Many companies may find some of the articles in the latest e-issue of the McKinsey Quarterly to be helpful, such as ‘Market fundamentals: 2000 versus 2007‘ and ‘Learning to love recessions‘.
Even more useful perhaps is the article on ‘Preparing for the next downturn‘ – it can be too late to think about escaping the quicksand when you’re already up to your neck. There’s an intriguing little twist to this one though – one of the examples quoted of successful survival after 2000 is Starbucks, who “… accelerated growth during the recession by increasing the number of licensed and owned locations.” Perhaps the authors could explain how come the company is now in trouble from following precisely that strategy? [see earlier post] When retail turnover falls away, rationalizing an over-extended branch network is often essential – better perhaps not to have over-extended in the first place?
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