Market Segmentation
The Phoebe’s is targeting the high-end consumer segment with the belief that their pets are not only their best friends but also their beloved children. According to the market survey conducted by Company A in 2006, the pet food market can be segmented into different levels of pet owners, with the so called “Indulgent nutritionist“ being the segment that The Phoebe’s is targeting. In that segment, pets are often being liked more than most humans.
TABLE 7.1PET OWNER SEGMENT Source: Company A.
A typical target consumer figure would be Paris Hilton. “My dog is my family, he is not just a dog, I am willing to do anything to make him happy,” said Hilton. As Paris is a public figure and needs to travel around a lot, there are places that might not be suitable for her dog to come along. In order to relief her pet from separation anxiety; a six-star upscale pet hotel would absolutely be her first choice.
Just like Paris, there are many pet owners in Taiwan who treat their pets as their
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ROLE OF ROLE OF PETPET
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DogDogDog OwnerOwner
Dog OwnerOwner
Dog Satisfaction Distance CompensationDistance Compensation Owner SatisfactionOwner Satisfaction
Eat well
100% trust & relief
Excellent consuming experience
Sense of social status
families. Plus the birth rate of Taiwan is decreasing while the total spending in the pet market is growing at the same time; The Phoebe’s niche is to offer the upscale pet owner the best pet hotel services for their beloved dogs.
The Phoebe’s value proposition
TABLE 7.2THE PHOEBE’S VALUE PROPOSITION
Like every pet boarding service, The Phoebe’s has two layers of customers to serve; boarding dogs and their owners. Even though decisions of the buying activities are made by dog owners, how their dog will be treated in The Phoebe’s will definitely be taken into account.
Despite the traveling-related reasons of dog owners, the separation between owners and their dogs are the bitterest thing to handle during owners’ whole trips, moreover, the separation can even cause dogs’ separation anxiety.
That’s why the value proposition of The Phoebe’s will be categorized into three sections:
♦ Dog satisfaction: The Phoebe’s promises to make sure boarding dogs can eat well, sleep well, and exercise well.
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♦ Owner satisfaction: The reasons why pet owners choose certain dog hotel among numerous choices available may be very complex. The Phoebe’s hopes to be 100% trusted by dog owners with excellent consuming experiences and sense of social status to our target customers.
♦ Distance compensation: The Phoebe’s exceptionally focuses on developing tools and services to shorten the distances, both mentally and physically, between our boarding dogs and their owners.
Location of The Phoebe’s
The location of The Phoebe’s is an essential mean to achieve The Phoebe’s unique value proposition. The Phoebe’s will be set up in Taoyuan County by the airport.
With this specific location, The Phoebe’s will be facing the most severe competition.
Based on the data, Taoyuan is the county with the highest amount of pet stores other than Taipei County; it is also one of the cities with highest dog population.
However, despite of the equally big challenge to the opportunity, the location of The Phoebe’s can actually carry out many of the ideas of its unique values. Because of the location, The Phoebe’s may acquire a larger space than any other location in
downtown Taipei with the same amount of budget. The larger the space is; the higher dog satisfaction will be.
Another unique value of The Phoebe’s is the distance compensation. Because of the location is nearby the air port with a very convenient highway traffic network, The Phoebe’s is able to design various shuttle services not only to pick up dogs for check-in, but also to bring dogs to the arrival hall to greet their owners when they are back. The shuttle service is aimed at shrinking the physical distance between dogs and their owners.
The Phoebe’s is taking the location advantage to attract all customers located in the
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area northern of Taichung since they have to travel through the International Airport in Taoyuan, Taiwan.
Product & Price
Also, with the location advantage, The Phoebe’s will lease 200 pins of land with a 3-floor building of 100 pins floor size to lodge at most 20 large dogs and 30 small to medium dogs.
