Rolls-Royce Furniture Brand Essay: Extension Strategy.

This report is in regards to Rolls Royce extending their brand to the luxury furniture business. It will include the idea behind the choice of extension and the workmanship of the existing product that will later be compared and related to the extended product. The report also includes how the existing resources available to Rolls Royce will be relevant to the products planned in the furniture line.

Irrespective of the size of the company, revenues, or funding, one of the sturdiest differentiators a business can possess it its brand. However, the strength of the brand does not occur on its own. It is all about attaining competitive advantage. It takes organizational self-reflection, discipline, and concentration to construct a brand that consumers prefer over its rivals. Therefore, it should be carefully managed (Schutt, 2018). It should have regulations placed around it to be effortlessly supported and presented suitably. In addition, it should be considerate to a rapidly altering world with many cultural shades. Brand management is said to be a continuous procedure that is comprised of maintaining reliability in the brand and offering values that are kept by the organization to gain a positive relation with the customers (Temporal, 2011). The aim of this report is to develop a brand extension strategy for Rolls Royce into the furniture industry. The paper will be comprised of a detailed analysis of the product offering and the way the company will successfully justify with the new offering in the market. Moreover, there will be an explanation of the brand execution under which report will provide the highlight of the place, promotion, and price strategies that will be selected by the company. In the end, it will suggest some brand measurement techniques for the Rolls Royce Company in the furniture industry.  

Rolls-Royce was a British luxury car manufacturer and later went into the manufacturing of aero engine in 1904 by Henry Royce and Charles Rolls. The company earned its reputation by manufacturing the best cars in the world through its superior engineering. Besides this, Rolls Royce was known for its part in the assembly of the Concorde aircraft. Four of the Rolls-Royce/SNECMA Olympus 593 engines powered the Concorde. The leather seats of the first supersonic airplane were created from the leather, which was produced by Rolls-Royce (Rolls Royce Motor Car, 2018). Rolls-Royce functions from purpose-built directorial and production amenities released in 2003 across from the significant Goodwood Circuit in Goodwood, U.K, West Sussex, and England. Rolls-Royce Motors is the high-class manufacturer of branded cars since 2003.

Rolls-Royce leather is said to be one of the superior quality of leather available in the market. The leather from Rolls-Royce is one of, if not the best, quality of leather available. The animals such as a cow that are utilized for the manufacturing of leather are left freely because it is believed that the cow's living conditions majorly influence the leather’s quality (Muaddi, 2011). Their hides are carried from the cow’s Simmental breed, which is larger in size, hence, offer bigger hides. These cows are raised in a humid area, which makes a huge difference in their skin. The grass quality that is provided to the cows for feeding has a direct influence on their skin.

The Roll-Royce can enter into the furniture industry to offer fine wood word with the help of specialists within the organization with around 20,000 diverse varieties of wood from France, Italy, and Spain selected by the master wood-carver. Every grain of each veneer is exclusive just like the fingerprints of a human being, thus, one product of furniture can never be similar to another. The company will reflect perfection in the woodwork it will offer through an intensive procedure. Once the wood for manufacturing furniture will be selected, it will be then polished and later numerous layers of varnish will be applied. If there will be any single kind of imperfection in the furniture, the responsible team will fix it.

Product/Service

Considering the financial position of Rolls-Royce the idea of entering into the furniture sector for the company will be of great success. The company is continuously able to increase its current assets like in 2017 the company had $27873 and it increased to $30071 in 2018 (Investing, 2018). This reflects that the company has enough of the assents to enter in different sectors to operate. Moreover, with the use of resources like quality wood or metal for the frame, exclusive and undisputed leather quality for the furniture exterior, and wood to pair with the features of the leather, it will be very convenient for the customers who search for these types of products.

The Roll-Royce is itself one of the famous brands that attract most of the customers in the market. If a business has a comfortable and elegant chair in its office accommodation of the brand, Rolls-Royce is a matter of pride and reputation (Geljon, 2014). Besides this, the furniture business will also attract those customers, who cannot afford the vehicles of Rolls-Royce, but now can buy elegant and standard furniture from the brand. Moreover, the car chairs will be the major inspiration for manufacturing the furniture chair in order to attract more and more customers. The feeling and experience that is gained by sitting in the Rolls-Royce cars are inexpressible, but the furniture chairs will give a similar type of experience to the customers. It will be as if the owner of a Ferrari, will purchase the accessories like watches or shoes to go with their luxury car, it is possible that similar kind of reaction will be noticed if the line of furniture is released by Rolls-Royce.   

A target market is said to be a group of consumers in a serviceable accessible market of the business at which a company targets its marketing resources and efforts (Weinstein, 2013). The major target market for Rolls Royce’s furniture segment will be corporate accommodations. The company will manufacture elegant and stylish furniture that will complement the owner’s personality and organization’s image. Moreover, it will focus on luxurious residencies with a good budget.  

In the initial phase, the company will be focused towards the United States market in order to place its strong existence in the market. The United States furniture retailing is a very essential aspect for the economy of the nation. The worldwide industry of home goods refers to the distribution, retailing, and manufacturing of the home furniture, soft furnishings, gardening, and cookware equipment, household decorative accessories, and appliances (Statista, 2018). The main players within the industry that can represent intense competitor in front of Rolls-Royce are:

Ashley Furniture Industries – It is one of the leading retailer and manufacturer of home furnishings of America. Ashley Furniture Industries is the parent company if the two subsidiaries i.e. Ashley home Stores and Ashley Global Retail. Ashley Home store is involved in the retailing segment and manages the distribution and supply of products globally (Ashley Furniture, 2018). Ashley Global Retail is a business organization that majorly concentrates on e-commerce, sales, and marketing of the manufactured products by the parent company.  

