Guide on How to win BSG game
The business strategy game BSG offers a unique, hands-on experience for students who wish to learn what it is like to run a company in a real-life environment. To help you win the business strategy game, this article explores some of the winning tips that have been tried and tested that will give you a competitive advantage and a confidence boost as you maneuver through the game.
corporate social responsibility and citizenry.
Companies today participate in CSR initiatives to boost their corporate image rating. The activities you can participate in include
- Workforce diversity training programs.
- Implementation of green initiatives in the company, like the adoption of efficient energy use, use of renewable energy at your plants, and use of environmentally friendly materials, like the use of recycled packaging.
- Ethics training for your workforce as well as spending on best practices training, which includes training that is focused on ensuring good workmanship.
- Charitable contributions to community organizations.
Participating in corporate social responsibility initiatives and citizenry is good, but there are only a few drawbacks if it is not implemented in a manner that can be sustained. For example, careful consideration should be given when making such an investment to avoid the possibility of diminishing marginal returns where such efforts do not add to the value or growth of the company.
Overspending in this sector can lead to a decrease in earnings per share (EPS), the return on equity (ROE), and even hurt the credit rating of the company. Finding a balance is important so that the future growth of the company as well as the initiatives are guaranteed. These actions also have the ability to attract socially conscious investors.
These efforts should be continued for a period of not less than four years in order to show consistency and create a positive impact.
Teamwork
Because this is collaborative work, working together as a unit will be crucial in coming up with the best strategy for the business strategy game. This means that the team members’ efforts serve to complement each other. Members should be allowed to present their opinions regarding their strategies as long as the information is grounded in well-conducted market research and backed by evidence. These debates and discussions should be presented professionally, as they would be in a real-life work environment.
Some of the key considerations for teams to make will be on
- Location of plant facilities and distribution centers.
- Whether to use the same competitive strategy in all the geographic regions or to use a unique strategy for each region.
- Deciding whether to offer standardized athletic shoes across all the regions or to customize the shoes according to the local tastes and preferences.
These decisions should be decided on as a unit, and everyone should be on board with the final agreed decisions or strategies.
Plant capacity decisions
When making decisions regarding the management of the plants, there are some considerations you need to make in order to fully maximize the production capacity of the plants as well as reduce overall operating costs.
Use the total capacity allocated for each year. This is for both the private label and the branded production. Production at full capacity boosts the EPS and image rating by cutting down on the costs, thus increasing the net profits and making it possible to charge a lower price.
Manufacturing shoes for the private label market allows for the proper utilization of the plant capacity. This is achieved by using some or all of the left-over capacity from the branded production and using it to make the private-label shoes to be supplied to chain retailers. Doing this enables you to spread some of the fixed costs of production and increase profit margin.
There are tariffs that need to be considered with regard to the geographical location of the plants. For example, you will need to pay tariffs on footwear exported from the Asia-Pacific plants to markets in Latin America and Europe—Africa and vice versa. These tariffs are subject to fluctuations caused by the difference in exchange rates. To avoid these tariffs, you can decide to allocate a plant to each of the four geographic locations. This way, all the market needs of those regions are met.
You can either decide to boost production by constructing a new plant in your preferred location or by purchasing an existing plant. The advantage of purchasing an existing plant is that it is ready for use in the same year it is purchased, whereas new construction takes a year. Purchases for the plants are done on a first-come, first-served basis.
Before making decisions on plant operations, such as whether to buy or sell a factory or to upgrade, it is good to look at the market needs to determine the market demand and the market supply to make the best cost strategy benefits from the factories. For instance, a 30% production surplus means you can use the excess capacity for private-label market shoes.
Other important factors that will affect the production at your plants are the best practices training and certification that complement the workers’ efforts. To boost their productivity, consider the following key points.
Positive factors that improve workers’ productivity.
- Investing in plant upgrades. To run a successful business, consider investing in upgrades that specifically improve plant operations because this will boost productivity and minimize the rejection of shoes produced due to bad workmanship. This also means that there are more shoes being produced, which translates to more profit.
- Increasing the annual base pay. An annual increase in the salaries of the workers, even by 2%, has a positive impact on the productivity of workers.
