Amy Wang, Dominic Mehling, Pam Fairbairn, Michael Teoh with coach, Dr. Marcus Ho formed Team AUT for the 3rd Round of the Deloitte National Grand Finals Case Championship Week 2008, held at Massey Albany last 5th of September.
The team was tasked to consult the New
Zealand Feijoa Growers Association on different issues affecting
their operations, mainly coming from quality control and the
streamlining of their processes to produce marketable feijoa fruits
for the local and export markets. The issue of fostering unity among
feijoa growers in New Zealand to join the association as a
centralised point of production and distribution was also an
impending issue in the case.
"For this task, we were eager to
deliver some really extraordinary suggestions to the association!
Let's make their plan for the future growth of feijoa growers
exciting!" Michael Teoh said, who felt that Team AUT did very well
in designing a unique business strategy for the association.
Team AUT guided the association through
a systematic approach in creating a Standards of Quality Seal to
grade the produce produced by the feijoa growers. The reasoning
behind this suggestion being the fruits would be easily marketable to
consumers once they have been assured of meeting the specific
requirements and are safe for consumption.
The team recommended that such an
initiative would also boost the brand of New Zealand feijoa and gain
trust among consumers for its quality.
On a different note, the team also came
up with an extraordinary idea of introducing ‘Freddy Feijoa', a
mascot that would represent the association among kids. Teaming up
with the 5 + A Day programme, Team AUT commented that the youth
segment was a profitable untapped market where the association could
motivate youths to buy feijoa fruits as their fruit of choice.
Parents would likely spend on such purchase as well, as the feijoa
fruits are healthy for their children.
The President of the association
himself was present to judge during the competition, along with the
National Communications Manager and National People & Performance
Manager from Deloitte. An academic from University of Auckland also
formed the judging panel.
"The judges had a laugh when we
unveiled our mascot - Freddy Feijoa! They really loved the idea and
we spent some time interacting with them about the viability of the
idea. They just loved it!" recalled Michael Teoh, who was
pleasantly surprised that the judges loved the mascot idea and
remembered it throughout the competition.
Team AUT came in 3rd place
during this round, behind University of Waikato and University of
Auckland, who came 1st and 2nd respectively.
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