Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool that can be used by Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc managers to do a situational analysis of the company . It is a useful technique to map out the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc is facing in its current business environment.

The Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc is one of the leading companies in its industry. Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc maintains its prominent position in market by carefully analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis.  SWOT analysis a highly interactive process and requires effective coordination among various departments within the firm such as – marketing, finance, operations, management information systems and strategic planning.


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The SWOT Analysis framework helps an organization to identify the internal strategic factors such as -strengths and weaknesses, & external strategic factors such as - opportunities and threats. It leads to a 2X2 matrix – also known as SWOT Matrix.

The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix enables the managers of the Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc to develop four types of strategies:

• SO (strengths-opportunities) Strategies
• WO (weaknesses-opportunities) Strategies
• ST (strengths-threats) Strategies
•  WT (weaknesses-threats) Strategies

SWOT Matrix Strategies Objective

The primary purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a company can use to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading companies in its industry, Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc has numerous strengths that help it to thrive in the market place. These strengths not only help it to protect the market share in existing markets but also help in penetrating new markets. Based on Fern Fort University extensive research – some of the strengths of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc are –

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• Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
• Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.
• Strong Free Cash Flow – Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc has strong free cash flows that provide resources in the hand of the company to expand into new projects.
• High level of customer satisfaction – the company with its dedicated customer relationship management department has able to achieve a high level of customer satisfaction among present customers and good brand equity among the potential customers.
• Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
• Reliable suppliers – It has a strong base of reliable supplier of raw material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.
• Superb Performance in New Markets – Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc has built expertise at entering new markets and making success of them. The expansion has helped the organization to build new revenue stream and diversify the economic cycle risk in the markets it operates in.
• Strong distribution network – Over the years Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc has built a reliable distribution network that can reach majority of its potential market.

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Weakness of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc can improve upon. Strategy is about making choices and weakness are the areas where a company can improve using SWOT analysis and build on its competitive advantage and strategic positioning.

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• Not highly successful at integrating firms with different work culture. As mentioned earlier even though Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.
• The marketing of the products left a lot to be desired. Even though the product is a success in terms of sale but its positioning and unique selling proposition is not clearly defined which can lead to the attacks in this segment from the competitors.
• Need more investment in new technologies. Given the scale of expansion and different geographies the company is planning to expand into, Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc needs to put more money in technology to integrate the processes across the board. Right now the investment in technologies is not at par with the vision of the company.
• Organization structure is only compatible with present business model thus limiting expansion in adjacent product segments.
• There are gaps in the product range sold by the company. This lack of choice can give a new competitor a foothold in the market.
• The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc are below the industry average.
• Investment in Research and Development is below the fastest growing players in the industry. Even though Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc is spending above the industry average on Research and Development, it has not been able to compete with the leading players in the industry in terms of innovation. It has come across as a mature firm looking forward to bring out products based on tested features in the market.

Opportunities for Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc – External Strategic Factors

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• New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.
• Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc’s products thus providing an opportunity to the company - either to boost its profitability or pass on the benefits to the customers to gain market share.
• Economic uptick and increase in customer spending, after years of recession and slow growth rate in the industry, is an opportunity for Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc to capture new customers and increase its market share.
• Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc products by the state as well as federal government contractors.
• The market development will lead to dilution of competitor’s advantage and enable Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc to increase its competitiveness compare to the other competitors.
• The new technology provides an opportunity to Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc to practices differentiated pricing strategy in the new market. It will enable the firm to maintain its loyal customers with great service and lure new customers through other value oriented propositions.
• Lower inflation rate – The low inflation rate bring more stability in the market, enable credit at lower interest rate to the customers of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc.
• Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.

Threats Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc Facing - External Strategic Factors

• Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc profitability.
• No regular supply of innovative products – Over the years the company has developed numerous products but those are often response to the development by other players. Secondly the supply of new products is not regular thus leading to high and low swings in the sales number over period of time.
• As the company is operating in numerous countries it is exposed to currency fluctuations especially given the volatile political climate in number of markets across the world.
• Growing strengths of local distributors also presents a threat in some markets as the competition is paying higher margins to the local distributors.
• Shortage of skilled workforce in certain global market represents a threat to steady growth of profits for Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc   in those markets.
• New technologies developed by the competitor or market disruptor could be a serious threat to the industry in medium to long term future.
• Liability laws in different countries are different and Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
• Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc

Although the SWOT analysis is widely used as a strategic planning tool, the analysis does have its share of limitations.

• Certain capabilities or factors of an organization can be both a strength and weakness at the same time. This is one of the major limitations of SWOT analysis . For example changing environmental regulations can be both a threat to company it can also be an opportunity in a sense that it will enable the company to be on a level playing field or at advantage to competitors if it able to develop the products faster than the competitors.
• SWOT does not show how to achieve a competitive advantage, so it must not be an end in itself.
• The matrix is only a starting point for a discussion on how proposed strategies could be implemented. It provided an evaluation window but not an implementation plan based on strategic competitiveness of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc
• SWOT is a static assessment - analysis of status quo with few prospective changes. As circumstances, capabilities, threats, and strategies change, the dynamics of a competitive environment may not be revealed in a single matrix.
• SWOT analysis may lead the firm to overemphasize a single internal or external factor in formulating strategies. There are interrelationships among the key internal and external factors that SWOT does not reveal that may be important in devising strategies.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc

In light of the above mentioned limitations of the SWOT analysis / matrix, corporate managers decided to provide weightage to each internal strength and weakness of the firm. Organizations also assess the likelihood of events taking place in the coming future and how strong their impact could be on company's performance.

This method is called Weighted SWOT analysis. It is better than doing simplistic SWOT analysis because with Weighted SWOT Analysis Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc managers can focus on the most critical factors and discount the non-important one. It also solves the long list problem where organizations ends up making a long list but none of the factors deemed too critical.

Limitation of Weighted SWOT analysis of Heritage-Crystal Clean, Inc

This approach also suffers from one major drawback - it focus on individual importance of factor rather than how they are collectively important and impact the business holistically.

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Example of Weighted SWOT Analysis

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SWOT Worksheet & Template

If you like to do your own SWOT analysis or want to make your own Weighted SWOT SWOT matrix then feel free to download Fern Fort University SWOT Analysis Template.

References / Citations & Bibliography

• M. E. Porter, Competitive Strategy(New York: Free Press, 1980)
• A. D. Chandler, Strategy and Structure (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1962)
• O. E. Williamson, Markets and Hierarchies(New York: Free Press, 1975);
• L. Wrigley, Divisional Autonomy and Diversification (PhD, Harvard Business School, 1970)
• R. E. White, Generic Business Strategies, Organizational Context and Performance: An Empirical Investigation, Strategic Management Journal7 (1986)