Ahmed Ashraf Salah

Marwan Ashraf
Dina Ahmed Fawzy
Doniya Fawzy

C Marwa Maher
Marwa Refaat
CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

Introduction:
In this report, we are going to talk about the marketing plan of one of the
Egyptian companies, which is Corona which is considered as a heritage in
Egypt. The company has seen major success in its first 50 years of
operations but unfortunately, lately, the company has been suffering from
quality & marketing problems that affected the financial position of the
company. At the end, we will mention our suggestions to enhance the
marketing plan of the company.

History of Corona:
The Alexandria confectionary & chocolate company – corona was
established in 1919 by Tommy Khresto, becoming the first confectionary &
chocolate company in the Egyptian market. It was nationalized in 1936 &
became the icon of the public sector in sweet snacks; soon it became
close to all Egyptian consumers. Then, it was privatized in 2000, bought
by one of the leading private holdings, which is Samy-Saad group holding
company that has diversity within the Egyptian market & beyond. Now
Corona is known with its nostalgic portfolio within many snacking
categories with famous brands like chocolate Rocket, Bimbo, cocoa,
wafers, biscuits, candies, toffees & gums.

Size and location of the company:

Corona is a big company, when it was first founded its location was in
Ismailia, Egypt, but later the factory moved to Alexandria, Boualino street
in Moharram Bey area. After this, in the thirties of the last century, Corona
moved to its current headquarter on the canal Mahmudiyah.

:The products of Corona

:Products of Corona are classified into different categories
:Chocolate-1
 Milk chocolate and hazelnuts
 Cooking chocolate (Coverture Chocolate)
 Dark chocolate

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 CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

 Lite chocolate
 Napolitan Mint chocolate
 Sando flavored chocolate
 Rocket
 Spread chocolate
2-Biscuits:
 Bimbo
 Mary
 Negrita
 Wafer
3-Cocoa powder
4- jelly candies:
 Valda
 Gummies for kids

Mission:
“We pledge to provide the Egyptian market with a high-quality portfolio of
biscuits, chocolate, cocoa & jelly; while promoting our consumer to build
delightful moments of joy.” In our opinion, this mission statement is
somehow myopic because it is product oriented & focuses only on the
products of the factory.

Vision:
To be the challenger Egyptian confectioner producer, with a strategic role
in middle east and Africa. To make Corona become a future umbrella mega
brand in Egypt and beyond.

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 CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

The organizational structure of the company:

Chairman
Basel Sami Saad

General Manager
Engineer Mourad
Samy

Marketing Supply Chain

Operation Director Sales Director
Director Manager
Ahmed Salama Mahmoud Ibrahim
Doaa saleh Ahmed Samir

The company is a corporate between engineer Sami Saad (owns 70% of

the assets) & the government (owns 30% assets as labor). The company
operates a factory in Alexandria & has 13 distribution branches in Egypt
covering 35,000 outlets. now the total employees’ number is around 600
employees at different levels & different locations
Competition:
Corona faces direct and indirect competition. Concerning the direct there
are factories that produce the same products that Corona produces
whereas for the indirect competition, it includes competitors that don’t
produce the same product as the company but it produces products that
take from the market share of the company
First the direct competition:
Corona products Competitor products
Corona chocolate bar Galaxy, Cadbury, Mars.
Cocoa powder Nesquik,Dream cocoa powder,
Hintz cocoa powder
Bimbo Ulker, Lambada
Wafer Shamadan, lambada.

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 CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

Second the indirect competition: includes jelly beans mini cakes such as Todo and Twinkies

Marketing functions performed by the Marketing

department:
In our opinion, Coronas’ marketing department needs more development
in order to enhance the product image in the mind of consumers, as well
as capturing more market share. They also need to enhance their IMC
(integrated marketing communication) plan to spread the awareness of
the brand among the new generations & to retain its current customers as
well. Here are some of the marketing strategies applied by the marketing
department
Brand management: Corona is trying to improve the brand image by
making quality enhancements. For example, they developed the
packaging of the chocolate from paper wrap to foil wrap which preserves
more hygiene & makes it more standardized. Corona also tries to develop
new showroom designs to be able to compete & support the new brand
image.
Trade marketing: is a form of B2B marketing the objective of the trade
marketing is to sell products to companies who can then go on to sell
those items to their customers. The aim of it for Corona is to increase
demand for their product with supply chain partners. For example, they do
promotions on large quantities that are estimated at 10% discount on
quantities of 100K which will give them a competitive advantage over
their competitors to have more presence.
Public relations: their objective is to show their new strong financial
capabilities, to be seen way more, to push positive feedback to 12% of the
total target market through contribution in social responsibilities & to have
a stronger & firmer company image by having articles written about itself
in the newspaper. Some of the tactics they made are the sponsorship of
big media events like (the voice kids), as these strong media events have
a strong impact, huge media coverage & reflects a positive image; which
will help by participating to strengthen the image of the brand & have a