Target Market

IKEA – IKEA is a manufacturer, retailer, and distributor of the home décor and furniture products. The product portfolio of the company in home décor and furniture ranges from decoration, lighting to children products, kitchen appliances, and outdoor furniture (Technavia, 2018). The company vend its services to its customer with the help of online stores and owned company owned stores encompassing of 1,002 home furnishing dealers in 51 nations.

Perceptual mapping is a graphic method utilized by the asset marketers that try to display the insights of consumers or potential customers (Masterson and Pickton, 2010). Classically, the place of a product, brand, or product line of the company is presented comparative to their competition. The Perceptual mapping of the Rolls-Royce position in the furniture industry of U.S is represented below:

No other brands of the car have yet entered into the market of luxury furniture. With the proficiency in woodwork and production of best quality leathers that are elite to the brand, Rolls-Royce standout very evidently in the market.

The Rolls-Royce brand value will be equally supportive in this extension because of the evidence that company is majorly focused towards the quality of the material its uses in order to accumulate the products but also give their best to remain gentle and eco-friendly while acquiring the materials (BHP, 2010). The company makes use of highest quality leather that is extracted from the Simmental breed of cow. This reflects that the company is unique because it makes its maximum efforts to be quality effective and work with full integrity as a famous brand. The customers of the Rolls-Royce are aware that the products of the company are costly due to its best quality and exclusive designs and this will be mutually relevant in the brand extension as well.

The brand personality reflects what the business desires its brand to be represented or known for, and in the case of Rolls-Royce, it can be portrayed as a sophisticated, reliable, integrity, and innovative brand. If the brand personality of Rolls-Royce can be described in a single word then it would be the highest quality. The brand personality of the company is mutually supportive of the brand proposition due to the use of the highest quality material will be used in the manufacturing of furnitures such as leather, and wood.

Brand identity is the technique used by the business to present itself in front of the customers in the target market. Brand identity is a diverse concept as compared to brand image. It is the way a business selects its logo, shapes, visual elements, colours, and different aspects of its products promotion. Besides this, it is comprised of constructing the language in the marketing programs and training the personnel to interact with the consumers with the purpose of refining a certain image in the mind of the customers (Millman, 2017).

Price 

The Rolls Royce motor cars are one of the premium prices vehicles and they are only served to the rich and affluent clients (MBA Skool, 2018). Considering the high-class image of the company, the furniture sector will also target the high-class and rich customers. The company will charge premium prices for its furniture products. Additional add-ons, customizations, and interiors will increase the products prices as per the wants and needs of the customers in the market. This reflects that the brand will not be disturbed by any of its rivals pricing strategies and simply concentrate on the highest quality and premium prices. The price strategy will support the brand value because it is only focused on the elite customers and high quality, which enforce the company to charge high prices from the customers.    

Competitors

Rolls Royce has a great international presence. It has offices spread in around 50 nations worldwide. However, in the initial stage, the company will operate its furniture segment in the United States market in order to be concentrated towards the demand of its customer and offer higher quality products. The place strategy will support the brand value, brand personality and brand identity of Rolls-Royce furniture segment because the company only offer high-quality products at high prices which is not affordable for all type of customers in the market. Besides this, the company was to be honest with its customer thus in the initial phase it will focus on the limited area.  

Rolls Royce has a great legacy and is a stimulating brand. It is not a brand that is preferred of purchased by a large amount of audience, hence Rolls Royce will not comply with the conventional strategy of advertising in its promotional strategy (Bhasin, 2018). As company caters only niche segment, making use of mass media such as print media, television, and online advertisements does not make any type rational sense for the business. Being a social status symbol company will attract elite people. Usage by businesspersons, rich people, and celebrities helps the company to become a powerful brand in the market. The company possesses a brand personality, which is to offer high-quality products to high-class people by charging premium prices; this reflects that there are limited people who purchase these type of products. Therefore, the company will not make use of mass marketing strategies to attract customers. This is the largest brand awareness and marketing strategy that will be adopted by the company in order to promote the services. For its consumers, Rolls Royce confirms that they remain involved with the help of different activities such as expensive gifts and exclusive merchandise.     

A survey is determined as the method of research utilized for gathering data from a pre-planned group of defendants to attain the information and visions on numerous areas of interest (Phillips, Phillips and Aaron, 2013). The company can perform surveys in order to ask customers about the entry of Rolls-Royce into the furniture segment. This approach will help the company in understanding the thoughts of the customers regarding the organization's services and the expectations they have with the new segment launch.  

Measuring the traffic on the website can help in revealing the insights of the brand. This technique will help the company in analyzing the number of customers interested into the new development of the company such that they can contact with them while advertising their services (Pescapè, Salgarelli, and Dimitropoulos, 2012).

Social listening is said to be one of the most effective techniques used to observe what customers are talking about the brand it can be done through social media and other different websites (Hollander, Graves and Renski, 2016). Social listening allows the company to listen to organic talks about the brand across the web and social media. Rolls-Royce Company can make use of social listening in order to analyze the thoughts and opinions of the people regarding the furniture segment of the company.    

Conclusion

Rolls-Royce is one of the premium motor cars manufacturing company that offer cars to elite customers at high prices. The company is only concerned about the quality it offers to its customers by using superior raw material such as leather, wood, etc. From the above analysis, it could be concluded that the company can enter into the furniture segment in order to offer luxury furniture products to its elite customers. The company can successfully enter in this segment because of available resources such as funds, leather, woods, etc. The company will offer its products into the United States market at its initial stage in order to understand the demand and changing trends into the industry. Moreover, the company will not make use of mass marketing strategies to attract potential customers because the products offered by the company are of premium price that cannot be afforded by all class customers. In order to target elite customers company will charge high prices such that it can maintain its pride and high standard in the market.

References

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