Analysis Of Stakeholders In The Waitrose Company

Government

The way in which Waitrose chose to provide media channels with information in order to reach their government stakeholders has to be carefully selected and monitored closely as they cannot risk the media having all access to certain information. This is because the media have the power and resources to potentially ruin a company completely, or harm them and a recovery can take several years to heal from. Waitrose effectively use press releases to communicate with the government in regards of environmental or community matters. Any information handed to the government, whether its public or private, can successfully be done through annual reports and CSR (corporate social responsibility) progress. By exploiting this media channel, Waitrose ensure that they are benefiting from making the most of their annual report and can include a vast amount of information, which reflects on the company and their service positively’.

Customers

Customers are debatably the most important stakeholders as without them a company cannot function. If there are less customers shopping at Waitrose stores around the UK, there will overall be a decrease in sales which results to less revenue for the business. This can heavily impact a business. Waitrose class Customers as their primary stakeholders for this reason. Waitrose use a huge range of communication tools to provide its publics with the latest news, deals and advances. This has a positive reflection to Waitrose as it shows they care about all customers. Waitrose often use social media platforms such as; Facebook and Twitter to advertise these alerts, the use these major platforms because these are two of the most used apps in the world. By using these, Waitrose’s target audience is expanded and the message is received to a larger range of people.

For a thriving business such as Waitrose it is essential that they are making the most of connecting with their primary stakeholders as losing customer interest and loyalty could effectively lead to their downfall.

Customers want to be able to purchase good quality goods at reasonable prices. Customers, being key stakeholders, have a huge say as businesses that ignore the concerns of customers find themselves losing to sales to rivals.

Suppliers

Maintaining lasting, positive relationships with suppliers is another essential factor in the success of a company, therefore communication between the two are critical. Waitrose pride upon themselves on being a fair trade company and remain committed to working with their suppliers to increase the sustainability of the majority of their products and promote fair treatment and pricing.

After asking Julie, the head of communication at branch 632, she has told me that for successful communication, there needs to be a day to day connection between suppliers, buying teams and technologists. They hold regular supplier conferences, forums and workshops, including events.

Suppliers are very important, although they are external stakeholders, as they are not directly apart of the business. Waitrose relies on the suppliers to be on time with all the correct goods. Vice versa, the suppliers expect to be paid on time, this overtime develops a good relationship between the two companies and helps progress. The suppliers want companies, like Waitrose, to keep buying from them and buy in bulk, as this profits the suppliers.

Of course there are several other stakeholders, that I have included in my Waitrose Stakeholder Map, however I believe these are the 4 most important ones ads they have the biggest role within the company.