You will be involved in a team project that will be addressed transversally throughout the program and is designed to give you an opportunity to use the theoretical and professional inputl from the classroom sessions.
In order to ensure that the project groups focus on real issues, every participant is requested to find a suitable project in their area as soon as he/she registers and to fill out the "proposed project summary card" below, which should be returned to the programme administration for comments as soon as a potential project has been identified by the participant..
The investigation conducted in teams will cover the issues regarding the importation / distribution / sales of either
(a) wine (or beer, spirits, fruit juice, organic drink, etc),
(b) or a tourism product (resort, venue, tour, trekking, ecotourism, cultural festival ),
into the European Union ,exported from your area in the world.
From our experience, the ideal project will be about a local firm (whichever country or state you live in) which may enjoy a regional reputation, may have limited experience in exports to a few countries, although this is not a pre-requisite. Usually, the size of the firm (or the lack of relevant expertise on the management team) has never allowed them to embark on a full-scale study of the potential for their product(s) in the EU in general. Especially since you will realise very quickly that the EU does indeed appear like somewhat of a riddle to small entrepreneurs.
They may however have some experience of one EU country in particular (very often due to a chance meeting or personal sympathy for a given individual in that country), but nothing that would look like a proper strategy in the eyes of your management professors. When approached, such companies will either be amazed or very interested – but most of the time, the fact that a business student should have singled them out for a project and the prospect of having free consultancy will prompt them to help you with some information, logos, samples and words of wisdom.
To help you, here are some examples from recent years: New Mexico proprietary wine, Canadian Ice Wine, Tennessee Bourbon, Illinois Wine, Cranberry Organic Wine, Florida Citrus & Mango Wines ,Small Brewery Beer, Chilean Pisco, Australian Wine Collection, Chinese Cultural Festival, Lassi Penjab Dairy Drink.
A committee of experts will screen each proposal on the basis of the preliminary information supplied on the summary card and retain those that are most likely to serve the educational purpose which underlies this programme. Proposers will be informed sufficiently in advance that their projects have been retained and will then be asked to collect info, samples, ad material, etc. as the latter will be virtually impossible to obtain once they have left their countries and the program has started.
During the program, each group of four will work on one project only. This assignment will involve field research as the program moves across Europe (visiting retail outlets, analysing bill boards, interviewing professionals, administering questionnaires, etc.). In addition, faculty members will include in their modules some time for consultancy on issues specific to each project.
The teams will be composed on the first night in Brussels and time has been allotted throughout the program schedule for groupwork. The teams elect their group leaders ---- who may not necessarily be the proposer of the project attributed to them
.
This is a strategic marketing problem and the outcomes will be viewed in that context, i.e. what strategic management decisions must this company consider and undertake in order to sell products in one or several of the EU countries you will be visiting.
At all events, it should be quite clear that the wine & spirits industry will be taken here as an example of strategic marketing decisions strongly dependent on national cultures and customers habits and that in no way does participation in this program imply having to purchase, taste or drink any amount of alcohol under any form whatsoever. Participants who prefer not to be involved in a project focussing on drinks are strongly advised to suggest a tourism based project (resort, special holiday package, etc.) . As a matter of fact, the project team that won the 2008 award was focussing on a traditional Indian dairy produce.
It should be noted that from a legal point of view, people are of age at 18 in our area of the world and it is not possible for us to exercise delegated authority on any participant above that age, as they are all personally responsible before the law for any misbehaviour.
