Channel design

Sapple is a fruit-based beverage company which founded in the early 2016. Though it is a small company, its brand get well-known in the market because of heavy promotion. At the beginning, it sale products almost exclusively to several chain stores in big cities. But because chain stores ask a lot of money for slotting 3 allowances (money paid to put products on store shelves). It cost a lot. And Sapple can not afford it for long. Now the company tries to change its channel strategy in order to reduce high cost in the channel.

Questions: What channel strategy should be appropriate for Sapple? Use four-steps method to design channel for Sapple.(draw the channel structure)

Four-step method :

a. What is the target market?

b. Understanding target consumers' channel preference

c. Segment the market according channel preference

d. Design a well-working channel for each segment