The land allocation and floor design of The Phoebe’s are as below:
♦ 1st floor
There will be 100 pins of out door grass yard with dog sports and training utilities such as stairs, tubes, swimming pools, etc, and 100 pins of indoor space with reception and check-in counters, a kitchen, SPA and herbal treatment, and indoor training courses.
♦ 2nd floor
There will be 30 rooms for small & medium dogs and a medical center on the 2nd floor of the hotel building.
♦ 3rd floor
There will be 20 rooms for big dogs, an office, and an MIS control room on the 3rd floor of the hotel building.
The services and the prices The Phoebe’s will be offering are listed in the table below:
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Basic Accommodation ( Including Food Supply )
NT$3,000
"See You in the Airport" Program
"Happy Day" Album
"Never Go Away" Program Free
SPA & Herbal Treatment
The best dog foods and accessories will be offered boarding dogs in The Phoebe’s. Each dog has its own single comfortable bedroom with isolated air conditioning. A designated professional dog-sitter will be assigned to each dog to take care of that dog during its entire boarding period. All these efforts help to ensure that boarding dogs can eat well and sleep well.
The price of the basic boarding service is NT$1,200 for a small to medium dog, and NT$1,500 for a large dog.
♦ “Never Go Away” Program
Owners can get our “Never Go Away” keep-in-touch package for free. The package includes real-time online video surveillance and call-in service.
Owners can log in to The Phoebe’s web portal anytime to get a real time video
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stream of their beloved pets that may be eating delicious foods, sleeping on soft pads in their single bed rooms, or running over the big grass yard with their friends. Selected video clips can also be sent through public cell phone networks to owners’ cell phones. If owners want their beloved dogs to hear their voices, simply call The Phoebe’s during lobby hours and we’ll bring their dogs to the phone.
Both real-time surveillance and the call-in service are free of charge and they can effectively ease the pain caused by separation and shorten the mental distance between dogs and their owners.
The “Never Go Away” program is free of charge.
♦ “Healthy Baby” Program
The “Healthy Baby” program includes daily health check up, daily individual play time, daily group play time, and swimming classes that are only provided in summer.
The daily health check up will be conducted by The Phoebe’s contract on-site vets, and during the daily individual and group play time, dogs will be
accompanied by The Phoebe’s on-site trainers.
The “Healthy Baby” program will ensure beloved dogs enjoy every healthy and joyful day in The Phoebe’s, and the “Healthy Baby” program is free of charge.
♦ “See You in the Airport” Program
Once owners buy this service, their beloved dogs will appear in the arrival hall prior to their arrivals. This service drastically shortens the physical distance between owners and their dogs.
Owner and their dogs will be able to see each other right away at the airport, and The Phoebe’s even allow the check-out process to be efficiently completed at the
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airport. After the check-out process is done, owners can just go home with their beloved dogs without waiting.
The “See You in the Airport” program is free of charge.
♦ “Happy Day” Album
With the idea like human beings love to keep sweet memory by taking pictures during their trips, The Phoebe’s wants to create an atmosphere, so that when owners are abroad for their pleasant trips, their pets can have their vacations as well in The Phoebe’s.
With this initiative, The Phoebe’s offers the “Happy Day” album for free.
Professional photographers will catch every happy moment of boarding dogs in every corner of The Phoebe’s. An exquisite “Happy Day” album will be
prepared and given to owners during their check-out process. The album not only enhances the consuming satisfaction but also presents a solid evidence of how well dogs have been taken care of in The Phoebe’s.
♦ Pet Limo
With the advantage of The Phoebe’s location, it is intuitive for The Phoebe’s to offer limo service. The Phoebe’s “Pet Limo” service includes single trip (from homes to The Phoebe’s or the opposite) and round trip, for not only dogs but also for owners.
Price for the single trip Pet Limo service is NT$1,000, and NT$1,800 for the round trip service.
