Ecostore: Pioneering Eco-friendly Cleaning Products And Services

Ecostore is a pioneer in the industry of environment-friendly cleaning products and services. The company was founded 23 years ago, which is responsible for providing eco-friendly cleaning products including body and baby care commodities and plant and mineral based items across New Zealand. In the rise of globalisation and constant challenges faced by the global environment, the concept of sustainability in the business operations has become the mainstream for the industrial atmosphere (Chipps 2013). Garg (2014) argues that the absolute factor is accounted for delivering tremendous growth opportunities to the firm operating in various industries, as the individual growth can be reflected in their increasing share in the respective markets. Most importantly, the study has further identified that the plethora of new entrants in the different market has driven the mainstream players to adopt an eco-friendly marketing strategy in order to add environmental credential in their product or service offerings. As a result, the certain scenario encourages the existing or potential brands to embrace the green initiative through their marketing strategies.

Based on the primary investigation to the marketing policies introduced by the firm, the economic activities undertaken by Ecostore are widely focused on securing the growth opportunities available from the market. For achieving such objective, the company is continuously striving towards maintaining reinvigoration of the operations and restarting its brand as the participant of NZTE Better through the application of Design Programme (Happonen 2016). Apart from that, the study conducted by Anne Wiese (2015) has found out that Ecostore embarks on a product transformation stage through investing heavily in its accreditations for setting apart itself from the green-wash brands. Lately, the company is also endowing the independent testing procedures for supporting the business overcoming the key barriers in entering the different parts of the market. However, the particular process has a limited outcome for the company due to its consumption of high costs (Hernik 2014). Due to the specific circumstances, the marketers of Ecostore has involved the application of comparative assessments for establishing various proofs referring the products offered by the company are safer and healthier than the alternative ones offered by the other competitors.

The products or merchandises offered by Ecostore are based on multiple needs from its target market. The Items manufactured and supplied by the company primarily covers various segments of the market from laundry, home, hand and body were products to skincare, hair, baby, and ultra sensitive items (Ecostore.co.nz, 2016). The laundry products of the company are aimed to reduce the exposure of the families to the nasty chemicals found in the laundry products used on an ever day basis. Ensuring the delivery of health benefits to the target market consumers as well as the overall society is the central guiding principle behind the formulation of these products (Bashir and Shah 2013). By investigating the product portfolio of Ecostore, it can be observed that customers have reported numerous health benefits by using the products offered by the company in the last eighteen years of operations. It is informed that various health-related infirmities have improved or disappeared altogether by using the eco-friendly items produced by the firm. The studies carried out by Gutierrez and Seva (2016) a vital understanding can be gained in the area of product development stage of Ecostore. The company has followed the strategy of independently testing its products with a comparison to the leading supermarket brands for adding value to the existing product lines. Based on the implication of the chosen practice, the efficacy in the over organizational performance can guarantee over the years while the customers from different segments are provided with the value-added services of the company. In this case, it is worth to mention that the suppliers are chosen wisely by Ecostore for maintaining the eco-friendliness in the products and services. The firm identifies and engages the suppliers of plant-based ingredients and pure minerals for biodegrading the products promptly and adeptly (Ueda and Ueda 2012). The particular process is aimed to ensure the safe disposal of the products after their usage.

Based on the analysis done so far, it can be acknowledged that the marketing strategies and practices undertaken by Ecostore specifically provide importance to the green initiatives. By accessing various works formed by the scholars over the recent years, it is apprehended that pricing the green products or services seems to be a challenging task for the companies. However, in case of Ecostore, the company follows some fundamental approaches for ensuring the smooth execution regarding the proper pricing of its wide range of products. The marketers of Ecostore primarily prioritise the assessment of prices charged by the key market players for their alternative goods or services falling in the green or non-green categories for determining the average price for the products of each class (Siitan 2015). Based on such average, the marketing personnel is responsible for setting apposite price, which can precisely cover the costs associated with the entire product manufacturing and development stages. Here, Kennedy, Kapitan, and Soo (2016) have importantly highlighted the need for conducting an effectual comparison between the chosen products of two companies for determining the possible chances for offering the individual product at lower price. By adopting the positive approach, Ecostore not only can denigrate the competitors, but also the marketers can find a superior way to promote their decision-making.

According to Moscardo et al. (2013) promotion is the imperative mean of marketing to convey the significant message about the products or services of the company in front of the target audience. The same study also reflects the involvement of numerous pitfalls in the process of promoting eco-friendly products while embracing some simple practices can mainly help the companies to achieve success in the promotional process. The marketing strategy of Ecostore is developed by brewing a primary perception about the usability and number of households using or not using its products (Tantalo and Paton 2013). Developing such understanding provides a promotional vision to the marketers to formulate the strategy to inform the consumers about the green concepts and their integrations to the products and services offered by the business.

Garg (2014) has significantly identified the need of portraying the image of environmental friendliness in the process of preparing the promotional activities related to the green products and schemes. The author states that including the particular image in the advertisement will broadly influence the decision-making process of the customers. From the application of the study, it is further identified that the clients love to correlate themselves with the firms that the environmental stewards. Ecostore understands the defined concept to communicate their useful marketing message in the advertisement, promotions, publicities, and corporate social responsibilities for ensuring the development of increasing base of loyal customers (Parsons, Soo, and Berth 2013).