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better consumer perception. They also created a football league among

teenagers between “12-15” which helped them push their image to
younger generations.
Personal selling: depends on the skills of their workforce, the seller
promotes the product through his/her attitude, appearance & special
product knowledge. He/her aim to inform & encourage the customer to
buy or at least try the product, also rent potential places inside the stores
or shelf places in key account customer stores.
Sales: the main objective for sales promotion is to acquire a huge sales
volume, making their selling offers for hypermarkets a lot more attractive
to push it forward over their competitors & innovative sales promotion
techniques that increase the desire for their chocolate. One of the sales
tactics done by the company is that they made a new product called
chocolate bites; an item which will be conducting more market presence,
as it is going to be distributed to cashiers in hypermarkets & used instead
of money change ensuring that people would see Corona more often &
memorize its name. They also have selling chocolate machines in railway
stations, super gets, kiosks in front of schools & entertaining places.
Offers with the beginning of the schools (with each large bar of chocolate
a gift, Corona-branded pens, erasers, colored pencils). However,
promotions don’t generate loyalty by any means but generate huge sales
volume; which is not only the main target that promotions seek but also,
to be seen by customers’ way more often.
Advertising: by making TV, radio & print ads to remind the consumers of
Corona, always keep them in touch with the brand & with the message
they want to deliver. The total budget for advertising is 7,250 million
pounds
Television: 5 million pounds (3 million ads +2 million cost of creating the
Ads )
Print: 1.25 million pounds
Digital/ social: 100,000 pounds
Outdoor: 500,000 pounds
Radio: 400 million pounds

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How does Corona achieve the two-fold goal of marketing?

In order to attract new customers Coronas’ value proposition is,
“products are always accompanied with top quality ingredients, 100%
chocolate & no artificial flavors”. All the products are made of 100%
chocolate; as Corona already owns a cocoa bean processing facility. In
addition, corona doesn’t use any artificial flavors; therefore, the chocolate
has a shorter shelf life compared to other brands. They also use top
quality ingredients to ensure that customers receive the best chocolate
possible. This value proposition helps attract more customers. In our
opinion, Corona succeeds in retaining their current customers by
achieving customer satisfaction, as the perceived quality & taste of the
chocolate matches the buyer’s expectations.
Is corona a smart company:
In our opinion, Corona doesn’t exceed customer expectations, they deliver
what they promise the customers exactly not more not less. Corona sets
the right level of expectations; it doesn’t under promise nor over promise.
This can be seen in its value proposition which is high-quality chocolate at
the same price range of the competitors. Corona doesn’t exceed customer
expectations; they meet those expectations achieving customer
satisfaction. Regarding proactivity, it has two aspects, the first aspect is
reacting to problems & placing greater emphasis on forward-thinking
strategic planning. The second aspect is social responsibility. Regarding
the first aspect, Corona makes reasonably effective projections based on
thorough analysis. They effectively plan for potential problems, market
evolutions, trends & consumer expectations before they develop; by
performing consumer research they carry out both qualitative research &
quantitative research. The results of one of their surveys will be attached.
They also carry out product test trials in order to attract the new
customers in their own sellers & the key stores. Also, they ask for the
customers’ feedback & their suggestions to improve the products. As for
the second aspect of productivity, we know there are four types of social
responsibility, we would like to focus mainly on the direct philanthropic
giving that includes the donation of money, time & resources to charities

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& organizations. Corona adopts an accommodating stance; it satisfies all

the legal requirements & attempts to meet ethical standards. Examples of
their participation to the social community offered gifts for the patients in
57357, participated in events at schools & created a football league
among the teenagers between “12-15” which reflect the image of the
company being keen on the wellbeing of the society & pushing Corona’s
image to younger generations. So, we consider Corona as a smart
company in the case of proactivity.
Boston Consulting Group matrix:

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 CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

