Cases in this issue
| Case title and target audience | Authors | Synopsis |
|---|---|---|
| Maison Maille: making mustard aspirational to younger consumers Audience: graduate students in brand management courses | Marie-Cécile Cervellon and Lea Lembo | This case introduces students to the heritage brand Maille. Dating back to 1747, this brand has managed to elevate the image of mustard from commodity to premium product, capitalizing on brand authenticity and adopting the codes and strategies of luxury brands. Present in supermarkets with a premium price positioning, Maille develops its image through creating an elaborate customer experience in its boutiques, as well as through a communication strategy based on storytelling. Yet, the core base of customers who identify as gourmets is aging. To sustain its development, Maille needs to gain appeal among younger generations of consumers, without betraying its identity |
| Yellow card: US Women’s Soccer seeks pay equity Audience: upper level undergraduate human resource management, labor economics and employment law courses, specifically courses in human resource management, gender equity, business law and labor economics | Joanna Kimbell, Anne Macy, Emily Hammer and Denise Philpot | In April 2016, Julie Foudy, a former US Women’s Soccer Player turned Sports Commentator, is challenged with explaining to soccer fans and the sports industry why current US Women’s Soccer players are complaining about a lack of pay equity This case focuses on the challenges of proving discrimination in professional women’s sports by exploring discrimination accusations within a collective bargaining environment of US Women’s Soccer. The case explores theoretical foundations of wage and compensation packages differentials, group wage negotiations, conditions permissible under equal employment opportunity law, and the challenges that come with analyzing a wage discrimination claim. Students will apply foundational concepts of human resource management, time value of money, and analysis of legal ramifications of contract differences to a factual, timely sports management scenario |
| SmartPooch: pre-venture opportunity assessment Audience: undergraduate and graduate introductory entrepreneurship courses | Mark Rice | In an MBA capstone project course, a team of four mid-careers, working professionals had assessed the feasibility of a new venture idea. All four were dog-lovers who had been frustrated by the ineffectiveness of the various dog training programs and products in which they had participated. Their idea was to utilize a novel technology to assist dog owners in the training process. After completing the course, the team met to determine whether SmartPooch was just an interesting idea – or alternatively was a sufficiently promising opportunity that one or more of them would continue to explore it |
| Pritchett Controls: ten years into employee ownership Audience: undergraduate and graduate level courses in strategic human resource management, organizational development, and high performance organizations | Richard Hoffman, Wayne Decker and Frank Shipper | This case illustrates the rationale for adopting employee ownership, and difficulties in implementing employee empowerment beyond investment. In the beginning it focuses on why Jerry Pritchett, one of the co-founders of Pritchett Controls, decided to convert it to an employee-owned company. In the body of the case, it details the efforts of the company to operate under its new ownership structure in an increasingly competitive environment. Although Pritchett established employee owners, only selected High Performance Work Systems (HPWS) practices have been implemented. The issue the reader must grapple with is whether other HPWS practices should be adopted or not |
| The dilemma down under Audience: undergraduate or graduate courses related to negotiation and/or decision making, international management/strategy courses | Michael Ricco and Patrick Hultberg | The dilemma down under is a two-party distributive negotiation with integrative potential. A large airline, Transpacific Airlines (TPA), created an internal tour operator brand named Transpacific Vacations as a separate profit center. After licensing its brand to Global Tour Services and establishing operations in the UK, negotiations to take over the internal tour operations of TPA-Australia are about to begin. The case involves the negotiation between Mr Edwards, Representative of GTS, and Ms Bentley, Representative of TPA-Australia |
| Jigsaw Academy: outreaching the analytics market Audience: graduate level courses in entrepreneurship, sales and distribution management, strategic alliances and mergers | Tuhin Sengupta and Arunava Ghosh | In May 2016, Sarita Digumarti, Chief Operating Officer of Jigsaw Academy in Bangalore, India, faced a challenging situation. Jigsaw Academy provided online courses in data analytics and big data at the beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels for students as well as working professionals. It was perceived that plenty of students from premier institutions in India had a high level of theoretical knowledge about the process involved in number crunching and data analysis; however, the hands-on experience on actual business problems or actual data sets was a major limitation with these students. Given the rapid growth of the analytics sector and the limited number of academic institutions offering analytics courses, there was lack of availability of the right skills in the analytics market. Jigsaw Academy seized this opportunity and started offering relevant courses. Jigsaw Academy wanted to grow its brand equity and to achieve this through B2B collaborations and/or alliances. However, expansion through B2B had its own challenges. Given the competitive landscape of the analytics market, Jigsaw Academy wondered whether to opt for B2B channel, and if yes, the process to use in choosing potential B2B partners |