According to Keenan, Amir, and Gneezy (2014), the location of selling provides noteworthy influence in the marketing and organizational success of the company. Based on the application of the study, the place of sale provides a significant impact on the position of the organization. Due to such scenario, the organization needs to put special priority in its distribution strategy after deciding the particular platform of executing the sales, such as at homes of consumer, through a shop, or via internet (Upstill-Goddard et al. 2013). In order to sell the eco-friendly products of Ecostore, the organization employs a green distribution strategy, which is a highly delicate operation while increasing the chances of making environmental-friendly sales. The selection of selling platform used by the company is based on guaranteeing the consumers about the ecological nature of its product at a possible extent (Fitzgerald et al. 2015). From the study of Pecoraro and Uusitalo (2014), green environment is continuously regulated by the authoritative or legislative bodies. This particular fact highly influences distribution strategies adopted by Ecostore to understand the stipulation of maintaining compliance in the distributing the green products to the identified market. Such procedure is commonly observed in the policies introduced by the company in the recognised department.

From the initial investigation to the environment-friendly cleaning products and service market of New Zealand, multiple involvements of dominant market players can be observed due to the increasing set of opportunities offered by the ecological products and services to proliferate business growth (Pecoraro and Uusitalo 2014). From the result of such assessment, the involvement of some of the important competitors like Omo, Fab, Planet Ark, Earth Choice, and Surf is observed within the market with each having their level of marketing mix strategies. Amongst these competitors, ALDI Brands and Biozet Attack are the ones maintaining more environment-friendly aspect to their products or services contribute to the quality and satisfaction in the overall market. However, the target market is primarily dominated by Duo with the promising outcomes regarding the quality of products, customer satisfaction, and environmental friendliness (Brooks and Rich 2016). Additionally, the eco-friendly products offered by Earth Choice are the cheapest within the particular market.

According to Ozorhon (2012), marketers in the modern day need to adopt integrated marketing, which can be defined as mixing and matching the marketing activities for achieving the maximum benefits from the market while improving the collective efforts of the marketing department. The particular study citing the evidence portrayed by Kotler and Keller (2009) has proposed that marketing mix is composed of four distinct elements, such as product, place, price, and promotion. In order to develop a superior distinction from the leading market players, Ecostore has identified the precious involvement of marketing mix and strategising its elements for the production of eco-friendly products and addressing the continuously increasing environment concerns from the customers (Keenan, Amir, and Gneezy 2014). Based on the study of Bashir and Shah (2013), in the area of maintaining product development strategies, Ecostore continuously strives to offer the entire bundle of utilities through its product to the customers while developing an understanding regarding such context by conducting the exchange process. Alternatively, the company also focuses on maintaining the advanced quality of its products, as it perceives quality as the compelling feature bearing the ability to satisfy the implied needs for ensuring uniqueness in the product offering process from its competitors.

Parons et al. (2013) have identified five stages of consumer decision making, such as problem identification, information search, assessment for alternatives, product choices, and outcomes. The impulsive buying decision and behaviour of consumers largely depend on the environmental cues. The marketers of Ecostore are highly informed about such fact to develop a proper packaging for the products to gain increasing attention of the consumers (Garg 2014). On the other hand, Upstill-Goddart et al. (2013) have claimed that eco-friendly products are more expensive than the conventional ones. Due to the scenario, the products of Ecostore are comparatively higher from its major competitors. Ecostore understands that consumers will opt for paying an extra penny if they acknowledge the health benefits of using such products (Morrow 2013). The certain situation cause the company to leverage more on the promotional activities to market the chief product messages to the consumers for making them informed about the superior benefits of using its products. Such events as part of the marketing mix create a vital difference between Ecostore and its leading competitors from the particular market.

The result of an investigation carried out by Hernik (2014) principally signifies that the right thing will be adopted by the consumers when it comes to providing protection to their health and environment at a whole. Even in the midst of significant economic demands from the industries, the green movement is rapidly gaining the momentum, as it was difficult to miss the deluge of advertisements from the well-known national brands involving the eco-friendly products (Moscardo et al. 2013). Despite the success of marketing practices, the increasing demands of the green environment are causing a significant number of pitfalls for Ecostore. One of such examples is the rapidly increasing competition in the New Zealand market. Therefore, the marketing activities of the company are suggested to consider the useful recommendation for guiding the future operations.

 Firstly, the company needs to prove their claims, as the business need to demonstrate that the identified products publicized as green will live up to their expectations (Kennedy, Kapitan, and Soo 2016). Secondly, it is observed during the investigation that many customers are willing to pay extra money for availing the product offering them the increasing benefits. However, Hernik (2014) importantly observes price as an essential factor influencing the purchasing decision of the shoppers. Therefore, Ecostore must need to develop awareness of the price affordability of the target market for pricing their product and developing useful decision in the product development stage. Lastly, contributing to the ecologic environment is a promising and meaningful job for many consumers. However, if they can relate such activity to their personal benefit, it can add value to the overall process undertaken by the company (Delai and Takahashi 2013). Hence, products offered by Ecostore must need to have the ability to provide personal benefits to the consumers; for example, improvement of health or saving money.

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