Product details

This is the second of a two-case series (IMD-5-0440 and IMD-5-0441). Now that DuPont had successfully designed and delivered the kinds of services which would enhance the customer''s carpet buying experience, Carr had a new challenge: how to reassess the links within the entire carpet distribution channel. The relationships within this chain, like those in many other industry chains, had been largely adversarial: each member out to strengthen its part of the whole, even if this meant endangering the integrity of the whole. DuPont would now take the lead in ensuring that end user''s needs were being met by all in the channel, no matter how far removed. And DuPont, while the farthest removed, also had the most to lose if things went wrong: the company annually invested hundreds of millions of Swiss Francs in fibre Research and Development, but unless these efforts were shared by others in the chain, they would fall flat. Carr thus launched a system of ''customer alliances for total gain'': who would these customers be, what were the selection criteria to be used, how to make them cost effective, and how to change peoples'' attitudes and behaviours were top on Carr''s agenda.