I have made the mistake of spending many man hours plotting against the competition. Doing what if scenarios on pricing, distribution, new products and promotions in search of the right plan that leads to victory. Jeff Bezos suggests instead that we should be obsessed about our customers not our competitors. “We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts,” he says. “It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.”
Now I see the beer category heating up and the local boys focussing a lot of their energy on the invading regional and global brands. While they must continue to ensure that their brands stay connected with consumers; they must also pay attention to their customers; the bars, supermarkets, restaurants and events that serve their consumers.
If I were the Carib Brewery I would focus more resources on trade relations while continuing to build consumers’ relationships with their brands. Being obsessed with the competition makes you take your eye and energy off of two far more important groups; the consumers and the customers (in the case of Carib they are the trade) And if you win with these two groups, the competition can have the rest.