Corona mainly has five product lines: chocolate, biscuits, spread chocolate

Marke ,cocoa & jelly they divide their SBUs according to products
t
growth
rate
high

low

lo
high low

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CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

Star⭐ Question Mark❓

(spread chocolate,Corona (Bimbo negrita,Bimbo chocobite,magic
chocolate, corona crispy
waffer,Mint chocolate,hazelnut chocolate )
chocolate,Valda jelly )

Dog�
Cash cow�� (Rocket chocolate,Flavored
(Original bimbo, Butter chocolate , chocolate,lux cocoa)
Cocoa powder,Negrita,Mary Biscuits )

Relative Market Share

Question Marks:
They are newly launched products that the company would decide
whether to develop them and grow them into stars or whether to phase
them out they have high market growth rate and low relative market
share. Companies should invest heavily in stars in order to figure out
whether they will move leftwards and turn into stars or whether the
investment won’t pay off and drop in the dog quadrant so they need to
figure this out as fast as possible . after analyzing corona’s SBUs we found
that there are new version of Bimbo recently launched such as the: Bimbo
Negrita , Bimbo Chocobite and bimbo extra chocobite. They are also
considered as line filling as they are a sort of development to the old
authentic bimbo that people are familiar with for the hope of reviving the
old Bimbo and repeating its cycle again turning it to a star. Another
question mark is a newly launched chocolate called “Magic” this chocolate
mainly targets lower income groups it is about 30 gms chocolate for 3 L.E
so this is considered line stretching as it aims at targeting new segments.
Another question mark is the Corona Crispy chocolate which is similar to
the milk chocolate but with crisps inside to add a more modern twist to
the original chocolate. The last question mark is the new hazelnut

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chocolate which is also considered a line filling of the product line of

chocolate in general .In our opinion regarding the question marks Corona
should analyze each SBU according to its attractiveness and market share
and decide which to invest in more and which to phase out we suggest
that they do more development and investment regarding the new
versions of bimbo because they will be profitable for the company as
people already know Bimbo so they would be keen on trying new versions
of it . Regarding magic chocolate, we see that it is creates a competitive
edge for the company because the prices of chocolate now in Egypt are
very high so it is quite amazing to find high quality chocolate with three
pounds so we suggest that they develop this product more in order to
grow its market share and turn it into star. Regarding the crispy and
hazelnut chocolates they should also invest in them because other
competitors such as Cadbury and galaxy have such versions so they must
keep them in order to be able to compete. The sales and market share for
these products are quite low so we don’t have the exact information about
the sales and the market share.
Stars:
The most emerging product of Corona in the current stage is the spread
chocolate this product when it was first launched it was not profitable
enough because it wasn’t so popular and it didn’t receive much attention
in the market it was launched in February 2018 but in November 2018 the
sales of the spread increased unexpectedly .The main competitors of the
spread chocolate in the market are Nutella, Nussa, Nucream so we
suggest that corona invest heavily in developing the spread chocolate in
order to be able to compete with those giant competitors . we also
suggest that they lower its price a little bit in order to be able to penetrate
the market of spread chocolate. The market share of the spread chocolate
is relatively low taking into considerations other competitors but it is
increasing as the sales increases. The second star is Corona wafer this
product gained its popularity because it offers very high-quality relative to
local competitors such as Lambada and Shamadaan so it filled this gap in
the wafer market in Egypt. Another star is the mint chocolate in our

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opinion this product succeeded to be a star due to its prestigious

positioning that the company gave it Corona sells this type of chocolate at
a relatively higher price actually this product competes with the known
“After eight” Nestlé chocolate. The last star is the valda jelly this product
also became popular because the market doesn’t include any other high
quality local brands for the mint jelly but this product is mainly targeting
adults.
Cash cows:
cash cows are considered the main source of cash to the company it
includes the SBUs that generate the cash that the company uses to invest
in and develop other SBUs. Mainly, Corona has three cash cows the first
one is the most popular product of Corona since Corona was established
which is the original Bimbo which is a nostalgic product that people used
to buy several years ago it occupies 10 % of the market and as we
mentioned before the company launched new versions of bimbo aiming
at reviving the product and repeating its cycle and return in it back to the
star in order not to end up as a dog so we see that the company has made
the right strategy concerning Bimbo. The second cash cow is the original
butter chocolate of corona the main competitors of the milk chocolate are
Cadbury and galaxy. So, Corona launched new sizes of this chocolate for
different prices in order to make it available for all income and social
classes in our opinion corona must carry out improvements to the quality
and the taste of this chocolate because it faces a fierce competition with
those market giants so they must devote more investment on the
research and development of such a vital product and carry out more
market research and customer survey to know what improvements can be
made to this product. The third cash cow is the corona cocoa powder it is
the second player in the market after Nesquick it nearly occupies 25% of
the cocoa market in Egypt relative to other cocoa imported brands such as
Hintz and Cadbury corona cocoa’s price is considered reasonable which
adds a competitive edge for the product as the cocoa market in Egypt is
not saturated enough. Another cash cow is a chocolate coated biscuit
called “Negrita” it is similar to bimbo but it is all chocolate it occupies a

