Mysore Ghee Stores: Expansion Strategy for Clarified Butter Business

Mysore Ghee Store (MGS) produced and marketed ghee (clarified butter) in the city of Hyderabad in India. Most of its ghee sales were B2B to businesses like restaurants and sweetmeat makers that used it for food preparation. Decreasing B2B market margins and increased packed ghee sales to end users through the retail market prompted Satish Kumar, MGS's current owner, to enter the B2C market. He tied up with More (pronounced `moray'), a national retail chain for supplying packed ghee in October 2013. MGS's packed ghee was also made available across multiple retail channels ranging from independent mom and pop stores to regional/local chains' retail outlets and e-retailers. Packed MGS ghee sales through the various retail channels were somewhat encouraging. In April 2016, MGS was looking at two sets of issues. The first was how to proceed with the brand building driven marketing communication effort. The second was to rethink the strategic options in front of MGS and assess the need for and viability of a new strategic direction for the company.

Learning Objective

This case can be used in undergraduate, graduate, and executive education programs. It is best suited for a strategy or an entrepreneurship course in addition to integrated marketing communication course. Executive education programs on marketing aimed at marketing executives in the fast moving consumer goods companies could be another place for the use of this case. Porter's 5 forces model, strategy execution and positioning can be effectively discussed in this case.