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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This 17 page paper is an in-depth look at the Columbia Sportswear Company, a US firm selling outdoor wear, sportswear, footwear, accessories and equipment. The paper assessing the company from the 2004 annual accounts with an in-depth ratio analysis, identification of financial and strategic issues and an assessment of the opportunities, threats, strengths and weaknesses. The bibliography cites 5 sources.
Page Count:
17 pages (~225 words per page)
File: TS14_TEcolumbia.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
Lamfrom, Gerts parents (Columbia Sportswear, 2005). The company has continued to be a family run company (Amders, 2005). The company which started out as a family owned hat distributor has
grown into an international supplier of outdoor wear with operations in Asia and Europe as well as the US and it one of the largest global companies in this sector
and is the leader supplier of skiwear in the US (Columbia Sportswear, 2005, 2004). The company has sought to retain a competitive advantage over its rivals and was one of
the very first companies to make use of waterproof/breathable fabric for the manufacture of jackets (Columbia Sportswear, 2005). The first mover advantage was seen in with the launch of the
"Columbia Interchange System" making use of multiple layers with a linter and a shell so that there would be different options for the wearing of the apparel. By the
1980s the company was growing and the marketing started to use Bert Boyle as "Mother Boyle" in the marketing campaigns, a differentiation that also aided with the development of another
competitive advantage with the image (Kotler, 20003). The company went public in 1998 which spurred on more growth and the idea of fitting the customer head to toe. Currently the
company has 12,00 retailers across the world, and employs 1,800 people, in addition to the manufacturing operations there are also seven company owned outlets (Columbia Sportswear, 2005, 2004). The main
sales come from outerwear which makes up 42% of sales, followed by sportswear with 36.2% of sales, footwear accounts for 16.9% of sales, accessories for 4.2% and equipment for 0.7%
(Columbia Sportswear, 2004). 60.9% of the sales take place in the US (Columbia Sportswear, 2004). There are a few events or circumstances that impact to the performance or potential
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