The
Body Shop possesses good information about the market and knows the good
attributes of the customer. This information will be leveraged to better
understand on who is served, what their specific needs are, and how The Body
Shop can communicate better with them.
Talking about Market Segmentation, TBS always tries to understand their customer and differ the target market to specify the product.
- Geographic Segmentation. TBS set up the stores all over the world, such as in United Kingdom, US, Australia, Canada, Japan, France, Korea, etc. In these countries, the level of people’s life is high. They always focus on their quality of life. Meanwhile, TBS also sell the different products in different places. For example, for Muslim country like Malaysia and Indonesia, TBS does not sell product made by alcohol. Another example is, due to the dry weather in the south of China, so TBS sold some moisture products such as skin lotion and shower liquid.
- Demographic Segmentation. TBS has range of customers including women and a small portion of men from middle to upper class. They consist mainly of people who buy organic products and are supporting many causes (e.g. charity work in the third world). Their main target audience is 20-55 year old women. Due to this wide range of ages for both women and men, the product segmentation is also varying.
- Psychographic Segmentation. From the early stage of survival in the market, TBS only concerned on women beauty product. Surprisingly, in recent years TBS started to focus on men products. The result was found that man skin care has a large market. Not only the women keep their skin carefully, also the men would buy some skin care products. Such as sports products, men who like sport would like to take a comfortable bath.
As well as TBS’ market
expands, the market created competitors. Though the opportunity of the new entrant comes, TBS has unique value that
the others cannot easily imitate. That is why the entry barrier always does
exist.
TBS' biggest competitors are retailers focusing on natural beauty products such as Lush, Yves Rocher and Aveda. While Lush and Yves Rocher both sell their products in their own shops across Switzerland, Aveda sells their products in the common retail trade and in their own Aveda Spa Salons. As TBS is a well-established brand with a long history and people trust its products, new competitors are struggling to enter the market. However, the large niche business that once grew rapidly now finds itself in a critical moment. Many competitors seem much more responsive and more willing to take risks in both product development as well as with customer experience. Lush’s growth rate was much faster than that of TBS during the same stage of development and Lush certainly has a high potential to increase their market share. Another competitor is Maybelline New York, despite not being an obvious threat to TBS the brand is starting to promote itself as being against animal testing and emphasizing on environmental protection. This company is well-known in the cosmetics industry and become a strong competitor.
TBS was built with the
belief of the businesses have the power to do good. Therefore, the keys to
success are dedicating the business to the pursuit of social and environmental
change. By keeping the relevancy of achieving the target and protecting the
environment, TBS will become sustainable company.
The other keys to success for TBS are applying the 5 company core values which are against animal testing,
support community trade, activated self-esteem, defend human rights, and
protect our planet. TBS should always hold the principle stated that
the nature’s way is the only way to be beautiful. If that belief always applies
in TBS' program, the running business would always be in line with
the mission.
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