Can Leaving Always Mean Living?

In life, yes! Leaving more – may it be cities, bad habits or toxic relationships, lets more live more.

But in business, what does leaving markets and leaving existing products lines behind mean?

Recently, one of Nigeria’s oldest manufacturers Unilever announced the market exit of its brands OMO, Lux and Sunlight. Brands that have been cultivated for decades to match the consumers’ expectations and meet the demand in the market, and yet now they’re going extinct.

This was said to be driven due to the Nigerian government launching new banknotes into the market during December 2022 and deciding to curb the usage of the old notes by Jan 2023.

Sadly, when the new year came, havoc let loose due to a huge shortage of new currency notes and Nigerians sleeping outside the bank to get their hands on the new currency ASAP. This uneasy environment made many businesses struggle hard to access funds and keep the operations wheel moving.

But, was it the right choice to leave products behind to build a sustainable life for Unilever in Nigeria?

And most importantly, could it have been avoided?

Was one of the world’s largest manufacturers not proactive enough to notice that growth has gone south?

If Unilever had the right insights and tools at the right time, could products assortments be more strategically placed at outlets for greater output?

Now let’s see the larger picture.

Everyday in your business, many things get left out too. May it be the last few outlets of the day your team skips, the sales insights that never reaches your table due to the heavy workload, or even the strategies that never get implemented due to the lack of time needed for execution or faulty processes that can’t support your plan.

So ask yourself, will leaving these for the future, help your brand live longer?

Or will it result in drastic business measures for survival?

The answer you know.

And Unilever has other brands and billions of dollars at its disposal to re-create the same market in Nigeria, without shedding a tear for the dollars invested in building OMO, Lux and Sunlight. And it will survive.

Because in the face of sustainability, profitability is never a choice.

But can your company make the same sacrifice?

And can you not have the best of both worlds?

Because leading brands like Heineken India, ABInBev, Cargill, Shell Malaysia, Tyson Foods, Reckitt Egypt, TCPL, Philips, Johnson & Johnson, Coca-Cola, Hershey’s, Beiersdorf are doing it!

Because they are leading with Retail Intelligence.

They capture real-time sales insights on their sales dashboards using Business Intelligence tools, and they can monitor every movement their team make in the market using Beat Optimization and Attendance Management tools on the Sales Force Management app.

Their strategies don’t need insights but are rather built on real-time sales insights they are capturing from the market. These strategies work in parallel with the Sales and Operations Planner tool to help them set the right goals towards profitability.

So instead of leaving, you should start leveraging. Tap in the link below or mail us at marketing@mobisy.com to explore what Retail Intelligence can do for your business.