Strawberry Fizz is a renowned bottled juice manufacturer in the United States. It exports its products to Mexico, has a joint venture in Hong Kong, and owns a subsidiary in South Africa

Question

The company has organized an export department to manage its international marketing activities. Do you think it has made the right decision? Justify your answer.

Answer 1

Organizing an export department is not the correct decision in this scenario. An export department is established when a firm has expanded its international sales by shipping out its products. If the firm moves into joint ventures or direct investment, the export department will no longer be adequate. Strawberry Fizz should create international divisions or subsidiaries to handle all its international activities. International divisions are organized in a variety of ways. An international division's corporate staff consists of marketing, manufacturing, research, finance, planning, and personnel specialists. It plans for and provides services to various operating units, which can be organized in one of three ways. They can be geographical organizations, with country managers who are responsible for salespeople, sales branches, distributors, and licensees in their respective countries. Or the operating units can be world product groups, each responsible for worldwide sales of different product groups. Finally, operating units can be international subsidiaries, each responsible for their own sales and profits.