Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. SWOT Analysis / Matrix

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SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool that can be used by Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. managers to do a situational analysis of the firm . It is a useful technique to understand the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. is facing in its current business environment.

The Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. is one of the leading organizatations in its industry. Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. maintains its dominant 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 organization 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 helps the managers of the Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. to develop four types of strategies:

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

Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. swot analysis / matrix

SWOT Matrix Strategies Objective

The core purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a company can use to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading organizations in its industry, Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. has numerous strengths that enable 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 Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. are –

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Superb Performance in New Markets – Core-Mark Holding Company, 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.
Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
Highly skilled workforce through successful training and learning programs. Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. is investing huge resources in training and development of its employees resulting in a workforce that is not only highly skilled but also motivated to achieve more.
Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.
Reliable suppliers – It has a strong base of reliable supplier of raw material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.
Strong Brand Portfolio – Over the years Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. has invested in building a strong brand portfolio. The SWOT analysis of Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. just underlines this fact. This brand portfolio can be extremely useful if the organization wants to expand into new product categories.
Strong dealer community – It has built a culture among distributor & dealers where the dealers not only promote company’s products but also invest in training the sales team to explain to the customer how he/she can extract the maximum benefits out of the products.
Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.

Weakness of Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Core-Mark Holding Company, 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 very good at product demand forecasting leading to higher rate of missed opportunities compare to its competitors. One of the reason why the days inventory is high compare to its competitors is that Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. is not very good at demand forecasting thus end up keeping higher inventory both in-house and in channel.
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.
Limited success outside core business – Even though Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. is one of the leading organizations in its industry it has faced challenges in moving to other product segments with its present culture.
Need more investment in new technologies. Given the scale of expansion and different geographies the company is planning to expand into, Core-Mark Holding Company, 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.
Days inventory is high compare to the competitors – making the company raise more capital to invest in the channel. This can impact the long term growth of Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc.
Organization structure is only compatible with present business model thus limiting expansion in adjacent product segments.
Investment in Research and Development is below the fastest growing players in the industry. Even though Core-Mark Holding Company, 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 Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. – External Strategic Factors

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New environmental policies – The new opportunities will create a level playing field for all the players in the industry. It represent a great opportunity for Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.
Stable free cash flow provides opportunities to invest in adjacent product segments. With more cash in bank the company can invest in new technologies as well as in new products segments. This should open a window of opportunity for Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. in other product categories.
Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. products by the state as well as federal government contractors.
The new technology provides an opportunity to Core-Mark Holding Company, 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.
Organization’s core competencies can be a success in similar other products field. A comparative example could be - GE healthcare research helped it in developing better Oil drilling machines.
Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.
The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. to increase its profitability.
New customers from online channel – Over the past few years the company has invested vast sum of money into the online platform. This investment has opened new sales channel for Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc.. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.

Threats Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. Facing - External Strategic Factors

New technologies developed by the competitor or market disruptor could be a serious threat to the industry in medium to long term future.
Increasing trend toward isolationism in the American economy can lead to similar reaction from other government thus negatively impacting the international sales.
Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc.’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
Liability laws in different countries are different and Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
Intense competition – Stable profitability has increased the number of players in the industry over last two years which has put downward pressure on not only profitability but also on overall sales.
Rising pay level especially movements such as $15 an hour and increasing prices in the China can lead to serious pressure on profitability of Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc.
The company can face lawsuits in various markets given - different laws and continuous fluctuations regarding product standards in those markets.
Growing strengths of local distributors also presents a threat in some markets as the competition is paying higher margins to the local distributors.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Core-Mark Holding Company, 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 Core-Mark Holding Company, 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 Core-Mark Holding Company, 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 Core-Mark Holding Company, 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 Core-Mark Holding Company, 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)