Page 7 - Drambuie Teaching Note

However, With declining sales in 2004 Parnell was

brought into the business. His vision for the company

was as a lean, sales and marketing firm, where everyone

was pulling together to sell its one core product

Drambuie.

Cream Sylk had struggled with increased competition as

larger companies, such as Diageo, introduced a plethora

of alternative drinks to the marketplace. However, for

Parnell the frightening thing was in the previous three

years the whole above the line consumer marketing

budget was all on cream nothing was being spent on

Drambuie. If the core brand is in trouble then don't waste

all your money trying to compete with Bailey's, the

number one priority of Diageo.

For Parnell the objective was to build a platform of

profitability of between £1.5 m and £2m by the end of his

first year in office. To this end his strategy was predicated

on the retention of very few fixed assets with the aim of

delivering a shareholder value of £60m plus.

Parnell had recognized that both internal and external

communication was something that Drambuie was not

good at.