Strategies and Plans Adopted by Businesses in the Recession Essay Example for Free

Strategies and Plans Adopted by Businesses in the Recession EssayThe long-term strategies and short-term innovations select by businesses in the receding The recession has polar impacts/effects on businesses/organizations as all businesses do not operate in the same market/sector. This throws the need for businesses to come up with strategies and plans for business survival. Strategies and plans take by businesses ar tactics developed by businesses to aid them reach a particular terminus/target. Plans adopted by businesses help them look ahead, focus on key points and prepare for opportunities and problems. Then strategies are developed to attend to the aim of the plan to eliminate or reduce flaws to hurl sure the plan is carried out successfully. Burger King (BK) and McDonalds (McDs) although both(prenominal) operating in the restaurant/fast food market, they both dealt with the recession disparately. BK planned to make up sales by drawing in more customers and ma ke it through a pricing scheme change and investments. They sold rough of their products at a way out in order to cope with the recession as consumers were looking for cheaper value meals.I think the employment of this plan was to increase the profitability of the business. This forced competitors to sell their products at a loss to try and increase sales and stop BK from benefiting from the flow rate recession as it has a well-known brand advert which spelt trouble for smaller competitor businesses. BKs low price strategy was firmly skewed towards poorer economic groups in the US who yield been hit particularly badly by unemployment this do their prices reasonable and affordable by all income groups.Focusing on customers from the poorer economic group might have helped boost sales as they and early(a) customers not hit by unemployment would be able to make purchases without great concern. As BKs sales during the 2006 trading period was weak, they invested $3m to strengthe n its UK operation and a marketing push has since paid off. Part of the investment was put towards the development of products which as a egress Angus Burgers and the spiced up Angry Whopper were created.A spokesman said these products have play well which message their strategy worked and the investment wasnt in vain as they achieved a 13% rise in quarterly kale to $50. 2m (? 31. 7m) as stated by guardian. co. uk. BKs menu remains unvaried centred on burgers, fries and fizzy drinks trying to gain more sales from repeat customers. Being narrowly focused in the recession is not such a good idea as the hearty economy is affected by the recession even though it has a greater impact on some groups. BKs strategy is a dangerous strategy because they are relying heavily on old repeat customers.If those customers changed their taste, it would have a huge impact on BKs sales and solutions to their situation could be being used by McDonalds leaving BK with no room to ameliorate their pe rformance. The best way to go about a situation like this is to focus on a strategy that would benefit and target everyone bearing in mind the areas which have been heavily affected to assist in controlling price levels. Using the full potential of the business/extension strategies could help fork out a business from a recession. This could create a loss in the short run barely the business can recoup its costs in the long run if successful.However, McDs approach to the current recession is different compared to the plans and strategies adopted by BK. BK is narrowly focused compared to McDs as McDs provides a variety of menus like the breakfast and the kids meal menu. McDs has diversified into salads, Paninis and cappuccinos in the hope of unanimous so-called soccer mums which is a strategy to attracts more customers. By diversifying its products, McDs is able to attract different types of customers like healthy eaters and regular caffeine takers.This expansion of product mark s trategy widens their target customers range allowing them to increase sales and market share. British Airways (BA) operating in the airline market tackles the recession completely different from McDs and BK. During the recession, according to BAs first half (April September) pre-tax profit and loss chart, their profits dropped dramatically from roughly ? 610m to ? 50m according to the chart given in the period 07/08 to 08/09 which is around the time the recession begun. They went on to make a further loss of ?292 Million in the 09/10 period. This sparked a cause for concern. BAA adopted a short-term plan which was heavily centred on the workforce as the airports operator was believed to be overstaffed. They decided to reduce the number of staffs and advice some workers to work for free in order to cut labour cost expenditure (inc. Bonuses and allowances) to reduce the loss their making to stay in the competition. Chief executive Willie Walsh and 800 workers agreed to work for not hing voluntary in the month of July to help the companion survive and reduce expenditure.This strategy although would help, it brings disadvantages. From this plan, their employer name brand will be affected as a lot of the staff will be unsatisfied causing the union to get involve and also affecting BAAs operations which in turn affects their customers as the airline will not be operating effectively and running smoothly causing disturbances and leaving customers displeased. The recession causes businesses to come up with plans and strategies in order to survive and stay in the competition.BK, McDs and BA all adapted different plans and strategies to survive. BK remained firmly rooted in their burgers, fries and fizzy drinks menu, reduced their pricing levels, invested in the engulf of new products and marketing and also, targeted those hugely affected by the recession to gain sales by simplification their prices for some products for the population with a low income charging bo th high and low prices in other lyric their pricing strategy was universal pricing (appealing to everyone upper, middle and lower class).Their rivals adopted a different strategy and plan although they both operate in the same market. McDonalds diversified their products introducing new products to target other types of consumers i. e. soccer mums as it already has menus which targets other consumers like children and healthy eaters. Also, they ran plenty of bargains and distributed gazillions of coupons which played a good part in their survival.BA was making a huge loss so they reduced the amount of employees as a means of cutting expenditure to help them survive. This strategy caused complications for their operations which left customers dissatisfied during the crisis and also the trade union decided to get involved as some of BAs staff disagreed to the changes that was to take place.