Footloose Inc. is a German footwear company with annual men’s footwear sales of approximately 1.0 billion Euro(€). Footloose Inc. has always relied on the boot market for the majority of their volume and in this market they compete with three other major competitors. Together, these four brands represent approximately 72% of the 5.0 billion € German men’s boot market.

The boots category includes four main sub-categories:

Work boots, casual boots, field and hunting boots, and winter boots. Work boots is the largest subcategory and is geared to blue collar workers who purchase these boots primarily for on-the-job purposes. Casual boots is the fastest growing sub- category, and is geared more towards white collar workers and students who purchase these boots for week-end or casual wear and light work purposes.

The four key competitors in the market are Badger, Duraflex, Steeler, and Trekker. Badger and Steeler are both well established as work boot companies, having a long history and strong brand recognition and credibility among blue collar workers. At the other extreme is Trekker, a strong player in the casual boot market but a very weak player in work boots. Duraflex, however, is a cross between the other competitors, having a significant share in both work boots and casual boots.

Source:https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/xe/Documents/strategy/me_Monitor-Deloitte-Case-Study-Example-Footloose.pdf

(a) Discuss critically FIVE (5) contingency plans that Footloose Inc. could execute given the fact that the business environment is very volatile in the footwear industry.

(b) Footloose Inc. management decided to restructure due to the footwear industry dynamic. Discuss TWO (2) reasons why Footloose Inc. needs to restructure when new strategies are developed.

(c) In Footloose Inc, who is responsible for providing ethics leadership?