Challenge:         

 

Determining the long term company strategy against strong competition.

 

Research:          

 

At the time, innovation was the key driver in the home storage market in creating items for each room of the house.  ClosetMaid was beginning to lose market share to a very strong competitor.

 

DecisionPoints presented our research on the coming strength of big box stores like Home Depot and Lowe’s.  Our strategic view was that ‘production capacity’ would play the major role (rather than innovation) in the home storage market.

 

We advised investing in significant new manufacturing capability to meet the needs of the big box stores as they began to spread throughout the country. The new investments reduced the time to make a storage shelf from 12 minutes to 6 seconds; an incredible productivity advantage.

 

Result:               

 

ClosetMaid captured 100% of the Home Depot and the Lowe’s business for decades as the other competitors could not handle the demand.