The Implications Of Ikea's Marketing Strategies To Chinese Home Furnishing Retail Industry

In recent years,China's economy has entered the mode of rapid development due to the Reform and Opening-up.The improvement of residents' disposable income and the transformation of the consumers' awareness have contributed that more and more consumers begin to focus on how to upgrade the quality of life.Especially,the construction of new urbanization and the integration of urban and rural development have brought the enormously developmental space to home furnishing retail industry.In the first place,furniture products,such as sofa,bed and tea table,etc.were barely regarded by consumers as durable goods,so people paid more attention to their practicality.With the improvement of living standards and personal aesthetic standards,furniture products are not confined to their usefulness,but are considered to be the home art that can display personal taste.What's more,personal preferences,brand awareness,fashion trends,and even personal emotions could have a huge impact on consumer purchasing decisions.Thus,consumer demands for home products are prone to be more diversified.Additionally,in recent years,due to the vigorous development of cross-border electricity supplier and express delivery industry,the acceleration of the global integration process has provided consumers with more consumer choices.Consumers are able to purchase home products from all over the world in less time.It must be said that the retail mode of this import and export trade also complements the traditional model of bulk container import and export.Nevertheless,with the disappearance of the bonus period for e-commerce traffic,home brands that rely solely on online sales have entered a period of weakness.In view of durability of home furnishing products,consumers will no longer rely on a single online retail channels,but prefer to use different scenarios and requirements to purchase high-quality products,that is the mode of combination of online and offline business.Based on the consumption trend,Jack Ma,the CEO of Alibaba,put forward the concept of "New retailing" in a speech in October 2016.New retailing means that enterprise must combine its online business with offline business.The online business must go down the line and the traditional businesses have to take advantage of the online business mode.In a word,the combination of modern logistics and online and offline mode,can really create new retailing.Thus,household industry must also keep pace with the business environment,catch up with the current opportunities for development,play their own advantages,and strengthen their own brands.Throughout the development of IKEA in China,its success is also sufficient to provide beneficial suggestions for Chinese home furnishing retail industry.As the global leader in home furnishing industry,IKEA entered the Chinese market in 1998,competing for market share with Chinese home furnishing enterprises.This competition also accelerated the transformation of Chinese home furnishing industry model.The home furnishing market has transformed from extensive and quantitative growth into intensive quality improvement.Although the Chinese home furnishing market is thriving,the home furnishing companies are confronted with big challenges.As we all know,the traditional home furnishing retailing,which was based on stand business model,become obsolete and was replaced by the supermarket model.In addition,due to the participation into the WTO,Chinese home furnishing companies had to compete with foreign brands to capture market share.It is urgent for the domestic traditional home retail enterprises to make necessary upgrade.In the period of transformation and development,aimed at making a foothold in home furnishing retail industry market,the domestic enterprises must learn the advanced concepts and marketing strategies from foreign enterprises and bring one's superiority into full play.It is under the industry background that this paper carries out relevant research and makes the corresponding analysis and recommendations.This thesis can be divided into five chapters.Studying the growth of IKEA Home Furnishing in China,including its difficulties at the beginning and its corresponding marketing strategy,and providing implications for Chinese home furnishing retail industry are the main purposes in this thesis.The theory of 4Ps is used to analyze IKEA's marketing strategy in the Chinese market.What is more,combined with the development status of Chinese home furnishing retail industry and the trend of retail development,this thesis put forward quite a few suggestions for Chinese home furnishing retail industry.The first chapter is an introduction,including the research background,research significance,research theory,research methods and innovation of this thesis.The second chapter is the literature review.This chapter presents related study in terms of IKEA's marketing strategies from domestic and foreign perspectives.It is found hat,although domestic scholars have done researches on IKEA Home Furnishing in Chinese marketing strategy,mainly focused on the bottleneck when IKEA entered the Chinese market.Few researches focus on IKEA's corresponding marketing strategy in current times.In other words,the domestic study on IKEA's marketing strategy in Chinese market still lacks dynamic research.In addition,in view of IKEA's achievements in China,most scholars focus on the analysis of successful marketing strategies.However,as for the problem of how to improve the level of Chinese home furnishing retail industry,the domestic scholars still pay little attention to it.Similarly,foreign research has mainly focused on IKEA's combination between differentiation and standardization marketing strategies in the world,lacking the specific analysis on the micro market.The third chapter introduces IKEA's marketing strategies in China.With the support of the 4Ps theory model,this chapter makes a dynamic analysis on IKEA's marketing strategy in china.In the first place,through the comparison of IKEA's marketing strategy both globally and in Chinese market,it found that IKEA has been insisting on its global procurement to reduce the cost,green environmental protection products in the global strategy.Besides,on the basis of Chinese market environment and the improvement of consumer demand,IKEA has revised corresponding marketing strategies,including gradually adjusting the price to adapt to the specific consumption group,store location and the specific service as well as a variety of publicity.This is also an important step for IKEA to integrate into the Chinese market.Secondly,focusing on the current economic environment,especially the development of e-commerce and express industry,and the concept of new retailing,this chapter also analyzes the multi-channels taken by IKEA in response to the new changes,including the combination of online and offline to give customers better shopping experience,the construction of distribution center and upgrade of logistics system.The fourth chapter analyzes the implications of IKEA's marketing strategy to Chinese home furnishing retail industry.Specifically,this chapter introduces the development process of Chinese home furnishing retail industry in the first place.To be specific,Chinese home industry has gone through three periods,including furniture private workshops,customized furniture stores,and the current diversified household retail stores.Secondly,it summarizes the current situation and future development opportunities of Chinese home furnishing retail industry in light of related data about industry and reports.Initially,the bonus in home furnishing industry has attracted many competitors both from home and abroad,but consumers' demand is limited,which inevitably caused the imbalance of supply and demand.At the same time,with the promulgation of relevant laws and regulations on environmental protection in China and the improvement of consumers'awareness of environmental protection,environmental protection products have been more favored by consumers.Obviously,domestic enterprises still have the great room for developing environmental products.In addition,service attitude and display methods in Chinese home furnishing stores still need to be improved.Finally,based on the analysis of IKEA's marketing strategy in the last chapter,this chapter provides concrete measures for the development of Chinese home furnishing retail industry.The fifth chapter summarizes the full text.When the basic requirements such as food,clothing and other necessities are satisfied,the soft factors,such as aesthetics and service,would make influence on consumers' demand,which are also the secrets of IKEA's success.In addition,this chapter looks forward to Chinese home furnishing retail industry relying on its own unique advantages to go abroad.