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large market share and generate quite good sales for the company. The
last cash cow is the Mary biscuits which is plain tea biscuits there are
many local and international brands producing this product under the
same name as well “Mary”. In our opinion Corona must focus more on this
product by adding new flavors and focusing more on its quality in order to
keep it in the cash cow stage as long as possible and to milk them as
much as they can before they eventually move to the dog quadrant.
Dog:
They are low growth rate low market share products that generate the
cash only needed to maintain themselves an example for this is Rocket
chocolate when launched in its early stages rocket was very popular and
loved by people but now its sales has dropped a lot in our opinion this
drop in sales is obviously because of some defects in the product itself so
we suggest that Corona carry out market surveys in order to spot out what
is wrong with product and modify it and if the trials were in vain we
suggest that they divest this product because it creates a burden over the
company and doesn’t generate much revenue. The second dog is the
“Sando” flavored chocolate by this product corona wanted to compete
with the international chocolates such as “Ritter sport” and “Lindt” by
making flavored chocolate but obviously the trial wasn’t successful
enough because they couldn’t make it with the standardized taste of the
flavored chocolate so people don’t buy them as much as they were
expected to be bought the flavored chocolate dropped into the dog
quadrant very fast and it didn’t even pass by the star or the cash cow and
it dropped in the dog quadrant after it was launched . The last dog that
the company already got rid of is the “LUX” cocoa which was a cocoa
powder produced to target lower income segments at lower quality than
the original cocoa powder but it didn’t actually face a promising market
and it wasn’t successful so the company decided to divest it this dog also
didn’t pass by the other stages the star and the cash cow but it
immediately dropped from the question mark to the dog directly so the
company phased it out as soon as possible.
Is Corona a strong, weak or a fair company?

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In our opinion after assessing the BCG matrix we think that Corona is a
strong company because it has five cash cows which can generate enough
cash for the company in order to support and develop other SBUs so those
five cash cows are considered a strong base for the company to rely on.
Concerning the stars, they have 4 stars that are actually facing a growing
market and they are expected to move to the cash cow when their market
growth rate declines. They succeeded to turn the good question marks
into stars because they were actually trying to fill the market gaps and
tackle markets that are unsaturated so they succeeded in turning them
into stars. Regarding the dogs, we think that Corona follows the best
strategies in dealing with them as they already phased out the
unprofitable dogs that creates a burden over the company. As for the
question marks Corona has many of them actually some of them are new
versions and flavors of old products and some of them are completely new
so they must invest in them heavily in a short period of time in order to
figure out which will face an increasing growth rate and which will fall into
the Dog quadrant.
Distribution:
Corona has 13 distribution channels that cover 35,000 outlets its
distribution is classified into two types the first one is direct distribution
through the key accounts and hyper markets such as Carrefour and Metro.
The second one is indirect distribution through sales men and
warehouses. They also have their own outlets accounting for six branches
which represents 1% of their distribution. In our opinion, the sales force of
Corona as a large company is weak as there is low availability through
limited numbers of outlets and poor showroom orientation and
inconvenient trade oriented promotions and offers. Thus, we suggest that
corona must at least reach 30 distribution centers over the country to be
distributed mainly over Cairo, Giza & Alex to cover almost 50% of different
outlet types (hypermarkets, supermarkets, large & small groceries and
kiosks), Develop new show room designs to be able to compete and
support the new brand image, implement contracts with the potential
wholesalers to be their distributors for the small groceries all over Egypt.

