of the brand name, logo,

slogan and brand extension to Granby Town

Recent studies indicate that more Coloradoan customers more so those in Granby town

have improved their eating behavior towards much healthier diet plans, which include bakeries

as an everyday breakfast diet instead of local delicacies which contain excessive amounts of fat.

Of the baked items, the demand for flavored low-sugar cakes and packaged bread was on the rise

in Colorado since 2011. Furthermore, the demand and sales of unpackaged cakes also moved up

due to the wide variety of their flavors available in Colorado (Filieri, 2013). The local population

of Granby has adopted a dear preference of bakery products for their breakfast time as well as for

their daily whole food consumption. We believe that Slices bakery offers the leading brands in

unpackaged bakery delights and pastries in Colorado that are widely accepted by the consumers

and considered as an exceptional source of well-proportioned nourishment.

•High Quality

•Low Flavor variety

•Quality customer service

•Low Quality

•Low flavor

•Poor customer service

•High Quality

•High flavor variety

•Quality customer service

•Low Quality

•Low flavor variety

•Poor customer service

Blue Moon Bakery

Slice Bakery

Rise and Shine

Bakery

Carver’s Bakery

Café

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 7

Through this provision, Slice bakery can satisfy its customers, which leads to increased

customer loyalty as well as high turnover and profitability. This is to say that Slice bakery will

amass routine customers for itself from the exceptionally unique cake flavors and pastries its

offers to them. Customers can sometimes be selective and unpredictable. What may work for one

customer may not work with another, therefore, understanding the behavior of your customers

and treating them as required will bring them back. Slice bakery realized that and ventured into

offering a wide variety of cake and pastry flavors and designs to meet the changing needs of its

customers (Filieri, 2013). Slice chose its brand strategy to fit into the customers who want

something unique in the taste and flavor of the bakery items they eat.

Slice bakery is interested in the experiences to derive from their products and services.

The same way, customers rate their experiences on different things. These are either soft or hard

target. Hard targets are those that can be timed, counted or observed while soft targets are

opinion-based, such as politeness of a server, the state of the cake, and fairness of the price.

While understanding the needs of your customers is important, being able to identify every one

of their need is impossible. That’s why Slice bakery adopted a strategy that caters to a mass

market through presenting a wide variety of flavors for the customers to choose from. This

effectively brings into play the soft targets, where you provide a diversified menu, but interaction

with server or manager gives the customer a unique experience.

Slice Bakery’s customers love fun, explore more and seek new experiences spread across

all ages. By organizing interactive tasting contests will help them challenge each other and

spread the word to other people. This and other promotional activities will make our brand more

acceptable and popular. Our name “The Slice Bakery” and our slogan “share the slice, promote

the community” inspires a sense of brotherhood and love.

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 8

Slice Bakery’s Mission Statement and Introduction

Mission Statement:

To create a unique diet experience for our customers by igniting their senses with a wide

variety of cake and pastry flavors in their eating routines.

Company Introduction:

Welcome to the Slice Bakery! We are an independently owned and operated bakery and

cafe located in Granby Town, Colorado. We specialize in all types of bakery and pastry items

that come in a wide range of uniquely combined original flavors and tastes that will leave you

asking for more. All of our menu items are fresh and uniquely baked to give you a one-of-a-kind

experience. When you visit the Slice Bakery, the experience you get makes you want to come

over and over again! We operate from 6 am - 12 pm Monday through Saturday and 10 am – 10

pm on Sundays. Welcome to Slice Bakery.

Marketing Plan: “The Slice” 9

References

Blankson, C., & Crawford, J. C. (2012). Impact of positioning strategies on service firm

performance. Journal of Business research, 65(3), 311-316

Gehlhar, M. J., Regmi, A., Stefanou, S. E., & Zoumas, B. L. (2009). Brand leadership and

product innovation as firm strategies in global food markets. Journal of Product & Brand

Management, 18(2), 115-126

Filieri, R. (2013). Consumer co-creation and new product development: a case study in the food

industry. Marketing Intelligence & Planning, 31(1), 40-53

Martinez, E., & Pina, J. M. (2003). The negative impact of brand extensions on parent brand

image. Journal of Product & Brand Management, 12(7), 432-448

Park, C., Eisingerich, A. B. & Pol, G. (2013). The role of brand logos in firm performance.

Journal of Business Research, 66(2), 180-187

Vraneševic, T., & Stančec, R. (2003). The effect of the brand on perceived quality of food

products. British Food Journal, 105(11), 811-825