Impact of Environmental Factors on Marketing Decisions of Costco Wholesale
Corporation
Environmental factors consist of all the factors and activities which have a considerable
impact on the running of the business. Environmental factors have a powerful impact on
the normal functioning of the any business, especially in the marketing decisions (Pagell &
Halperin, 2000). These factors pose challenges and threats to the success of any business.
In order to deal with such environmental factors a firm should enhance its core
competencies and make sound strategies (Staff, 2009). There are various factors which
would have deep impact on these new services offered by the firm. The firm should make
a strategy after considering these factors.
David Jobber describes in his book that with the help of this analysis, the company
becomes more competitive and effective to implement the various strategies (Jobber,
2001).
Costco Wholesale Corporation is one of the biggest organizations in the retail industry,
which operates at the global level. The company was founded by James Sinegal and
Jeffrey Brotman (Costco Wholesale Corporation, 2009). On the basis of the sales volume,
the company is considered among the worlds largest membership warehouses (Costco:
About Company, 2009). The company has taken the position of the five largest companies
in the United Sates in retail Industry. The Headquarter of the company is situated at
Issaquah (Washington) in the United States (Costco Wholesale Corporation Reports
January Sales Results and Comments on Earnings Outlook for Its Fiscal 2009 Second
Quarter, 2009). The company runs its operations at the international level within different
segments and covers about 60-70 billion US dollars as revenue (Costco: About Company,
2009).
The economic segment of the external environment has a great interaction with the scope
of the companys business prospects and business strategies of the companies to handle the
marketing environment (Chidrawar, Hatch & Kramer. 2009). These factors are essential to
evaluate the marketing mix strategies of the company at the global level. These factors
usually cannot be controlled by the businessmen and therefore, a careful analysis of the
environment is essential to discover the problems and find their possible solutions.
The economic condition of Costco Wholesale Corporation mainly remains consistent, as
the growth rate of the sales of the company is consistent. This is because; on the yearly
basis, the growth of the warehouses of the company is moderate and the growth of the
membership of the company also runs on the proper track (Taking Stock in Costco