- Higher emphasis on incentive compensation. This is measured by the percentage of the company’s total compensation package accounted for by incentive pay. For example, workers get a bonus for a given number of shoes that pass the inspection.
- Higher compensation in comparison to the rival company where your plant is located. To retain top employees and high-performing individuals in your company, it is important that you pay them well so that they can stay loyal to your company and not quit in favor of another company. In the same breath, you are able to attract workers that seek out attractive and higher compensation packages.
Investing in efforts that motivate workers and also boost their productivity has a direct impact on the quality of work in the shoes that they produce. Another important reason is that, over time, when their productivity has increased, there is no need for more workers because the available workers have been empowered to produce more. This in turn reduces the company’s overall production costs and increases its profits.
How to increase net profit margin
The overall point of any business is to generate revenue and increase profits. That is one of the focus areas for growth-minded companies. These are some of the strategies that you can employ in the business strategy game.
Use a low-cost leadership strategy where you will sell the shoes at a lower price than your rivals. This gives you a competitive advantage because you will essentially be driving out your competitors and denying them any market share in the region where you implement this.
Make use of a differentiation strategy that sets your shoes apart by using features such as a higher S/Q rating, a variety of models to choose from, greater marketing efforts through advertising and celebrity endorsements, for example, and more retailers spread out across the different geographic regions carrying the brand.
Make sure customers get value for money. This is a high-quality strategy where you provide highly rated shoes for a cheaper cost than your rivals. This makes sure that your customers are getting great shoe attributes at a cheaper price.
Focus your strategy on controlling at least two market shares in the geographic regions where you operate. You can do this by ensuring that you have plants in those regions that operate more efficiently at a cost advantage over your rivals.
When a company generates more profits it means that you are able to meet most of your stakeholder’s and shareholders’ obligations. This means that you are able to do activities that further grow the company for example making consistent dividend payments to your shareholders
Private label production
To get the lucrative market share of the private label production, you should take a look at the market snapshot from the previous years to get a guide for the bidding ranges. Because some groups do not change the default bidding for the first few years, you should set your bid at a lower price than the default.
Utilize any remaining plant capacity and overtime production and allocate it to the private label production. Then analyze the cost to see whether the shoe will be profitable.
Change and toggle the superior materials and styling features to make sure you get the lowest possible prices.
To get the bidding contract, make sure your S/Q rating is 4 and above. A lower S/Q rating will disqualify you from other bidders.
Consider the wholesale price of the region you are targeting and make yours lower than that.
Other additional tips include:
- If you are the only one in private label production, set your prices as high as possible because you have no competition.
- If there are numerous entrants, make sure your prices are lower than your competitors’ prices. This will capture the market share and deter other entrants because of the low prices.
Finance decisions
The decisions and the strategies that you will come up with as a team will mostly revolve around finances. More importantly, each decision that you make will have a financial implication on the company.
When borrowing loans, check out the interest rates offered and pay the debt off within the set period. One way of offsetting the debt is to sell stock. By settling all your debts in time, you are boosting your credit rating. When it comes to loans, longer-term loans offer a more friendly interest rate as compared to short-term loans.
The ideal credit rating you should strive to maintain is at least a B+.
Taking up stock offering is a cheaper alternative to loans in case of an expansion into a particular geographic area, but caution should be taken as this move might lead to a drop in the cost of the earnings per share (EPS).
Pay big dividends to your shareholders. This boosts the confidence of the investors and has a positive impact on the stock price of the company shares.
In order to boost the Earnings per share, the company stock, and the Return on Equity, Your company should consider using cash to purchase outstanding shares.
Switch between different advertising budgets to see which strategy will be the most cost-effective to capture the target market at the best price.
When coming up with a CSR initiative, ensure that the budget can be sustained over time without burdening the company. There should be a balance.
Celebrity Endorsement Decisions.
A celebrity endorsing your product offers a big boost to product awareness, helps a brand penetrate new regions thus acquiring new market shares, and can drive up sales. Here are factors to be considered before picking a celebrity.