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CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

Supply chain:
The company gets its packaging material, flour and sugar from local
suppliers whereas the cocoa and the dairy products are imported to
ensure their quality. In addition to this Corona has its own cocoa bean
processing facility so it imports the cocoa beans because Egypt’s climate
is not suitable for growing the cocoa beans which means more costs over
the company. Then the raw materials are processed by machines supplied
by El Tarek machinery corporation.LTD. They get from them all the
machines the printing machine, the blowing film machine, the sealing and
cutting machine, recycling machine and punching machine. After the raw
materials are processed into finished products they are packaged, the
packaging materials are mainly purchased from local firms in Egypt then
they are transported to the 13 distribution channels that we mentioned
before covering 35,000 outlets around Egypt. Through direct distribution
through key accounts as the hyper markets and super markets and
indirect distribution through warehouses.so this is the journey of the
product from the raw materials till it reach the final consumer.
STP
Segmentation:
Corona uses multiple segmentation bases in an effort to identify smaller
better-defined target groups they use:
Demographic Segmentation:
Firstly, they segment by age regarding the Jelly category they have two
products one for the kids from age 2 years to 10 years called “Gummies”
and other mint jelly especially for adults called “Valda”. Another example
of age segmentation is the spread chocolate they make two types the first
one is the hazelnuts spread chocolate made for the adults and can be
used for household purposes and mainly target the house wives there is
also another version of the spread chocolate made for the school kids that
contains vitamins to promote proper growth of the kids. They also
segment their market based on the income they produce high quality
products for high income customers with high prices such as the spread
chocolate , Mint chocolate , and the Sando flavored chocolate they also

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produce lower quality products at lower prices for low income customers
such as magic chocolate which costs only 3 LE and “lux” cocoa powder
another type of income segmentation is that they produce small sizes of
the original chocolates at lower prices so they would be able to target
lower income classes .
Psychographic segmentation: Corona also segments its market on
psychographic bases according to the lifestyle and personality. corona
produces different chocolate flavors and types that suits different
personalities and life styles such as the mint chocolate the strawberry and
lemon chocolates. they also made lite chocolate which is a sugar free, low
fat chocolate produced to target the segment of people who are following
a diet and want to be healthy so this type is designed for people with
healthy lifestyle. They are targeting Egyptian people who support the
Egyptian products and those who love old nostalgic products and this is
quite obvious in their slogan"‫"طعم حبيناه و بنعيش معاه‬.
Behavioral segmentation: Moving on to the behavioral segmentation
the first one is the Occasion segmentation such as back to school
corona offers certain promotions and promo packs at the times of back to
school it also gives away pencil cases and other stationary carrying the
logo of Corona this is also used to push corona’s image to younger
generations. Corona also segment the market based on the User status
they made a product for first time user which is the chocolate bites which
is going to be distributed to cashiers in hypermarkets and used instead of
small money change at a price of one pound so it is produced mainly to
allow users to try the chocolate and turn the first-time users into regular
users of the product. They also segment the market based on the usage
rate into light, medium and heavy users of the product this is obvious in
the different sizes of the chocolate they offer some sizes that are suitable
for family use, others for kids, others for adults and so on. we can consider
also that Corona segments the market based on the Benefits sought
they produce another type of chocolate called the coverture chocolate
which is a cooking chocolate that is used in making cakes and other
bakery so it mainly targets house wives and young mothers. Corona also

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 CORONA MARKETING PLAN 12/19/2018

provides two types of Cocoa the first one is drinking chocolate powder
that is used to make hot chocolate and the second type is the raw cocoa
powder which is used in household purposes such as bakery and sweets
and not used for drinking as chocolate drink so each product gives a
different benefit

Variables  Specifications  Target customers 

Jelly: Gummies jelly for kids, Valda jelly for adults.

Age
Spread chocolate: Hazelnut spread chocolate for adults and 

mothers, spread chocolate for kids containing vitamins.

Demographic 
Higher income class: high quality expensive products as: Mint
chocolate,sando chocolate
Income
Lower income class: Magic chocolate for 3 pounds and “lux”
cocoa

Different flavors of chocolate to fit different tastes and

Personality
preferences of people
Psychographic 

Lifestyle Light chocolate for people who follow a healthy lifestyle

Back to school they offer promotions and giveaway stationery 
Occasions
for school kids  

Raw cocoa powder for household use and bakery, drinking

Behavioral 
chocolate powder for chocolate drinks
Benefits sought
Dark chocolate for people who are allergic to lactose in milk so
they can eat chocolate

Usage rate Different sizes of chocolates for light, heavy and medium users

Chocolate bites used at the cashiers to be given instead of 

 User status  change produced to attract non­users and turn them into first 

time and current users 

Targeting:

