Case study:

WHITE
HEAVEN
GARDEN
MERVE ALTAY

Summary
Introduction
Situation Analysis SWOT
Assumption And Missing nformation
Statement Of The Problems
Development Of Alternatives
Alternatives Evaluation And Recommendations
Implementation
Conclusion

1.WHITE HEAVEN GARDEN (WHG)

White Heaven Garden (WHG)

is a producer of Oyster

Mushroom & Some Kind of Organic Vegetables pre-ordered

by restaurants and hotels which is frequenters of it. It
founded in 2010, April. It has 10 plants (each one is 150
m2 of indoor place equipped with systems that set the
ambient

temperature,

ambient

humidity,

ventilation) for mushroom cultivation and

farmland for ordered vegetables.

also

make

1 acres of

WHG serves both the consumer market, as well as

restaurants hotels all over Turkey , also it has been planning
serve big hotels from Europe especially Spain and France,
therefore

it

made

stride

to

actualize

its

plans

via

communicating with a distributor company, in France, to

distribute their crops to Europe

3 months ago (2014,

September).
Merve Altay, the founder and owner of this market opportunity
and is prepared to seize it. Merve's relentless pursuit of
quality, combined with her extensive background in mushroom
cultivation and sheer passion will propel the business into
profitability.

Mission
White Heaven Gardens' main mission is to provide the
highest-quality mushrooms also, grow some specific kinds of
organic vegetables. In addition its some objectives are;
Maintain positive, steady growth each month.
Experience an increase in new customers who are turned
into long-term customers. Generate brand equity in the
domestic and foreign market.
It exists to attract and maintain customers so all stuff work
long hours a day meticulously as long as they keep working
in this way, accomplish its goals, success will be inevitable.

Market Summary
White

Heaven

possesses

good

Garden
Growth and Share(TURKEY)

information

Competitor

Price

the common attributes of ts

ABC
Gardens

10.132
milyon TL

most

WHG

about the domestic market

Growth
Rate
(20102014)
8%

Market
Share
(Turkey
)
37%

8.76
milyon TL
5.568
milyon TL
3.2
milyon TL

12%

35%

6%

18%

2%

10%

6.915
milyon TL

5.75%

and knows a great deal about

prized

and

loyal

customers.

White

Garden

leverage

will

information

to

Heaven
this
better

XYZ
Gardens
Other

Average

understand who are served,

their specific needs, and how
White
better
them.

Heaven

Garden

communicate

can
with

25%

Total
27.66
milyon TL

27%
100 %

2. SWOT Analysis
2.1.Strengths
Flexibility in meeting restaurant's needs. In the domestic market
WHG produce pre-ordered special organic vegetables for

steady

customers provided that they promised to buy that vegetable at

least 1 year .
High-quality products, which conforms to the Europeans standards
such

as

GFSI

(Global

Food

Safety

Initiative), HACCP(Hazard

Analysis and Critical Control Points), ISO 9001, exceed competitors

offerings of price, quality, and service.
Higher than industry margins due to production efficiencies.
Mushroom is a short-duration crop with high yield per unit time.
Technologies for value-added mushroom products have been
standardized and are ready for commercialization.
Small scale of horticultural holdings.

 Stuff is Well educated ( with an agricultural engineer, 30

stuff and owner who took mushroom cultivation courses
for 3 months before launching agriculture )
Increase

in

the

popularity

of

oyster

mushroom

cultvaton in Turkey but lots of them launch this field

just heard somewhere (TV, internet or some friends
interested in this issue) that how profitable growing
mushroom . And very few of them are educated and
professional in oyster mushroom.

2.2. Weaknesses
Lacking of brand equity : Although White Heaven Gardens have
been planning to exporting its crops, it lacks of brand equity in
Europe.
The existence of strong competitors in European market: The need
of oyster mushroom in Europe is provided by Greece and Spain and
they are the dominant players in this market so it is hard to prove
itself as an 4 years mushroom breeder.
European

people

hesitations

towards

Turkish

organic

producing conditions and standards.

