Sep '22
Case Folio
The IUP Journal of Management Case Studies
Focus
The first case, "Unilever's Sustainable Living Plan: Putting Sustainability at the Center of Business Strategy" by Shwetha Kumari and G V Muralidhara, is about Unilever's Sustainable Living Plan (SLP) and the progress made by the company till 2020, the final year of its 10-year plan. The Unilever SLP strategy was not successful in all sectors. Unilever had planned to halve the waste associated with the disposal of its products by 2020, but it managed to reduce it by only 34%. The company also could not reach its defined target regarding GHG emissions and water usage. In its endeavor to make the company sustainable and achieve all its SLP targets, Unilever would have to overcome several challenges.
The next case, "Sustainable Packaging Practices at The Better Packaging Co." by Hadiya Faheem and Sanjib Dutta, is about how a New Zealand-based sustainable packaging company sought to tackle the packaging waste crisis by providing sustainable packaging solutions. However, analysts felt that the packaging solutions provided by The Better Packaging Co. (TBPCo.) were 'not perfectly circular', meaning that the raw materials they used were not totally renewable and not all of them were compostable. How can TBPCo. make compostable packaging mainstream?
The third case, "Living Goods: Delivering Quality Healthcare and Empowering Women in Uganda" by K B S Kumar and Indu Perepu, talks about how a social enterprise in Uganda worked toward solving the challenges in making medicines available to patients. The medicines were not reaching the needy due to problems in last mile distribution. The enterprise brought in several improvements in the supply chain to deliver quality medicines at affordable prices at the doorstep of the patients.
The last case, "Britannia & Company Restaurant: Will the Legacy Come to an End?" by Joyee Chatterjee, is about a popular restaurant in Mumbai from the pre-independence era, operating in a commercial hub of the financial capital of India for the last 99 years. The restaurant was operating on a leased space which was terminated recently. It would have to be relocated, but that would mean losing the legacy of the brand. What are the options before the restaurant?
Consulting Editor
Unilever's Sustainable Living Plan: Putting Sustainability at the Center of Business Strategy
Unilever, of Anglo-Dutch parentage, owns a wide range of consumer product brands in foods, beverages, cleaning agents, and personal care products sold in over 190 countries. The company brought in Paul Polman (Polman), an outsider, as its CEO consequent to a fall in market share and its first ever profit warning in 2004. In 2010, Unilever started a new initiative called the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan (USLP) in response to major global trends the company had identified - growth in emerging markets, increasing population, environmental stress, digital revolution and changing (urbanization) demographics. However, it faced a backlash for environmental destruction. The USLP initiative covered not just Unilever's GreenHouse Gas (GHG) emissions, waste and water use but also the impact caused by its suppliers and consumers from agricultural growers to its packaging and waste water produced by consumers of its brands. Although Unilever celebrated the final year of its 10-year USLP in 2020, the strategy was not successful in all sectors as it faced many challenges. The question experts were asking was how Unilever would be able to make sustainable living commonplace and continue to be the leader in sustainable business worldwide. More »
Sustainable Packaging Practices at The Better Packaging Co.
The case is about New Zealand-based sustainable packaging company The Better Packaging Co. (TBPCo.). At a time when the world was experiencing an explosion in packaging due to rapidly increasing e-commerce businesses, TBPCo. sought to tackle the waste crisis by providing sustainable packaging solutions. One of the first products launched by the company was an innovative sustainable packaging solution-a courier satchel, known as the 'Real Dirt Bag', which was a direct alternative to plastic. The products were home compostable and biodegradable. The company's efforts went beyond packaging. For consumers who could not compost at home, TBPCo. started BCollected-a network of collection points which made it easier for consumers to compost the packaging they received from e-commerce companies using packaging from TBPCo. The packaging solutions provided by TBPCo. were 'not perfectly circular', meaning that the raw materials they used were not totally renewable and all of them were not compostable. Is there a greater need for design, creativity, and innovation to make TBPCo. a truly sustainable packaging business in future? Going forward, what should TBPCo. do to achieve its goal of making compostable packaging mainstream? More »
Living Goods: Delivering Quality Healthcare and Empowering Women in Uganda
Essential healthcare is unavailable in most underdeveloped and developing countries. The problem is more pronounced in Africa which accounts for 24% of the global disease burden. This drew the attention of Chuck Slaughter (Slaughter), a Yale alumnus; he started Living Goods, a social enterprise with exclusive focus on healthcare, in Uganda in 2006. Slaughter started distributing medicines in the hinterlands in the country through a team of Community Health Entrepreneurs (CHEs). He brought in several improvements in the supply chain and technology to deliver high quality medicines at the doorstep of the patients at a price that was lower than the price prevailing in shops. Slaughter was looking at replicating the model and scaling it to improve the health of over 34 million people across the world by 2021. This called for building supply chains, developing a huge network of CHEs, and getting help from funding agencies and the support of local NGOs, especially in countries where Living Goods has little or no presence. More »
Britannia & Company Restaurant: Will the Legacy Come to an End?
The case presents the story of Britannia & Company, a popular restaurant in Mumbai since pre-independence era. It provides information about the origin of the restaurant, its history and its current position. The restaurant had been operating in a commercial hub of the financial capital of India for the past 99 years. However, it was operating on a leased space which was terminated recently. The owner faced a dilemma on the way forward for the restaurant: whether it needed to be relocated or whether they should continue at the same place. Relocation would mean losing the legacy of the brand. Another key reason for the popularity of the restaurant was Boman Kohinoor, the late father of the current owner Afshin Kohinoor. His interactions and engagement with his customers had made him extremely popular. Boman used to narrate stories about the restaurant, crack jokes and interact with the customers. He used to carry a folder with laminated and some photocopied dog-eared documents. It included a letter from Queen Elizabeth. The restaurant also gained a lot of visibility in 2016 during Prince William and Kate Middleton's visit to India. The death of Boman Kohinoor had left a void. The restaurant was situated in the southern part of Mumbai where many of its competitors had also been operating since pre-independence era such as Kyani & Co., Cafe Military, Ideal Corner, Jimmy Boy, Cafe' Universal, Cafe' Excelsior, etc. Britannia & Company did not have any air-conditioning; the restaurant was adorned with imported Polish teak wood furniture and the wall color was green; but the paint peeled off in multiple areas. Since it was one of the oldest restaurants serving Parsi cuisine in the city of Mumbai, the restaurant was also visited by foreigners traveling to Mumbai and by celebrities. More »
Upload Articles
Click here
to upload your Articles
- HRM Review
- Marketing Mastermind
- Global CEO
- The IUPs World of IOT