Lombada Case

Initial Strategic Decision - Company start up: Since the beginning of how the cruise lines operated and up to the early 1970's, the industry's go to market approach was to serve its customers as a form of transportation offered via upscale transatlantic voyages and cruises to exotic destinations on traditional size ships. Ted Arison founded Carnival Cruise Lines in 1972, which later became one of the nine brands of Carnival Corporation. In 1973 Bob Dickinson, VP of sales and marketing innovated a go to market strategy approach as the "Fun Ships" campaign. This strategy targeted a new market class with its low pricing and fun atmosphere in larger ships and increased passenger activity options inside its vessels. In time Carnival learned that in order to differentiate their business model from the rest and continue to grow this new market segment the company's strategic decision was to design, create and market the ships themselves as a destination.

Strategic decision to gain market share and branding by market segment tiers: Carnival created a unique and valuable position as reference in the article "What is Strategy?" by Michael E. Porter. The organization's main focus was defined as attracting the younger, middle class market who had never cruised before. Carnival catered to this specific niche by offering live music, discos, dancing and casinos. This image of cruising was different than the luxury cruises offered at that time which were marketed to affluent customers.

As the company matured, it added global expansion to its strategy and acquired several foreign cruise lines. Carnival recognizes the importance of trade-offs by enabling unique branding, staffing, and processes for key activities suck as marketing and sales within their portfolio. Their strategic position is enhanced by each brand pursuing the unique strategic continuity of activities that reinforce market fit while leveraging the competitive push to the productivity frontier (Porter, 1996, p.18)