A limited marketing budget to develop brand awareness.
The decreased degree of flexibility when near full production.

food

2.3.Opportunities

The ability to develop long-term commercial contracts which

should lower costs associated with production.
Development

of

mushroom

production

on

the basis

of

domestic and foreign demand,

Increasing consumer consciousness and demand for healthy,
quality and organic products,
Accessibility to European Union, and domestic funds,
Increasing government support to domestic growers.

2.4. Threats
Rising input prices in the world,
Europeans trust to major mushroom producers.
raising the awareness of people about the profits
of mushroom farming in turkey. Therefore increase
the number of oyster mushrooms grower.
Any Turkish entrepreneur hasnt been successful in
maintaining its existence in the foreign oyster
mushroom

market.

Therefore

there

is

successful company to hold up as an example

no

3.MISSING INFORMATIONS
What is the information about the mushroom company
made agreement before?
What was the duration from dealing up to failing ?
What was the domestic market share of WHG when it made
the agreement with the distributor company?
How much oyster mushroom is needed in foreign market?
What was the proposed price by WHG at that time?
What is the foreign competitors market share in European
oyster mushroom market?

4. PROBLEM STATEMENT
In 2012 October, WHG tried to export ts crops to Italy but it failed

in 3 months.

Greece and Spain that are the dominant players in this market and they supply
the biggest proportion of Europeans mushroom needs. It was difficult to attain a
place in the foreign market also WHG was a 2 years mushroom breeder, it wasnt
prove itself even in domestic market yet. Beside, its annual revenue wasnt as
much as it is now and it couldnt invest the enough money to make it visible in
foreign market. Because of these reasons , its venture remained inconclusive.
However the company took lessons these bad experience. It never gave up and
started to negotiations with a distributor company which is in France. Today It
prove itself in Turkey and it is the second biggest mushroom breeding company
with the 35% market share. Nevertheless, Europeans have some biases towards
Turkeys mushroom cultivation standards.
The problem statement for the WHGs case study is How to change European
mushroom distributor companies biases towards Turkey and be able to achieve to

5. ALTERNATIVES

1. Status quo
2. Terminate the agreement with the distributor company
and open dealership
3.

Increase the domestic income and bring down the

price in foreign market

6. EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES
6.1.Status Quo

The status quo option involves maintaining the current

business and marketing plan. Currently, WHG the second
biggest mushroom breeding company with

the 35%

market share and it has enough annual revenue to set up

this business. In addition after the failure , the company
spent two productive years containing lots of experience.

For these reasons

maintain the current foreign

marketing strategy sounds logical however it is a

short term soluton to this problem because
hasnt made a foreign market research

WHG

properly so

doesnt know the market needs exactly.

In many

ways like this, its status quo isnt ready to launch out.
I think it needs more time.

 6.2. Terminate The Agreement With The

Dstrubutor Company and Open Dealership;
if WHG makes extensive marketing research and obtain the
weaknesses of this market in Europe, it could terminate the
agreement

with

the

distributor

company

and

open

dealership ,so It would not share its profit with the distributor
company but it is TOO RSKY. Since it hasnt recognzed at the
market yet, it could not sell its product as much as it
assumes.

Oyster mushroom shelf life is 10 days therefore

it lose its freshness in a few days. If t couldnt sell the crops

in a short time, it would lose money. As its
experiment
opened.

previous

the dealership could be closed, as soon as

 6.3.Increase The Domestic Income and

Bring Down The Prices in Foreign Market
As long as,
it Divides the target markets as domestic and foreign
customers,

after that

identifies priority target as growth in the

domestic market
and develops a marketing strategy to supply the customers
needs,
it would increase the domestic income and annual revenue ,by
this way it can dominate in domestic market. And have enough
money to invest. To implement this strategy t needs time
should postpone the negotiation made
company.

with the distributor

For the sake of opening up foreign marketing , t should stop

to think to make profit for a while.
When t sends its high quality crops samples, approved from the
Europeans

standards

with

the

lowest

price

in

the

Europe

mushroom market to distributors, distributors must be satisfied to

negotiate with it .
After it proves its crops quality, it would start to sell them with
normal price.
It is a long term solution

so it needs more money and time

however, oyster mushroom is commonly used material in Europe's

hotels and restaurants, thus their oyster mushroom market is
rather big and profitable. Be sure that all the sacrifices
amortize themselves.

