Tim Hortons

visibleness CANADIAN MARKETING EXCELLENCE It began as a mavin-store shop in Hamilton in 1964 founded by leg completionary hockey player Tim Horton. By 1967, there were three Tim Hortons stores open for business under the first thriving franchisee, Ron Joyce (who presently serves as chairman emeritus of the TDL Group). Since then, Tim Hortons has grown to 2527 stores (2343 in Canada, 184 in the fall in States) and all over US$800 million in revenue. With a 13-year cumulative bonny growth in gross sales of 7. 1 per centum in Canada and 17. 5 percent in the United States, Tim Hortons is one very successful drinking chocolate and doughnut shop.How this local operation turned into an international franchise ac keep beau monde and a major(ip) Canadian cultural icon, with a rapidly expanding U. S. presence, has everything to do with a very well-planned and c befully kill trade scheme. Tim Hortons core strategy is the reason for its success. On its most basic level, the Tim H ortons merchandising team has created a brandmark that represents an idealized image of the Canadian national character friendly, neighbourly, unpretentious, light playful, frugal, trustworthy, and clean. The company measures everything it does against this list of brand values. In everything we do, weve always focused on the concept of being that friendly, unpretentious, good neighbour youd want liveness down the block from you, says Cathy Whelan Molloy, TDLs vice-president of brand advertising and merchandising. It also uses lengthy customer and franchisee surveys, and other consumer research, to make sure its products, service, and communications fit the ideals. Furtherto a greater extent, the disposal has shown unwavering commitment to this vision and strategy for over 30 years. Tim Hortons has executed this core strategy through many years of innovative trade campaigns.It was one of the first Canadian organizations to tap into the benefits of sports marketing. Its first stores were painted grubby and white to capitalize on the fame of Tim Horton himselfa Toronto Maple Leafs legend. It has developed a major presence in local communities with the creation of the nonprofit Tim Hortons Childrens Foundation. The thattocks sponsors an estimated 33 000 children in Timbit hockey leagues annually and operates phoebe bird camps at which unfortunate Canadian and American children enjoy ten summer days and five winter days of activities. Developing MarketingStrategies and Plans 2 CHAPTER 2All of the companys campaigns are designed to communicate a positive and believable truth slightly the Canadians who go to Tim Hortons. Effectively, Tim Hortons dares to hold a mirror up to Canadians and challenges them to like what they see, says Philippe Garneau, a partner at Torontos Garneau Wurstlin Philp Brand Engineering. For example, in 2002, the company ran a television ad campaign called True Stories. These were a series of vignettes ground on hundreds of sug gestions the company receives from its customers every year.The campaign featured Canadian sailors and students foreign trying to get their fix of Tim Hortons coffee. In 1976, Tim Hortons changed the face of doughnut utilization forever with the introduction of Timbits. It has been able to use this product in the companys marketing strategy to continue to build the playful, friendly genius of the brand. Of course, no discussion of Tim Hortons would be fire without one of the most successful annual promotional tools in Canadian history the Roll Up the Rim to Win customer reward program that offers prizes ranging from coffee and doughnuts to prodigality cars.In one of the best examples of how Tim Hortons used this program to build the brand, the company aerate a TV spot featuring a Canadian citizen crossing over the U. S. border. When asked to prove his nationality to the immigration officer, the character simply rolls his Rs while speaking the excogitate roll up the rim to win . These investments have paid off. Of those surveyed in the Canadian Business poll of Canadas best and worst brands, Tim Hortons was the clear winner, with 42 percent of those who responded to the poll (conducted by the Strategic Counsel and Spencer Francey Peters).What is more awful is that 95 percent of the companys 2500-plus outlets are owned by franchisees, which may have independent ideas about what Tim Hortons is about. However, creating programs to ensure that the organization builds the brand and develops the business together has been crucial to the overall strategy. New franchisees must complete a seven-week training program before taking ownership of stores. Furthermore, the company has strict quality control standards. It routinely surveys and inspects stores, including checking everything from how fast and friendly the staff is to whether the trash in he parking lot has been cleared. But it is not through hierarchical, heavy-handed intervention that it creates strong brand commitment from the franchisees, it is through a well-developed internal strategy that works to ensure the success of distributively franchisee. For example, the Roll Up the Rim to Win promotion was created specifically to gain coffee sales in the warmer spring months. While franchisees end up giving away thousands of free coffees and doughnuts (in 2004, winners redeemed over 20 million food prizes), the promotion drives sales growth.Consistently keeping customers coming sand every day (sometimes two or three times a day) is Tim Hortons challenge. In this intensely competitive market, it does not take much more than a stale doughnut or a cup of ratty coffee to lose a customer. Yet consumers keep lining up. (Tim Hortons had a 68 percent share of the most often coffee purchases in the first quarter of 2004, while Starbucks and Second Cup had 7 percent and 3 percent respectively. ) Part of this success is believed to stem from Tim Hortons decision in the 1980s to drop the Do ughnuts from its name and carve out a deferral as a breaktime restaurant.Now the company appeals to consumers who want to stop in for dope up and sandwiches as well as those simply looking for a coffee. Interestingly, one of the brands that Canadians seem to identify with most closely is actually owned by Americans. In 1995, Ron Joyce sold the company for US$450 million to Ohio-based Wendys multinational Inc. In 2003, Tim Hortons sales represented nearly 20 percent of the fast-food lusus naturaes retail sales, and the Tim Hortons operations in both 36 diverge ONE Understanding Marketing ManagementCanada and the United States posted the best same-store sales growth in the entire organization.Sources John Gray, King of the Cruller Our sight Crowns Tim Hortons the Best-Managed Brand in the Country, Canadian Business Magazine Online, www. canadianbusiness. com, June 6, 2004 (viewed July 12, 2004) Before Tims Was Tims, abbreviate and excerpted from Tales from Under the Rim The Mar keting of Tim Hortons by Ron Buist, Marketing Magazine Online, www. marketmag. ca, family 22, 2003, (viewed July 12, 2004) Terry Poulton, Long Live the Double Double, Strategy Magazine Online, www. strategymag. com, July 29, 2002, p. 9 (viewed July 12, 2004) Wendys International Inc. Investor Presentation, June 2004, www. wendys-invest. com (viewed July 12, 2004) Tim Hortons Web site, www. timhortons. com (viewed July 12, 2004). A key ingredient of the marketing management process is insightful, creative marketing strategies and plans that can guide marketing activities. Developing the right marketing strategy over time requires a blend of discipline and flexibility. Firms must stick to a strategy but must also find new ways to constantly meliorate it.