Etude De Faisabilité: Lancement D'un Site Internet De Vente Privée De Prêt-à-porter En Roumanie (document en anglais)

e-Business Strategy Seminar

Table of content

Table of content 2

Description of the Web-business 3

1. Sector of activities 3

2. Products/services provided 3

3. Competitors 3

4. Value chain 4

5. Market analysis 5

6. Market share 6

7. Work force 6

8. Key commercial & financial 6

9. Turnover, profit, market value 6

The Business Model Canvas and the e-Business strategy 7

1. Business Model Canvas 7

a) Customers segment 7

b) Value proposition 7

c) Channels 8

d) Customer Relationship 8

e) Revenue Streams 9

f) Key resources 9

g) Key activities 10

h) Key partnership 10

i) Cost structure 11

2. Interactions within the Business Model Canvas 11

3. SWOT analysis, 12

4. Three key issues 13

Critics of the outcomes 14

Recommendations & Conclusion 15

Bibliography 16

Description of the Web-business

1. Sector of activities

Zalando is an innovative e-commerce company which is specialized in online sales of brand’s shoes and quality clothes. The firm was set up in 2008 by Robert Gentz and David Schneider. Its headquarters is located in Berlin.

The e-commerce company is quickly become the number 1 of online selling shoes in Germany, thanks to its expanded product catalog and marketing strategy. Following its huge success in the German market, Zalando is located in fourteen other European markets. Nowadays, Zalando has become the largest online store in Europe for shoes and offers quality services. The firm is considered one of the fastest-growing companies in the world.

One of the key elements of this success is the combination of unique services delivery and free call customer service as well. Moreover, free return policy within 30 days guarantees a simple and secure shopping experience at Zalando.

2. Products/services provided

The wide range of products for men, women and children includes products ranging from urban style to popular designer pieces in more than 1300 brands. With 100,000 references, Zalando is very diversified and offers an exclusive selection of various accessories, specific products for home, cosmetics and sportswear.

3. Competitors

Zalando has a lot of competitors but we have to distinguish the ones that are «direct ones» and the ones that are « indirect ones ».

Zalando is one of the first to offer such a range of products. But, there are some direct ones competitors. We have Spartoo who can be considered as a major direct competitor. But also, La Redoute and Trois Suisses because they are offering: shoes, clothes and even kind of the same products for home styling as Zalando.

The indirect competitors are for example Sarenza. They are offering the same type of product except that Zalando is offering more than only shoes.

4. Value chain

Value chain quite important for companies that are presents in different countries, like Zalando.

First of all, there is primary Value Chain Activities is composed by the Inbound logistics. Inbounds logistics are made of the receiving, warehousing and inventory control of input materials become easier and faster thanks to the IT. There are also the operations– Specialists consider that Zalando has become the market leader mainly due to its operational excellence which also is impacted by the Internet since the company can distribute information quickly, efficiently and with low costs. Furthermore, The company has two logistic centers situated in Erfort and Mönchengladbach, Germany (outbound logistics) . Both of them are more then 110,000 sqm and employ around 1,000 staff members. The perfect coordination of those centers is quite important since the company wants to strengthen its sales activities in major western European markets. As far as the marketing & Sales are concerned Zalando uses Internet to spread information to the market, but also provides information about the customers’ needs. An example is the change of their assortment sector in September 2012 when they added more brands for the men’s segment and enlarged the range of their own brand Zalando Collection with more articles for men. Moreover, Zalando has launched its own men’s magazine with styling tips . Internet also enables the company to strengthen the relationship between business and customer.

Second of all there are the support activities,The range of the products of the e-shop is quite complex. IT helps to save time in searching different suppliers. As far as the Technology Development is concerned, – The company has set up “Zalando E-Commerce Operating System” wich is an own website used in order to publish more information about the technology and how it is used in the system.

5. Market analysis

One of the advantages of the online-shopping is avoiding the rush and stress in stores. Moreover, the e-shopper can to go shopping at any time. It seems to be easy and simple. The most popular online purchases are fashion items, multimedia, software and toys.

We can see that the fashion sector is situated at the forth position concerning the products and services bought on Internet during the last 6 months.

The amount of online sales in Belgium in 2011 was about €1.2 billion which represents an increase of 24%. In France, this amount was about €37.7 billion and it expresses a rise of 22%. In Germany, the retail sector

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