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Corona follows a differentiated targeting strategy as they target each

different segment with a different product that fits the needs of this
segment. The first segment they target is the school kids with the
“gummies” jelly, corona milk chocolate, bimbo …etc. The second segment
is the young mothers they target them with the “coverture” cooking
chocolate, raw,cocoa powder and the spread chocolate. The third segment
is the old people who are familiar with Corona products they target them
with bimbo and the old well-known Corona products. the fourth segment is
the lower-class people they target them with “magic chocolate”, “lux
cocoa”. They also target Egyptian people who support the Egyptian
products and those who love old nostalgic products. They also target
healthy people with their lite and dark chocolates.
In our opinion, the differentiated targeting strategy of Corona is a well-
established strategy because it serves each segment in a different way
compatible with their needs and wants although this strategy might be
expensive for the company but it results in higher sales and stronger
position within each market segment.
Positioning:
Corona differentiate themselves with serving their target segment by
delivering good value and quality for an affordable price versus the
positioning of their competitors such as Cadbury which has a brand
recognition (good product and quality at high prices)
And other unidentified local brands that offer poor quality at cheap price.
So, we can conclude that Corona follows a same for less positioning
strategy as relative to other competitors, Coronas’ prices can be
considered reasonable. The brand image that corona wants to draw in the
minds of consumers is that Corona is the brand which gives good quality
with different flavors (based on heritage and taste of our memories), for
an affordable price (cheaper than Cadbury but more than the local
brands), using their slogan "‫ "طعم حبناه و بنعيش معاه‬which focuses on the
company’s nostalgic portfolio becoming close to all the Egyptian
consumers’ hearts triggering desire. The value proposition for Corona is
“…products are always made with top quality ingredients ,100% chocolate

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and no artificial flavors” so this is the set of benefits that corona promises
to deliver to its customers to satisfy their needs so this is the way they
want to be positioned and perceived in the minds of the target consumers
Marketing Environment:
The marketing environment consists of the actors and forces outside
marketing that affects the marketing management ability to build and
maintain successful relationships with target customers. The marketing
environment is classified into Microenvironment consists of the actors
close to the company that affects its ability to serve its customers.
Consists of: the company, suppliers, marketing intermediaries,
competitors, publics and customers. Regarding Corona, the top
management is considered really weak because there are some
management positions that are currently vacant which would negatively
affect the company and its strategic planning as currently the company
has vacancy in the position of the CFO and the HR manager. Regarding
the finance of the company it is quite deteriorated Workers claimed that
upon Privatization Company owned 1.2 M L.E unpacked products, 1M L.E
raw materials and 2 M L.E finished products. They also claimed that
Samcrete withdrew 7 M L.E from depositors of Corona and reinvested in
other companies. Third claim was Samcrete took a loan 25 M L.E for
Corona but reinvest in other companies. Regarding the research and
development, the company decided to sell some assets for product
development and human resources, in return Corona started a new quality
system that comply with ISO 9002 requirements, and hired good calibers
in the market. The second component of the microenvironment is the
suppliers regarding the local suppliers they don’t form a threat over the
company but with international suppliers their might be a threat due to
the high exchange rate regarding the competitors of corona the main
competitor for the milk chocolate is Cadbury , for the cocoa powder is
nesquick ,for bimbo ulker and regarding the wafer the main competitors
are shamadaan and lambada According to the chocolate Market studies in
Egypt we found that: kraft owns 47% market size, Mars owns 26%, Nestle
owns 10% and others including Corona owns 17%. So, corona obviously

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faces fierce competition with those international and local brands because
its competitors are quite strong so they must invest more in research and
development and design a completely new strategic plan concerning the
future of the company. On the other side the macro-environment
represents the larger societal forces that affect the micro environment
such as the political, socio-cultural, technological and natural for the
political the recent direction of the government toward protecting the
Egyptian production this would definitely have a positive impact on the
company. Regarding the economic environment, the Devaluation of the
Egyptian pound gives the company an opportunity to export this would
positively impact corona as it gives it the opportunity to expand
internationally and export its products. another trend is the currency
exchange problems this might affect the company when importing the
cocoa and the dairy products from the international suppliers which will
have a negative effect on the company.
Another trend in the Egyptian economy is the hyperinflation which will
oblige the company to raise the chocolate prices which might affect the
demand and subsequently the sales of the company. Marketing director at
Corona, said that the company raised the prices of its products by 5% in
2016 and by 10% in 2017, then by 5% early this year. He added that the
volume of company sales fell by 20% last year, noting that the company
aims to, once again, return to Arab and African markets following 8 years
of hiatus, so as to offset the decline in local sales. As for the sociocultural
environment, there are three trends that might have an effect on the
company the first trend is the change in life style toward more healthy
and green. As people nowadays want to be fit and healthy so this might
affect the chocolate and confectionary market negatively in general. The
second trend is that most Egyptians nowadays want to support the
Egyptian products and the made-in-Egypt products in order to support the
Egyptian economy so this would positively affect corona as an Egyptian
brand. The last sociocultural trend is the increase in birthrates last years
in Egypt which means larger market which means more demand. One of
the natural factors is that Egypt environment is not suitable for cultivating

