BLUE OCEAN STRATEGY

Creating Blue Oceans

 Much of our readings over the past couple of classes involved business plans. “Positioning” and “Three Questions to ask about your brand” discussed the topic of brand positioning.

 When we look at the fast-food market alone, we see Subway, McDonald’s, Burger King, &c; when we look at the carbonated drinks market, Coca-Cola and Pepsi alone dominate 9 out of 10 of the top sellers. It makes it highly improbable that a new brand can break into this market, without creating and capturing new demand well beyond existing industry boundaries.

 Which brings to mind the “Blue Ocean Strategy”, a book that I had read earlier in the year. Unlike the articles that approached the competition head-on, this revolves around the idea of creating uncontested market space and making competition irrelevant. A ‘red ocean’ represents an ocean of all the industries in existence today in which cutthroat competition makes the ocean bloody whereas a ‘blue ocean’ denotes all the industries not in existence today, in which there is an opportunity for highly profitable growth.

 The book, obviously, does not talk about the difficulties in creating of ‘Blue Oceans’. In my opinion, this is easier said than done. This business plan has been thought out by many and the industries of the world are already cluttered with competition. How often, do we see a company like Apple attempt to seize the MP3 market by storm, or Starbucks, which gave coffee a whole new meaning?