Business Research and Data Analysis

RESEARCH

INTRODUCTION

As people these days are concerned about their fitness. So, nowadays people are engaging themselves into sports and fitness activities. Trend is changing as people used to pass their time by doing household work in the past and now people started falling towards sports and fitness activities. Due to this change in trend, the sports and fitness apparel stores started earning more profits as they used to before the trend.

So, in this report we are going to research as consultants to an investor who wants to invest money into these apparel stores. Our ultimate agenda for this report will be to research the sports and fitness apparel market globally, its trends, players in this market, growth in this industry.

SCOPE OF SPORTS AND FITNESS APPAREL IN GLOBALMARKET

With theincrease in the awareness of the importance of sports and fitness in the life routine. People are becoming more conscious towards their health and sports and fitness companies have seen a tremendous growth in their sales or revenue of different sports and fitness wears. Nowadays the most demanding sports are Football, Swimming, Aerobics and the fitness activities such as Yoga, Gym and so on. Some of the highest grosser in this industry are Nike, Adidas, New Balance, Puma etc. Scope of this industry is increasing day by day and will bloom in the future too.

Not only these companies but some companies have come up as winners and are giving competition to these established brands. Each brand has build up their own strategies it might be growth strategy or market strategy. Not only the developed countries but developing or emerging countries in Asia such as India are viewed as having a great market for the sports and fitness apparel and it is estimated that India will become the highest grossing market for these products. In this ongoing growth phase,the industry is able to see many product launches, partnerships which will help further in growing this market. E-commerce will also play a significant role towards increasing the sales for these stores. Most of the brands have already started selling their products through some of these online markets such as Amazon.

MARKETING MIX

A marketing mix is a tool used to determine the best way to market a product or service. It is a combination of broad factors that address different aspects of marketing. The best-known and most basic marketing mix is known as the four Ps of marketing: product, price, place, and promotion(Gilstein& Julia. posted by Salem press Encyclopedia, 2018. 2p. retrieved on September 21,2019 from conestoga college library).

Marketing Mix includes four elements or consists of 4Ps-:

1. Product - Product is a commodity that are presented to the customers. In this case, there are many products that are related to sports and fitness.

2. Price - Price is the rate at which a customer agrees to buy a product. Many companies make different strategies such as lower cost strategy which is used by companies to attract more customers towards them. Many emerging brands use this strategy to survive in the competition.

3. Place - Place is where customer can find products. Many companies have their products placed at different locations. Most of the apparel stores have their products in big malls where its easier for the customer.

4. Promotion - Every company or most of the companies have their own strategies of promoting their products and most common for all companies is advertising their products or launch of new products in the market.

MARKETING STRATEGY

In order to understand the marketing mix in the industry we can compare the markets and strategies of most significant brands such as Adidas and Nike.

Both the brands use best of the technology for the production, but difference is that Nike focuses more on cross-training and Basketball and on the other hand, Adidas focuses more on Athletics and Soccer.

On a different note, when it comes to production, Nike doesn’t own their production plants. They usually outsource to several Asian countries as they simply advertise, distributes and the products through stores. If we talk about Adidas, they have their own production plant in Germany (GradesFixer. (2019, January 03) Marketing Strategies between Adidas & Nike. retrieved on 2019, September 2).

TARGET MARKET(SEGMENTATION)

The target market of a company is where a company wants to sell its products which are targeted at some section of customers. In the Sports and Fitness Apparel industry, companies try to focus mainly on the people who are involved in one or the other sports or fitness activities such as Cricket uniform, Football Jerseys, Yoga vests, Gym outfits etc. For example, Nike focuses on children, women and men trainers or sportspersons, whereas, Adidas focuses mostly on men sports and fitness apparels.

Both companies try to minimize cost like Nike does outsourcing of its products to lower the production costs whereas, Adidas uses the strategy of providing low salaries to cut production cost. There is tough competition going on between global players in order to increase their market sales. Due to this competition, the technological advances have occurred which is leading to enhancement in quality of the apparels.

Figure 1- An area of breathability on the chest of the NikeCourt Advantage Men's Tennis Polo, seen above on Frances Tiafoe, creates a brick pattern inspired by thestreets of New York City.(Nike.com, august 12, 2019, retrieved on September 22, 2019)

This figure depicts the growth and reach of sports and fitness apparels in the Sports industry where International players support the brands which are technology and quality oriented. Because of the increase in sports competition at different levels the growth of sports and fitness apparels has been increasing tremendously.

The intent is to communicate the essence of New York City through subtle signals. “There’s so much going on around Flushing Meadows, but even though that playing atmosphere is well-known, we knew we could expand our notions of what the city can mean to the people who live there, and to the players,” says Abby Swancutt, Global Design Director of NikeCourt. (Nike Inc, august 12, 2019, retrieved on September 22, 2019).

