Stages of the Product Life Cycle

During each stage of a product's life cycle, the types and levels of sales, profits, and competition rise, peak, and eventually decline.

The product life cycle defines the stages that new products move through as they enter, are established in$,$ and ultimately leave the marketplace. In their life cycles, products pass through four stages: introduction, growth, maturity, and decline. The product life cycle offers a useful tool for managers to analyze the types of strategies that may be required over the life of their products. Even the strategic emphasis of a firm and its marketing mix $(4$Ps$)$ strategies can be adapted from insights about the characteristics of each stage of the cycle.