| Case title and target audience | Authors | Synopsis |
|---|---|---|
| Maison Maille: making mustard aspirational to younger consumers | Marie-Cécile Cervellon and Lea Lembo | This case introduces students to the heritage brand Maille. Dating back to 1747, this brand has managed to elevate the image of mustard from commodity to premium product, capitalizing on brand authenticity and adopting the codes and strategies of luxury brands. Present in supermarkets with a premium price positioning, Maille develops its image through creating an elaborate customer experience in its boutiques, as well as through a communication strategy based on storytelling. Yet, the core base of customers who identify as gourmets is aging. To sustain its development, Maille needs to gain appeal among younger generations of consumers, without betraying its identity |
| Yellow card: US Women’s Soccer seeks pay equity | Joanna Kimbell, Anne Macy, Emily Hammer and Denise Philpot | In April 2016, Julie Foudy, a former US Women’s Soccer Player turned Sports Commentator, is challenged with explaining to soccer fans and the sports industry why current US Women’s Soccer players are complaining about a lack of pay equity |
| SmartPooch: pre-venture opportunity assessment | Mark Rice | In an MBA capstone project course, a team of four mid-careers, working professionals had assessed the feasibility of a new venture idea. All four were dog-lovers who had been frustrated by the ineffectiveness of the various dog training programs and products in which they had participated. Their idea was to utilize a novel technology to assist dog owners in the training process. After completing the course, the team met to determine whether SmartPooch was just an interesting idea – or alternatively was a sufficiently promising opportunity that one or more of them would continue to explore it |
| Pritchett Controls: ten years into employee ownership | Richard Hoffman, Wayne Decker and Frank Shipper | This case illustrates the rationale for adopting employee ownership, and difficulties in implementing employee empowerment beyond investment. In the beginning it focuses on why Jerry Pritchett, one of the co-founders of Pritchett Controls, decided to convert it to an employee-owned company. In the body of the case, it details the efforts of the company to operate under its new ownership structure in an increasingly competitive environment. Although Pritchett established employee owners, only selected High Performance Work Systems (HPWS) practices have been implemented. The issue the reader must grapple with is whether other HPWS practices should be adopted or not |
| The dilemma down under | Michael Ricco and Patrick Hultberg | The dilemma down under is a two-party distributive negotiation with integrative potential. A large airline, Transpacific Airlines (TPA), created an internal tour operator brand named Transpacific Vacations as a separate profit center. After licensing its brand to Global Tour Services and establishing operations in the UK, negotiations to take over the internal tour operations of TPA-Australia are about to begin. The case involves the negotiation between Mr Edwards, Representative of GTS, and Ms Bentley, Representative of TPA-Australia |
| Jigsaw Academy: outreaching the analytics market | Tuhin Sengupta and Arunava Ghosh | In May 2016, Sarita Digumarti, Chief Operating Officer of Jigsaw Academy in Bangalore, India, faced a challenging situation. Jigsaw Academy provided online courses in data analytics and big data at the beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels for students as well as working professionals. It was perceived that plenty of students from premier institutions in India had a high level of theoretical knowledge about the process involved in number crunching and data analysis; however, the hands-on experience on actual business problems or actual data sets was a major limitation with these students. Given the rapid growth of the analytics sector and the limited number of academic institutions offering analytics courses, there was lack of availability of the right skills in the analytics market. Jigsaw Academy seized this opportunity and started offering relevant courses. Jigsaw Academy wanted to grow its brand equity and to achieve this through B2B collaborations and/or alliances. However, expansion through B2B had its own challenges. Given the competitive landscape of the analytics market, Jigsaw Academy wondered whether to opt for B2B channel, and if yes, the process to use in choosing potential B2B partners |
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