PESTLE ANALYSIS

Apart from the company’s internal resources and policies, several other external factors also influence functioning of a business. So, PESTLE analysis is one of the business strategic tools like SWOT and Porter’s five forces which plays significant role in identifying, analyzing, monitoring and managing the external factors, opportunities and threats of a business and shows the impact of its components on a business for the present scenario and the future.

Components of PESTLE analysis:

P: Political

E: Economical

S: Social

T: Technological

L: legal

E: Environmental

· POLITICAL FACTORS: This external factor describes about the government’s regulations and policies to analyse business and market trades to run in a long term. Various political factors such as the conflicts & stability of the government, trade policies & regulations, national and international trade

agreements, manufacturing & custom related process and safety regulations influence the survivability of an organization.

For now, being a peak time for Canada as elections are ahead, it is completely uncertain about which party will be elected as a majority. This can have direct effect on the business as the business policies might take a turn which can either lead a way to the loss or benefit of the business depending on the type of changes made. For example: liberal party usually increases the taxes whenever comes into the power. To act on the safer side, we should not invest in the uncertainty period rather should wait or the political changes to be made a go ahead with some certainty.

· ECONOMIC FACTORS : it shows the economic forces that can affect the growth and functioning of the business. Economical factor that affects the business are:

· Interest rates: benchmark for Canadian interest rates are set by Bank of Canada’s Governing Council. This interest rate benchmark was held at 1.75% on 24 April,2019. It remained the highest rate since December 2008. The bank rate and deposit rate also didn’t change and were left at 2.0% and 1.50% respectively(Canada interest rate)

CANADIAN INTEREST RATE

· Exchange rates: Canada being the top 10 trading nations in the world does most of its trade with the U.S , hence a minute change in the U.S interest rate or the exchange rate can have an affect on the Canadian trade.

CANADA/US EXCHANGE RATE

RECESSION : Canada is in a debt of $2.2 trillion in total which is nearly higher than a trillion dollar in last 10 years, chief economist and strategist David Rosenberg said. He also warned that this can lead to 75 points of Canadian GDP growth (risk of 2018 recession ‘higher than lot of people think’:Rosenberg)

· SOCIAL FACTORS: With this component of the business Strategic tool, all the social aspects and attributes are examined carefully at various levels. The demography, population, custom & culture, customer’s belief, religion, educational background, lifestyle and the desire of the customers affect the the business to run and grow in the market.

· TECHNOLOGICAL FACTORS: Due to the advancement of technology and its reach to all, this factor has become one of the key players in determining the future of a business. This has led to increase the competition among various organizations for enhancing their brand value and profit maximization. From the accumulation of raw material to manufacturing the final goods and its distribution, it has great influence on businesses as well as the consumers. Some of the examples which this factor includes are innovation, research and development, automation and transportation, product and service efficiency, internet banking, networking, advertisement, customer-relationship management and so on. Canadians rely heavily on internet for their study, careers and leisure, hence technological factor

· LEGAL FACTORS: There have been many legal requirements set in Canada for the business to thrive in the market. There are provincial and territorial consumer protection legislation and violation of such rules and legislation can put a businessman into trouble.

· The Competition Act: “There is the competition-act containing both criminal and civil provisions which aims to prevent anti-competitive practices in the marketplace” (Consumer Protection legislation in Canada, 2018-12-04).

There are other laws as well for the various categories like packing and labelling, accuracy and measurement, pollution and environment protection, export and import. Working condition of the employees and standard wage rate and the Occupational health and safety Regulations are also important legal factors which must be taken into consideration while operating a business.

· ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS: Before establishing the sports and fitness apparel store in an area it must be taken care that all the environmental regulations and guidelines have been fulfilled. The store should be opened in the environment friendly zone only and it should not harm the ecology of the area. There are many laws regarding the pollution and emission of gases.

· Pollution and Environmental protection concerns: One such legislation by the government of Canada is the “pollution and environmental protection concerns” which aims to support pollution prevention measures and the protection of the environment and the human health (The Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 2018-12-04).

RESEARCH PROPOSAL

INTRODUCTION

A research proposal is intended to convince the reader that the project is worthwhile, and it has a meaning and relevance. Our research is all about finding the scope and analysing the data of Sports and Fitness Apparel stores in Global market. We as consultants have tried to put value in our project for a potential investor who wants to invest in this industry that is Sports and Fitness Apparel store. In order to fulfil our research project, we have studied various articles and done all the secondary research related to the ongoing and future market growth of Sports and Fitness Apparel stores. This research will specify experience about the sports and fitness apparel mostly preferred by different age groups especially by young generation. Sports enable people to develop both physically and mentally.

RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

The objectives of this research study is quite clear as the research states the following-

1. The scope of the industry in the global market,

2. The competitiveness in the market for the key players,

3. The present and future trend of the market,

4. And the problems and opportunities for the players in the market.

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Every research study consists of two basic elements-

1. PROBLEM - The problem area for our research are the relevance, changing preference of customers and most importantly the departures of people from top management. Firstly, many brands are losing relevance and have started adding irrelevant material to the sports clothing. Many customers can easily get attracted towards other apparel stores due to which the famous and big brand store are losing their competitive in the market and hence, the sports and fitness apparel brands are looking for different methods to increase sales. One of the most famous examples for the top management weakness was experienced by Lululemon when its CEO Laurent Potdevin departed from the organization.

2. OPPORTUNITY - In the slowing sales rate of spacious brands like Nike and Adidas, the opportunity has been taken by other emerging brands such as Under Armour and many more. With the increase in the sports competitions and also the enhancement of fitness awareness, the popularity of sports and fitness apparel stores are taking a limelight.

LITERATURE REVIEW

· The active wear industry would benefit from an evidence-based understanding of how active wear is incorporated into women’s lives and their changing participation in physical activity. Active wear brands may be missing the trend of women moving from organised sport to non-organised and individualised sport and recreation. The purpose of this paper is to explore the degree to which academic and industry research understood patterns and influences on female’s active wear consumption and identified what significant gaps are evident in understanding the drivers and industry trends that pertain to female consumers of active wear.( Grant Anthony O’Sullivan , Clare Hanlon , Ramon Spaaij , Hans Westerbeek , Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management , 13 March, 2017. retrieved on 24 september 2019).

RESEARCH DESIGN

This research study includes all facts regarding the Sports and Fitness Apparel stores. Till now, we saw some of the problem faced, opportunities occurred that makes the study interesting to read. Research design includes various elements like Data collection methods, Data analysis, sample design, budget included.

DATA COLLECTION

Firstly, other elements the reader or the investor should get to know about the method used in collecting the about a specific topic. The data used in this research is the secondary data. The data is researched from different sites and after the careful reading of many article we understood the scope of the industry, present and future growth rate, reasons for the boom in the industry. We saw the pestle and marketing mix for sports and apparel industry and scope the stores of different brands. In this part of the project no primary research such as questionnaires, interviews and samples were not taken.

DATA ANALYSIS

Data Analysis is can be shown by Industry Growth rate-

Table 1- Apparel market size projections from 2012 and 2025, by region(in billion U.S. dollars).

Region	2012	2025	CAGR
Australia	25	45	5
Brazil	55	100	5
Canada	30	50	4
China	150	540	10
India	45	200	12
Japan	110	150	2
Russia	40	105	8
Rest of the world	75	195	8
Global	1,105	2110	5

CAGR- Compound Annual Growth Rate

(Yayati Shinde & Sadaf Khan, posted on semanticsscholar, retrieved on 24 september 2019).

REFERENCE

· Canada interest rate, interest rates bank of Canada

https://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/interest-rates

· risk of 2018 recession ‘higher than lot of people think: Rosenberg economics

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/risk-of-canadian-recession-higher-than-a-lot-of-people

· The competition Act. Consumer protection legislation in Canada. (2018-12-04). office of Consumer Affairs. “Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada” Retrieved from

https://ic.gc.ca/eic/site/oca-bc.nsf/eng/ca02965.html

· The Canadian Environmental Protection Act. Consumer protection legislation in Canada. (2018-12-04). office of Consumer Affairs. “Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada” Retrieved from

https://ic.gc.ca/eic/site/oca-bc.nsf/eng/ca02965.html

· The apparel market projection for 2012 and 2025

Retrieved from Senmaticsscholar.com

· Grant Anthony O’Sullivan, Clare Hanlon, Ramon Spaaij, Hans Westerbeek,Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management, 13 March, 2017.

· .(Nike.com, august 12, 2019, retrieved on September 22, 2019)

CONCLUSION:

Investigating the business of sports and apparel store, it is worthwhile to invest in this business. Since our main customers can be people from 6 to 40 years of age groups, we need to make strategy according to them. Also, the store should be opened to the locations like schools, colleges or park, where we can find the maximum number of people. After PESTLE analysis we have found that all the external factors will have positive impact on our business except political influence and that is due to the elections which will occur across the country for couple of weeks. After the formation of new government establishment of the store can be started.

CAD/USD Exchange Rate Latest Data (2019-09-25): 1 CAD = 0.7536 USD Jul Aug Sep 0.74 0.75 0.76 0.77

Overnight Repo Rate (CORRA) Latest data (2019-09-24): CORRA = 1.7439 Jul Aug Sep 1.65 1.70 1.75 1.80 1.85