Could you use the case study as a reference and answer the questions below:

Q1)Could you indicate any five additional products that the Swiss army brands can consider producing in the future? Could you justify your choice? By using marketing concepts and case study facts

Q2)Swiss Army Brands opened its own retail store. How does this own store of Swiss Army brands help the company grow the sales of its product in different ways? Could you please question using the marketing concept and facts from the case study?

 

Q3) could you describe and explain the purchasing process you might use to purchase the following using the consumer product acquisition model (explain each step)( (steps: motive development, information gathering, proposition evaluation, proposition selection, acquisition/purchase, re-evaluation)

a) A chocolate bar (for example Snickers or Cadbury's Dairy Milk in the UK)

b) A tablet computer to help you write essays and in group work for your marketing course.

Swiss Army Brands It seems appropriate that the maker of multifunction knives would build a multiproduct brand. Swiss Army Brands is the international marketing arm of Victorinox and Wenger, the two Swiss companies officially licensed by the government of Switzerland to manufacture the world-renowned Swiss Army Knives. The popularity of the "Swiss Army Knife" concept has enabled the company to expand into all manner of consumer goods: watches, luggage, apparel, and other lines. When it was founded in 1884, the company didn't intend to become such a household name. Originally, the company was just a small family-owned cutlery company that got a Swiss Army government contract in 1891. Based on its official tie to the Swiss military, in 1897 the company registered its title as the "Original Swiss Army Knife." For nearly 50 years, the company subsisted as a local supplier to the Swiss Army. During that time, it created the now-familiar cross-and-shield emblem and named itself Victorinox after the deceased mother of the founder (Victoria) and the INOXidizable stainless steel of the knives. World War II marked a sharp turning point in the company's fortunes. American Gls were intrigued and enamored by the mul- ifunction pocket knives of their Swiss counterparts. Gls bartered for these fascinating gadgets, started buying them from the com- pany for sale at local military "PX" stores, and brought them back to the United States. Soon, Victorinox had a growing export busi- ness to supplement its Swiss government contracts. Sales grew as exports surged. Currently, 90 percent of the knives leave the tiny Swiss federation to satisfy a growing global customer base. With growth came expansion of the product mix. At first, the company only expanded the range of pocket knives to suit different applications beyond what the company offered the army. For example, a fisherman's knife might include a fish scaler and hook remover. A golfer's knife might include a tool for repairing divots or cleaning the spikes of golf shoes. A petite, discrete knife for a woman's purse might include a toothpick, tweezers, nail file, and clippers. These extensions retained the core idea of a multifunctional pocket knife even as they extended the line to other categories of customers. In the late 1980s, the company realized that it had created a massively popular brand. The term "Swiss Army Knife" achieved widespread recognition as synonymous with high- quality, highly-useful, multifunctional objects in any category. Brand recognition stands at 92 percent. Thus, the company looked at ways to leverage its brand in new product lines. The first brand extension beyond the trademark knives was the Swiss Army Watch, launched in 1987. The watch became one of the top watches under $500 and one of the most popular watch brands over the last decade. Initially, the company sub- contracted watch manufacturing to another company. Six years after launching Swiss Army Watches, the company bought a watch manufacturing operation in Switzerland. At Swiss Army Brands, brand extension begins with con- sumer research. The company believes that it is important to con- sider what consumers think of, the brand, and what values and attributes they associate with the brand, so that any extension of the brand reflects what consumers already feel about the brand. In the 1990s, research indicated that the brand could be extended to two new product categories: travel gear and apparel. Extending the brand allowed the company to start its own retail channel in 2001. The company opened a trendy store in New York City to highlight the brand and sell its expanding array of knives, watches, luggage, and apparel. With breadth comes enough product range to justify such store openings. A second store in Tokyo in 2005 signals the company's plans for global expansion that leverages the expanded product mix. Yet some might wonder if Swiss Army has strayed too far. On the one hand, the watches and luggage share much in com- mon with the namesake knives. They have the same rugged, multifunctional ethos. They come in the same no-nonsense color schemes that include stainless steel, white, black, and the Swiss flag's signature red. In short, these products exude Swiss stolidity and mechanical ingenuity. Watches are clearly a natu- ral for a Swiss company and the association of Switzerland with travel is a natural for North American consumers. On the other hand, Swiss Army has branched further into fashion apparel. Although some of the clothing provides a mul- tifunctional, travel-oriented feel and muted travel-safe colors, the company's more recent designs seem to stray ever farther from that core. Polo shirts in the latest fashion-oriented colors reflect the Swiss Army brand only by the almost incidental pres- ence of the cross-and-shield logo. Like an oversized pocket knife with too many blades and attachments, the Swiss Army brand may be becoming too bulky for its own good. The company continues to consider various directions and has registered its trademark in connection with products such as tents, sleeping bags, canteens, office equipment, shoes, bicy- cles, and other products. Whether these products will ever appear under the Swiss Army cross-and-shield remains to be seen. The future of the brand is in the hands of consumers.