National shampoo market trends and Nolan's competitive positioning

Nolans's Fine Foods

What are the national trends in the shampoo category?

The shampoo brand "Clean and Soft" leads the field in all the national food chain stores, according to Exhibit 6 data. Exhibit 1 shows that nationally, overall in the shampoo market, there is a dominance of brand names of shampoos as opposed to generics and store name brands. Thus, brand names dominate the overall national market at present and Exhibit 2 shows that food stores still dominate the shampoo market in terms of styles of stores. Exhibit 3 shows the most growth in mass marketed shampoos, and also drug stores continue to make incursions into the shampoo market. Exhibit 4 reflects this, showing that the market dollar sales of food stores purveying shampoo are down. But Nolan's is declining at an even more precipitous rate. The competition of brands is relatively the same in this category for Nolan's as it is for the national market according to Exhibit 5 of the case study. "Clean and Soft" is the dominant market brand at Nolan's and at other food store chains.

Question 2: What are the differences between Nolan's and national trends?

Nolan's best selling brand name is "Clean and Soft." It carries more of this brand than other brands, such as "First Impressions" and "Mane Tame," which are also good secondary sellers at other competing drug chains. The remaining competitors carry a greater variety of sizes of these products, though. (Exhibit 6) Nolan offers less variety of sizes and brands of all its shampoos, and consequently offers the consumers less choice, but more of the most popular brand. In contrast, in terms of the lowest product sellers, Nolan's has not eliminated such duds as "Silky Style," which has a consistently narrow share of the market, 13 weeks ago and a year ago as well. (Exhibit 7) Nolan seems to have a number of slow sellers, however, rather than just one clear slow seller, despite its relative lack of variety of high sellers in comparison to its competitors.

Question 4: Suggest a plan of action

Nolan's must diversify the sizes of Clean and Soft, offering more variety. It must offer a higher number of secondary, popular brands, particularly luxury brands to compete with the growing sales of the market of drug stores and specialized mass marketing of shampoos. Rather than eliminating one slow seller, it should eliminate all of the slow sellers from its shelves.