will

Alternatives

Status quo

criteria

Terminate the agreement

ncrease The Domestic

with the distributor company

ncome and Bring Down

and open dealership;

The Prices n Foreign

Market

Cost
Revenue
Addressing the
SWOT Analysis
Addressing the
Problem
Statement
TOTAL

3
2
2

2
1
1

1
3
3

10

1 = worst option
2 = not worst not best
3 = best option

Alternative scores
Best Alternative
ncrease The

Better Alternative

Worst Alternative

Status quo

Terminate the agreement

Domestic ncome

with the distributor

and Bring Down

company and open

The Prices n

dealership;

Foreign Market

From the evaluation of alternatives, the most suitable

alternative for WHG was selected. The alternative
which best coincided all the criteria is,
ncrease The Domestic ncome and Bring Down The
Prices n Foreign Market

7.IMPLEMENTATION OF THE BEST ALTERNATIVE

Implementation of the best opton steps are as follows:

1. Postpone/ terminate the current negotiation ,

2. Divide the target markets as domestic and foreign customers,
3. Identify priority target as growth in the domestic market,
4. Develop a marketing strategy to supply the customers needs,
increase the domestic income and annual revenue.

As shown on the Chart 1 WHG has

higher

growth

rate

than

its

competitors. Also its growth rate is

Chart 1: Growth and Share(TURKEY)

Competitor

Price

ABC Gardens

10.132
milyon TL
8.76
milyon TL
5.568
milyon TL
3.2
milyon TL

increasing gradually (Chart 2) and

the market share is close to
competitor. Even if it

first

maintains its

WHG

current state, it is easy to say ;

XYZ Gardens

t would

Other

market

dominate
in

implements

the mushroom

year.

When

it

the

steps

mentioned

above, it will obviously increase the

Average

the

Turkish

35%

6%

18%

2%

10%

5.75%

25%
27.66
milyon TL

mushroom

market.

12%

Total

grow rate and annual revenue and

dominate

6.915
milyon TL

Growth Rate Market

(2010-2014) Share
(Turkey)
8%
37%

27%
100
%

Chart 2:Market Analysis(TURKEY)

2010
Potential Customers
Hotel
Restaurant
Individual customers
Total

Growth
12%
8%
0%
11.99%

12,000
28
0
12,028

2011
13,440
30
0
13,470

2012
15,053
32
0
15,085

2013
16,859
35
0
16,894

2014
18,882
38
0
18,920

CAGR
12.00%
7.93%
0.00%
11.99%

5. While

increasing

domestic

income,

make

marketing research in target foreign countries as

well.
Here are the some common methods for conducting
primary

research

methods:

observation,

written

surveys, personal interviews, and test marketing

(offering your product on a limited basis in order to
evaluate potential sales).
6. After market research ,give advertisements which
stress the market needs and remedy to

this

needs , for developing visibility, get web design

specialist to design the current website again.
Whats more give advertisements in googleetc.

7. Start to negotiate with the previous distributor company

end other companies as well,
8. Submit the crops samples to the companies,
9. On condition that
the mushroom
limitations

Distributor company promises to buy

at least 1 year periodically in some

, make an agreement about selling the high

quality approved crops with the lowest price all over the
Europe for a period of 6 months.
10.Doing this, maybe at first you cant make enough profit
but it is the best way to attain a place in the market

 In order to implement the alternative decided upon, a Gantt

chart was developed to illustrate the sequence of events required
for the new strategy.

Here is the Gantt chart prepared for this study;

8. CONCLUSION
Through the investigation of WHG, the weaknesses of the business
were identified and potential courses of action to mitigate these
weaknesses were identified. Using a SWOT analysis, it was identified
that the main strength of the business was the difficulties to enter
foreign market.
It is noticed that the problem stems from the WHG lacks OF A
FOREGN marketing strategy. In order to address the problem
identified, three alternatives were identified. And when they are
evaluated, Increase The Domestic ncome

and Bring Down The

Prices n Foreign Market opton was chosen as a best soluton.

Provided that the best alternatve is implemented As shown in

the Gantt chart, WHG would be able to gain a place in the

European oyster mushroom market. Besides t would ensure its long

QUESTIONS?

THANK YOU