Case studies

The case study will provide an opportunity for students to identify the challenges a business-to-business (B2B) organization in a commodity product category faces in a growing environment. The students will learn to analyze and evaluate different strategies for growth and profitability. The students will be equipped to make decisions based on financial and nonfinancial data and the trade-offs therein. The case study will enable students to understand the application of the concept of operating leverage in different business conditions.

The leadership team at Mangalam Organics Limited (MOL) was worried about the company’s future in December 2021. The chief strategy officer (CSO), Akshay Dujodwala; the chairman, Kamal Dujodwala and the managing director, Pankaj Dujodwala had watched MOL go through many ups and downs. MOL manufactured camphor powder and supplied it to tableters [1], who would convert it into tablets, essentially used for Puja [2] purposes in India. Camphor was a white, waxy terpenoid with a strong aroma. It was mainly a commodity business with no pricing power when MOL supplied it in bulk to tableters. They had ventured into the business-to-customer (B2C) [3] space with their consumer brand “Mangalam” camphor tablets, positioned for religious uses in homes. However, this formed a very small percentage of their turnover. With thin margins and a low growth rate, it was difficult for MOL to sustain and grow, especially in the B2B [4] business. To make matters worse, their manufacturing unit caught fire in 2015, causing a major blow to their business. Under the leadership of their CSO, Akshay, they implemented strategies that helped the company bring down costs and wastage. Akshay helped MOL diversify further into the B2C market through their brands, “CamPure” for home care products and “Cam+” for health-care products. Huge expenditures on marketing and advertising were incurred to promote these brands. The COVID-19 pandemic watched the world go through a terrible phase with lockdown and rising health issues (both physical and mental). Camphor found an interesting place in immunity and religious purposes due to its aromatherapy properties and evoking feelings of relaxation. The newfound use helped MOL achieve an unexpectedly higher turnover. But Akshay knew that camphor, by itself, was fickle in providing profitability. To sustain growth post-COVID-19, MOL would urgently need to look for growth options. After giving it a lot of thought, he was faced with three options – he could either focus on CamPure as a B2C option, or concentrate completely on camphor powder and aroma as an existing B2B option or take the third option to go in for a first of its kind exclusive stores for all types of puja items called Pooja Sangam. While all these options had their own pros and cons, he had to now decide which was the best financially viable option for MOL as a way forward.

The case study is designed at the postgraduate level in an Master of Business Administration and executive education programs. Given the nature of the issues in the case study, it can be included in courses such as business strategy and strategic marketing.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing.

This case study allows students to appreciate the value of standard operating procedures in customer management. This case study emphasises the role of employees in delivering superior customer experience. This case study explores many facets of customer experience, reputation, social class membership and standard operating procedures (SOPs). Students will be able to apply theories of customer experience, behavioural psychology and service dimensions relevant to the airline industry. After completing this case study, students will be able to do the following:1. Evaluate the value of SOPs in Customer ManagementThis case study refers to the need for adhering to SOPs to deal with complex situations. Students will be able to evaluate whether compliance to SOPs could have helped Air India avoid the crisis or was it possible that a culture of absolute commitment to customer wellbeing could have prevented the crisis.2. Apply the theory of defensive attribution in customer grievance handling. Discuss if reducing customer effort in getting their problem solved can result in superior customer service.The victim had attributed the blame for not insisting on filing a complaint to the crew. Air India crew had defended their actions or lack of it by stating that they had followed the rule book. Students will be able to appreciate the need for a swift redressal mechanism to protect the self-image and self-esteem of the person/group involved. They will also understand that customer service interactions designed to solve customer problems swiftly and easily can be a very simple dictum to guide all employees in their decision-making while handling a customer complaint.

3. Evaluate the relationship between customer satisfaction and customer experience and examine the value of net promoter score (NPS) to study customer satisfaction.

Air India Airlines was catering to varied customer groups such as the Indian diaspora, large student population pursuing education abroad, first-time flyers and the rising middle class with travel aspirations. Customer expectations vary across segments and change over their lifetime. Airline staff must trace customer corridors and deliver on customer expectation across the touch points that matter to them to ensure meaningful and relevant service delivery. Students will have an opportunity to evaluate the NPS in measuring customer satisfaction and debate whether it is a sufficient metric to guide the organisation on delivering and monitoring customer experience.

