مطالعات مدیریت راهبردی (Sep 2023)
Identifying and explaining competition in the strategic positioning of the clothing industry
Abstract
Introduction: Managers of organizations in today's completely turbulent environment have to identify the environmental factors that will cause competition in an uncertain environment due to the existence of numerous competitors and its rapid changes, therefore, strategic planning is a useful and powerful tool to achieve Organizational goals are discussed. The purpose of the current research is to identify and explain the effective competitive factors in the strategic positioning of the industry. Iran's clothing industry is one of the industries that despite its historical background, after industrialization and the establishment of industrial production factories, it did not reach its historical position, and after a period of prosperity, it has faced many challenges in the last two decades, and its share in Iran's economy has declined. This industry has always been of interest due to its direct connection with the daily life and basic needs of households, and despite its small contribution to the national economy, it is highly sensitive. Also, Iran's clothing industry has also been active in foreign markets, which has also decreased in the last decade. On the other hand, the issue of clothing and the type of clothes that people wear in public environments has been pursued by the government with special policies, and a type of clothing is promoted as official clothing, and some forms of unconventional clothing have been violently dealt with. The current situation of Iran's clothing industry indicates that there are problems in creating a competitive advantage over foreign products, and one of these problems is improper positioning of Iranian clothing. Choosing the wrong positioning policies and not re-positioning in the clothing industry has made the position of foreign clothing in the minds of customers to be better compared to Iranian clothing, which is clearly evident in the purchase situation in the market.According to the problem in this research, we are trying to design a competitive model of strategic positioning of the Iranian clothing industry, so that in this way, the problems of the existing position of Iranian clothing are determined, and while choosing the appropriate policies, appropriate methods are suggested to create a suitable position in the minds of customers.Methodology: The research method is mixed one(qualitative-quantitative). Delphi technique is used in the qualitative part. The panel of experts of this research consists of 15 people who are experts in the garment industry in Tehran province, who have been consciously selected. In the quantitative part, the statistical population consisted of all business owners and clothing sellers in Tehran province, according to Morgan's table, 385 people were randomly selected as the sample size. Quantitative data collection was done using a researcher-made questionnaire and quantitative data analysis was done using the structural equation modeling method (PLS software 2.0) and SPSS 26 statistical software.Results and Discussion: The final model was formed from the categories of organizational factors, customer factors, competitiveness, contextual factors, facilitating factors, strategies and consequences. Therefore, Iran's garment industry has faced economic logic on the one hand and special social and political considerations on the other hand, which has put this industry in a situation where its growth has been interrupted. In recent decades, the import of foreign clothing from illegal or smuggled materials has caused intense competition in this industry in the country. Meanwhile, despite the good quality of domestically produced products, we still see the desire of customers to buy foreign products, which has caused some violations such as the sale of domestic products with foreign brands. The results indicate that by using the correct positioning policies while improving the position in the market and in case of adoption of differentiation strategies, cost leadership and concentration, consequences such as strategic positioning, increase in relative market share and growth and profitability are possible.Conclusion: Based on the obtained results, the consequences of the relationship between these variables and their components, which were prioritized, will be strategic positioning in the Iranian clothing market, which will lead to the growth of market share and profitability. Based on this and by creating a suitable position of the brand in the clothing industry, which today is competing with foreign brands, it is possible to create suitable competitive conditions by using the correct positioning policies while improving the position in the market.
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