Order Winners and Competitive Priorities Pursued by Paint Manufacturers in Kenya
Abstract
The concept of Order winner & order qualifiers is important in business today, A firm that
seeks to gain a competitive advantage in the market ought to understand the dimensions that a
customer look for him to consider a firm product as a candidate for purchase(order
qualifiers), further it’s also important to understand what aspects informs a customer
purchase decision(order winner).Competitive priorities have been defined as the strategic
capabilities/preferences that a firm chooses to compete in at the marketplace. The general
objective of the study was to establish if matching of order winners & competitive priorities
is essential in helping a firm gain competitive advantage.
The study researched specifically on the paint industry in Kenya, Descriptive research design
was used for the study, The respondents of the studycomprised of the personnel in the
operation departments in all the twenty six paints manufacturing firms registered under the
association of paint manufacturers in Kenya, Top paint distributors in the industry drawn
from the major market region, Tier one customers and selected professional painters. Primary
data was collected by use of questionnaires, In order to satisfy the research objective two
questionnaires were used, the response rate for studies was at 72%, and data from
questionnaires was analysed and presented using content analysis.
The studies established that competitive priorities pursued by paint manufacturers in Kenya
matched the order winners in the industry. The major competitive priorities pursued by
players in the industry included Cost, quality and speed. These were well matched with the
major order winners in the industry which included price, reliability of the product, product
performance, and availability of the product in the market. The study established that
matching of the order winner and competitive priorities in did help a firm gain a competitive
advantage. Crown paints and Dura coat paints with a customer preference of 89% and 67%
respectively were amongst two brands that the study established to be enjoying a competitive
advantage as a result of matching competitive priorities and order winners in the industry.
The study was limited to paint manufacturing industry in Kenya, Whereas its evident that
competitive priorities and orders winners matter in other sectors, it hence essentially
important that the study recommended further studies be conducted in other manufacturing
sectors i.e. petroleum industry, service industry etc.
Publisher
University of Nairobi
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United StatesUsage Rights
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/Collections
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