4. Examine why reputation risk management and not crisis management should be the focus of Air India in delivering superior customer service because nearly 70%–80% of market value for a company comes from its intangible assets such as brand equity and reputation.

Students will discuss crisis management i.e. handling the threat to reputation after it has occurred and reputation risk management i.e. proactively managing potential threats to its reputation by taking timely actions to avoid or mitigate it. There are three factors (reputation reality gap, changing beliefs and expectation and weak internal coordination) that determine reputational risks. Students can evaluate this model to determine if Air India should address these three factors to manage its reputation proactively.

This case study is set around an incident that happened on 26 November 2022, on Air India flight bound for Delhi from New York when an inebriated 34-year-old man had peed on a 72-year-old woman. The perpetrator of the crime had walked free, and the victim was left dissatisfied with how the cabin crew had handled her ordeal. Air India Airlines was launched in 1932 by industrialist JRD Tata and nationalised in 1953. In 2021, Tata Group acquired the 90-year-old Air India from the Government of India for $2.4bn (INR 18,000 crore) and appointed Campbell Wilson as chief executive officer and managing director. The incident brought to the fore the customer management issues that Wilson had to address. First on the list of Air India’s turnaround plan was delivering “exceptional customer experience”. How was it going to achieve it because the Indian aviation ecosystem lacked infrastructure such as airports, airspace, competition and customer preference-based services? There was also shortage of pilots, engineers, technicians, air-traffic controllers and technocrats to occupy positions within security agencies and regulatory bodies. With Air India’s acquisition, the Tata Group had to find innovative solutions to deal with decades of internal neglect, non-performance and labour union problems. This case study is relevant to address real issues of customer experience, consumer psychology, reputation risk management and standard operating procedures in service management.

This case is suitable for both undergraduate and postgraduate level students of business management. It can also be used for training service personnel of aviation industry.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 8: Marketing

The primary objectives of the case study are to get the participants exposed to the issues of working capital which even profitable companies face on a day-to-day basis; give the participants an understanding of how to balance the, at times, conflicting objectives of increasing profits and sales through favorable credit terms; and expose them to the impact of increase in inventory levels and average collection period on margins in a period of slow growth. They will also learn about the concept of factoring and its uses.

The case study is about a group of companies engaged in education, steel fabrication and oil businesses owned by a single proprietor. The company was based in Fatehnagar which was part of Hyderabad district in the state of Telangana, India, and the case study traces the origins of the group from 1960s to 2021. The group was invested the surplus cash flows from the oil business to initiate and expand other businesses during this period. The economic downturn due to the COVID-19 pandemic had hit the company, particularly its oldest business – Noble Chemical Agency. The oil business was facing issues related to its growth and profitability, and the uncertainty around COVID-19-related restrictions had only augmented the fears of the management. The case study looks at issues and the dilemma which the owner of the company faced. The case study highlights various issues related to working capital management, especially related to receivables management and inventory levels faced by businesses during the slow-growth phase. It demonstrates how working capital management issues, if not resolved in time, can lead to insolvency of even a successful company with a sound business model.

The case study is meant for teaching in postgraduate management programs (Master of Business Administration and Postgraduate Diploma in Management) in the following courses: corporate finance/financial management course in the first year (the case study should be taught towards the end of the course); and management accounting courses in first year (the case study should be positioned in the middle of these courses). The case study can also be used to highlight issues related to working capital and small business management in a Management Development Programme (MDP) course for “Finance fundamentals for non-finance executives”.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 1: Accounting and finance.

The case describes a hypothetical hedge fund manager who is examining whether to invest in bitcoin. The case discusses potential risks and rewards of investing in bitcoin, the role of bitcoin and digital currencies more broadly, and financial innovation in the space, such as ICOs. It can be taught as part of a second-year MBA elective course in investments, financial institutions/capital markets, or fintech.

Few cases allow the student to understand the relationship between brand strategy, marketing strategy, implementation, and analysis. While some conceive of the process as being sequential, this case demonstrates that in fact, this process is more fluid, and that implementation and analysis impact subsequent strategy.

This field-based case provides a rare glimpse into the turnaround of a brand that was all but dead. After Buick suffered more than five decades of declining business results and an inferior brand image versus all rivals, few thought that the brand could be resuscitated. This case provides a valuable under-the-hood look at how the Buick team, over time, progresses through a series of marketing improvements all anchored on an evolved strategy. Specifically, Buick introduced a shift in brand strategy behind an evolved brand essence statement (i.e., brand positioning), improved product lineup, new-to-the-world innovation, enhanced dealership service, and more compelling advertising. The results led to a record number of product awards, significantly improved advertising measures, improved service ratings, and better business results.

