M&S: An adventure in building marketing capabilities

This case study looks at M&S Food, the UK retailer, and the campaign to return the business to growth by building marketing capabilities and infrastructure across the business to ensure a premium image.

M&S: An adventure in building marketing capabilities

The challenge

At the start of 2013, the M&S Food Marketing Team found themselves faced with a plethora of external and internal challenges that were threatening to affect our strong Food sales growth. We were under even more pressure as the wider M&S business also faced a number of competitive threats.

Rising energy and commodity prices were impacting consumer spending habits and, whilst consumer confidence had started to improve, it remained fragile in the threat of a triple-dip recession.

The competitive environment had become increasingly intense and we found ourselves in a slowing...

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