♦ SPA & Herbal Treatment
The Phoebe’s provides exquisite SPA and herbal treatment to boarding dogs to ease their tension in their owners’ absence. The service will be performed by professions using upscale branding accessories. The SPA and herbal treatment
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service includes 2 packages, the Grooming/Jacuzzi/Pedicure package, which is NT$300 for one small to medium dog and NT$500 for one large dog, and the Facial/Skin Care/Massage package, which is NT$500 for one small to medium dog and NT$800 for one large dog.
♦ Obedience Training
Besides regular free-of-charge exercise for boarding dogs, The Phoebe’s also provides educational obedience courses. The training program will be conducted by certified partner coaches and the program is separated into the Essential Program and the Advanced Program. For the sake of completion, dogs will be required to stay in The Phoebe’s for at least 2 weeks for the Essential Program, and 1 month for the Advanced Program.
Price for the Essential Program is NT$3,000 and NT$5,000 for the Advanced Program.
♦ 360 Degree Health Check
The Phoebe’s also provides the “360 Degree Health Check” program. Unlike other similar products offered by vet clinics, The Phoebe’s can do a lot more because of accompanying for longer terms and close observation on boarding dogs.
Owners who purchase this service will receive a 360 degree health report of their dogs with description of dogs’ physical statuses, mental statuses, and customized recommendations from our professional vets for dogs’ even healthier future lives.
With all these unique value propositions and value-added services, The Phoebe’s will be a real six-star pet hotel standing out from the competition on the island.
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In the first year of The Phoebe’s foundation, the major slogan for marketing will be
“The Phoebe’s; the shortest distance between you and your dog”. The slogan is set to highlight the unique customer value of The Phoebe’s, and also to imply our company vision.
The major focus in the first stage of The Phoebe’s marketing promotion is mass marketing communication. Since The Phoebe’s is positioning itself as the first branded pet hotel in the market in Taiwan, the brand awareness establishment will be the key to success. The tools for mass marketing communication will be:
♦ E-Marketing
E-marketing channels of The Phoebe’s include a well-designed web portal, keyword bidding with major search engines such as Goggle and Yahoo,
community websites, blogs, website sponsor links, and sending EDMs with the mailing list database obtained from online media.
♦ Cross Brand Event
The Phoebe’s will be working closely with high class pet food and accessories
Vet
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suppliers by issuing coupons for free SPA service or discount for lodging. The Phoebe’s will also aggressively take part in the pet owner gathering events to build up brand awareness among pet owners. In the meantime, The Phoebe’s will also co-work with online travel agencies with luxury travel routes and provide coupons if the travelers’ dogs need to be taken care of when their owners are away from home.
♦ Celebrity Promotion Campaign
To really touch our target audience, The Phoebe’s plans to hold one major celebrity promotion campaign in the first year. The purpose of the campaign is to promote The Phoebe’s six-star brand image and to create a sense of belonging to an upscale consuming group of pet hotel. The deliverables of this campaign are to increase brand exposure, brand awareness and recognition, and the initial customer base.
The preliminary celebrity candidates are Tao Ching Ying and Rosemary Ho. Tao Ching Ying is a famous singer, writer, and TV show host in Taiwan; she has been a dog lover for a long time and owns a golden retriever dog. Rosemary Ho was the former President of HP Taiwan; she is famous for frequent traveling, and she loves cats and dogs.
The Phoebe’s is going to invite the chosen celebrity to enjoy The Phoebes’
service for free and ask them to share their experience via media.
Membership
The Phoebe’s will establish its membership system and loyalty program which are similar to airlines’ loyalty club programs for their frequent travelers. The membership program provides discount as well as promotional season service for members. Since the
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pet hotel is to ensure pets’ safety and health, The Phoebe’s is targeting to build a tight relationship with pet owners with relationship, so that owners can rely on us and make sure their beloved pets are in good hands.
Other than marketing communication events and membership programs, public relation will be another main focus for The Phoebe’s marketing efforts. The Phoebe’s will actively contact pet related magazines or other media for interview opportunities. Also The Phoebe will attend all major pet and traveling related exhibitions to introduce its brand name to the market.