Despite significant improvement across multiple dimensions of the business, Buick still trailed key competitors on one of the most important measures Buick tracked—the brand momentum rating—suggesting that there was still more work needed to complete the brand turnaround. The case introduces Molly Peck, the new marketing director on Buick, who is wondering what more, if anything, Buick should do. The material allows for instruction around marketing strategy and the process of converting it into implementation through the use of a creative brief.

This case replaces UVA-M-0837. It can be used in a variety of marketing and strategy classes to understand how (1) at a macro level, a shift in consumer and environmental factors can impact firm strategy and (2) at a micro level, an e-mail-based marketing campaign designed to address these changes can impact firm-level performance.

The case puts the students in the position of CEO Robert Huth as he is preparing for a board meeting. He had taken David's Bridal from a loss in 1996 to sales of over $1 billion by 2011, but he was concerned about future growth. People were waiting longer and longer to get married and, once they decided to, were spending much less than in the past, so the industry had seen year-over-year declines since 2007. How would David's Bridal establish its brand in the minds of a new generation of brides who shopped, purchased, and decided differently than had brides in past generations?

This public-sourced case describes the latest restructuring efforts by Deutsche Bank (DB) and gives a short history of prior restructuring efforts from the decade before. In July 2019, Christian Sewing, the new CEO of DB, announced a series of measures that included, among others, the elimination of global equity trading, the layoff of 18,000 employees, the creation of a “bad bank” to transfer noncore assets, and the suspension of dividends until 2022. The case describes key decisions a bank CEO makes when a bank needs to change course to return to profitability and growth. The case offers an opportunity to debate these key decisions, as well as discuss some of the prior ones during earlier restructuring efforts, and put the students in the CEO's shoes: What would you do and why? The case also describes key banking performance metrics (e.g., ROE, ROA) and other critical variables such as those reflecting capital health (Tier 1 ratio), as well as gives an overview of the bank business model and factors impacting bank profitability and value.

This case teaches students the importance of maintaining a strong FICO score by illustrating the consequences of paying bills late or not at all. The protagonist is David Molina, a waiter at a struggling Italian restaurant located down the block from where he lives. Money is tight for Molina right now—his limited income means he lives paycheck to paycheck. However, Molina knows things will be looking up for him soon because he recently accepted a job as a bank teller across town—his first desk job.

Molina has been putting off paying two of his bills: a cable bill and his Bank of America credit card bill, both of which are late and have been issued, this time, in the form of threats to impact Molina's credit score if he doesn't pay them. He has just enough money to afford the minimum payments on each overdue bill. But then he receives a phone call from his friend, Jim Lindsey, reminding him about an invitation to go to Myrtle Beach for the upcoming weekend. Molina knows he cannot afford it, but a woman he's attracted to, Jessica, will be there too. Should Molina put off the bills yet again, and if so, how exactly will being late on them hurt his credit score?

This case requires students to evaluate alternative dual-share-class corporate structures that allow companies and entrepreneurs to pursue profit with purpose. The case explores Impact Makers, an IT consulting company based in Richmond, Virginia. While original founders of the firm hold all voting rights, the cash flow rights belong to two nonprofits setting the stage for a Newman's Own model of management consulting. The case discusses whether and how the alternative corporate structure aids the firm's overall strategy to attract top-quality employees, pay them competitive salaries, and provide superior service to its clients while donating 100% of its lifetime value to charitable causes, largely through partnerships with various nonprofit organizations. More importantly, the case asks students to evaluate how such a dual-share-class and dual-purpose company can raise capital to fund continued growth.

The case opens with CEO Michael Pirron reminding himself of all the questions he had run through to execute a strategy to further grow Impact Makers' consulting business both through expanding a menu of services and through conquering new geographical markets. To do either, or both, the company needed a cash infusion. Internal cash was limited, as up to 40% of it flowed to charitable partners, demonstrating Impact Makers' commitment to its mission. Raising debt for a company without fixed assets was challenging and time consuming. Complicating it all was that being structured as a nonstock corporation rendered equity raising difficult. Could Impact Makers raise money to grow and stay true to community values at the same time?