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the coco beans which will lead to importing the raw material which means
increased costs over the company so this has a negative impact on the
company.
Website:
Corona has a website but it doesn’t offer any services it is a sort of
building awareness about the brand as in the website they mention the
history of the company , the product categories and some recipes to be
tried using Corona products in our opinion Corona must use its website
more wisely for example by offering job opportunities ,by giving their
consumers the chance to write their suggestions and complaints on the
website by showing their financial position sales, revenues in order to
attract investors .
Pricing:
Corona adopts different pricing strategies for each product category
regarding the biscuits and the cocoa powder the company sets low prices
for high quality products so it follows a penetration strategy in order to be
able to compete with its strong competitors in this area. Regarding the
chocolate, we see that it adopts skimming strategy as it offers low quality
relative to other competitors such as Cadbury and galaxy at high prices so
we suggest they lower the price in order to be able to cope with their
competitors. Corona adopts a premium pricing strategy with one product
which is the mint chocolate which costs 22 pounds but in exchange for
that price it is a very high-quality chocolate and it is known for its
prestigious positioning. The company adopts economic pricing strategy
with some of their products in order to be able to reach lower income
segments as it sets low prices for low quality in return such as “magic”
chocolate and “lux” cocoa powder.
Promotional tools:
Sales Promotion:
(A total budget of 6.45M EGP)
Objective:
The main objective for sales promotion is to acquire a huge sales volume,
making their selling offers for hyper market a lot more attractive to push it

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forward over their competitors and innovational sales promotional

techniques that increases the desire for their chocolate and drives
consumers for Corona this will all be responsible for 36% of the total
target sales revenue and increasing brand awareness by 16%.
Sales tactics:
Their tactics here are divided into two parties B2B and B2C:
- Starting with B2B Promotions on large quantities that is estimated at
10% discount on quantities of 100k and above which will give us a
competitive advantage over our competitors to have more presence. (This
will stand for 1.2M EGP of their sales budget) (This will achieve sales of
13% of the total sales volume during the whole year)
- "It takes one Pound to touch happiness" It is a new innovative
promotional idea with which they are trying to increase the level of desire
to their chocolate and making a lot more attractive for kids and teenagers
where you put a one pound coin into a machine and press a button that
drops liquid chocolate straight into your mouth. (They will be operating 5
machines at a total cost of 500k EGP) including all expenditures as this
will make a huge drive for kids to remember the experience of using
Corona for further purchases in the future as it will be located mainly in
mall kiosks and hyper markets we believe (this will push our sales by 7%
especially among younger generations).
- Chocolate bites are going to be another item with which we will be
conducting some more market presence and holding Corona's name at the
mind of our consumers continuously as it is going to be distributed to
cashiers in hyper markets and used instead of small money change it will
be a one chocolate bite at a selling price of half a pound. This will be a
great tool that people get to see us way more often and memorize our
name and try consequently to push Corona into people's preferable list
(this we believe will increase our brand and product awareness by 5%)
Moving along to B2C offers that we believe are very critical and crucial for
large quantities selling mainly in large events like New Year’s Eve,
Valentine's day, Mother’s Day, summer vacations and Egyptian valentine's
day.