Make sure the celebrity is suitable in the geographical region you want them to endorse your shoes. The celebrity should also be compatible with the product, for instance, a football player would be ideal for a sports shoe endorsement.
The celebrity endorsement will work well only if it is boosted by aggressive advertising. advertising dollars This enhances the marketing efforts for the brand
For long-term celebrity contracts and endorsement, bid for them in the early stages of the simulation.
Don’t blindly waste resources on a celebrity tag; be strategic to make sure you will get the return on investment .
Boost your internet sales
In the business simulation game, it is important for your team to come up with ways that can grab the internet market share. To do so, there are a number of things that you need to pay attention to
- Since your internet price represents the average retail price for your shoes of all the styles and design, it is important that you price them well. You can take a look at your competitor’s price to see how much you need to adjust in order to capture that market. The prices should not go so low that they compete with retail stores that carry your company’s brand.
- Consider the pros and cons of free shipping. While many customers are attracted to free shipping, carry out a forecast to determine whether the cost of absorbing the shipping cost would make financial sense for the company in the long run.
Tips for capturing the wholesale market
The wholesale segment can be a lucrative market for you to dominate.
When setting up the wholesale prices for your shoes, remember that the average price of your branded shoes compares to the industry average price. You should study the reports to make a projection.
It can be tempting to set lower prices in order to attract more buyers if all the other competing factors are kept equal but you should take precautions because this practice might lead to very lower profit margins.
Invest heavily in advertising efforts, more than the industry average. This will attract more buyers to your shoe brand.
Focus on making the delivery time to the retailer shorter. Preferably under 4 weeks. They are most likely to stock up on your brand because they are assured that their inventory will not run out.
Allocate an above-average budget for retail support. Retailers are motivated to stock your brand if they are supported, for example, through advertisements, giving information about the shoe designs, style, and functionality, making it easy for the retailers to sell to the customers.
Analyze the Industry Reports
The whole point of the business strategy simulation is to see which team comes up with the winning strategy. To better understand the rules of the game, the forecasts as well as get an idea of what your competitors are doing, you have to digest competitive and market intelligence and other information that is found in the following reports.
Footwear industry report. In this report, you will get information that gives you a view of the factors that affect production in the footwear manufacturing industry. Here you will learn the prices of materials, what determine the S/Q trends, the number of shoes sold, the demand forecast for the coming years as well as how much your company spends in terms of costs of production in relation to other company.
competitive intelligence reports. This contains information that captures the market snapshot that will guide you on the decisions to make pertaining to the S/Q ratings, the range of prices for the shoes, levels of advertising, the time it takes to deliver to customers and retailers, and a host of other competing factors.
company intelligence report. Studying these reports will give you insights into the plant operation reports, distribution channels, private label and branded sales reports, income, and cash flow statement, and the balance sheet.
Achieving strategic outcomes will require you to carefully analyze and digest competitive intelligence and the company operating report to that all the decisions that you make as a team, you are assured that your company spent enough time to research and come up with a sound strategy. It also helps your team to make informed adjustments.
In addition to the above tips for winning the business strategy game bsg, there are other equally important tips that should consider
- Inventory management is important because it allows you to determine the number of shoes per demand. It is always better to have a surplus inventory above the pairs required to meet the retailers demand.
- Inventory clearance should be done at the end of every year. This is done to clear old styles and designs and can be done at a discount. This helps the plants to run at a full capacity and even more importantly failure to clear will lower the S/Q ratings for the coming year.
- Company continual effort in programs like the TQM/Six Sigma initiative has a greater impact because they come from an ongoing effort from the company to boost productivity rather than short term and quick fixes that are focused on getting faster results.
As this article demonstrates there are a number of strategy combinations that would work to fit the particular needs of your company. Therefore, clearly define what your goals and targets are as a team for the company then discuss with your team which strategies will work and which ones will not be effective.
Strive for clear communication and present your agreement or opposition to a particular strategy in a structured and respectful manner.
Always back up your research with strong evidence and once a team decides on a particular strategy all the members of the team should support it.
This online business strategy game, BSG, will teach you a lot of real-life scenarios and what to expect when you get into the business world as you build a career in business and business management, so you need to pay attention to all the important lessons.