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- Offers of buy 3 get 1 free which in events (They this believe will make
them acquire a sales volume of 7% of their total target quantity alone in
these main events). (This will cost them 4M EGP for extra gifts on 2.5M
chocolate bar).
-Sales Promotions and presence in summer vacations is very important
since their message is to deliver happiness and they need to be there
where people are most happy. There are free giveaways of chocolate bar
through promotional kiosks in summer vacations like Alexandria, Ras El
Bar, North Coast and Hurghada. People will need to like our face book
page as well for an extra gift of Corona Pencils or an extra Corona bar or
some school items to attract children and it will be done though lottery for
better excitement (These kiosks with the giveaways will hold 750k EGP to
distribute 200K chocolate bars at a cost of 2 EGP each and the additional
gifts) (This will contribute by at least 4% of total sales volume)
Sales promotion does not generate loyalty by any means but generates
huge sales volume which is not the only main target that they seek, their
main purpose here is to be able to be seen by customers way more often,
they need them to buy their chocolate and go around with it and their kids
and the family and everyone gets to see that you are eating Corona as
this will drive more desire and need for Corona chocolate later and
showing our customer our presence and that we are everywhere since
through their survey they have noticed that almost all of the kids who did
the survey had no clue what Corona is and never heard of and adults had
never heard about Corona for at least over a year which was kind of
shocking and they wanted to change that.
Publicity & public relations:
(A total budget of 3.42M EGP)
Objective:
Through Publicity they would like to show their new strong financial
capabilities and to be seen way more and pushing a positive feedback to
12% of the total target market through contribution in social
responsibilities and having a stronger and a firmer company image by
having articles written about Corona in newspaper.

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Publicity tactics
- Sponsorship of big time media events like "The voice kids" as these
strong media events has a strong impact and huge media coverage and
reflects a positive image which will help by participating to strengthen the
image of their chocolate and having a better consumer perception. (The
show will help contribute with 8% of our total sales volume) (sponsoring
the show will cost 2M EGP)
- Creating a football league among teenagers between "12-15" which will
help us to push corona's image to younger generations and keep
reminding their target customers with their name which will lead them to
branding Corona eventually. (The football league holding will cost 500k
EGP) (will contribute with 2% of total sales)
- Again, with pushing corona's name and brand and awareness through
their target customers by giving away pencil cases which will be seen in
school by other classmates from similar and close age range. (The
giveaways will cost 450k EGP for a cost of 50 EGP per case) (will
contribute with 2.25% of total sales)
- 48 articles written a year by 4 a month that will cost about 480K EGP and
that will contribute in brand awareness and promotion by 6% and will be
mainly be in El- Ahram and El-Shabab magazines as these newspapers
have a direct relationship with our direct market.
Direct Marketing:
(A total budget of 400k EGP)
Objective:
Mainly focused on increasing brand and product awareness and the ability
to reach 100k customers monthly through SMS and illustrating the
benefits of eating chocolate
daily through E-mails.
Direct marketing- Tactics
- E-mails that are going to focus on increasing brand and focus awareness
through pushing valuable information about eating chocolate and the
nutritious value of chocolate which will be mainly sent to parents to push
their kids for eating Corona over other competitors.

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(will contribute with 1% of total sales) and increasing brand and product
awareness by 5%.
- Sending 1,2M SMS to 100K consumer a month between "11-20" years at
a cost of 400k pounds
Personal Selling:
(A total budget of 2.58M EGP)
This very sensitive way because it depends on selling skills of our sales
force. So The sellers promote the product through their attitude,
appearance and specialist product knowledge. They aim to inform and
encourage the customer to buy, or at least try the product.
Objective:
They want to increase their product sales by 65 % by personal selling with
recruit a huge sales team consisting of 45 sales excusive & 5 sales
supervisor so cover all area in Egypt By
1-Putting a hard target and monitor the supervisor to activate this target
2-Compansation and incentive regulation for increasing sales and achieve
their target
3- Set a corona day in the clubs and meeting point
4-Personal promotion for huge market and retailer
Our opinion:
To an extent, Corona does believe in marketing. But not as much as it
should. Corona is more of product oriented, it develops a product, launch
it into void, then see what does its consumers think about it. At this age &
time, all company should be consumer oriented, identify what the
consumer want & work towards providing that for its consumers. For
example, the new types of Bimbo that are produced. Corona launched an
extension for its famous product Bimbo into the market from some time,
but up till this point I haven’t heard anything about it from anywhere. If it
wasn’t for the meeting we had with their marketing manager, we wouldn’t
have known anything about its existence.
One of the most important recommendations we have for Corona is do
more market research, make marketing a major role in your success.
Market research helps to reduce risk, identify options, increase

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confidence, & provide an objective perspective necessary to direct

growing. And paradoxically, reducing risk helps you take on the risks your
company needs to grow. Because “armed with research, you can take
those risks and shift the odds in your favor”. Focus on developing the
marketing department, if done right it’ll take Corona into a new level.

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