A SWOT analysis of Sears Canada makes determining the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of this company possible. Every company is influenced by internal forces and external forces. These forces comprise of the internal and external environment of a company and they can be analyzed or scanned by conducting a SWOT analysis. The internal forces are the strengths and weaknesses of a company while the external forces are its opportunities and threats. In simple terms, SWOT analysis can be defined as a framework or tool that can be used to identify and analyze the external and internal factors that can affect a person’s, place’s, product’s or project’s viability.

Concrete SWOT analysis of Sears Canada

Sears Canada is a large retailer store whose headquarters are in Toronto, Ontario. This firm was established in 1952 and it offers a wide range of shopping options to Canadian consumers with specialty as well as departmental stores. This company has operations in various territories and provinces within Canada.  It has 197 Hometown stores, 38 Home-improvement showrooms, 167 corporate stores and a nationwide home repair, installation and maintenance network.

The SWOT analysis of this company is as follows:

Among the weaknesses of this company are:

• Low turnover for its inventory.
• Weak sales of comparable stores.
• Closing some of its stores because of low performance
• Old look due to the failure by the company to change or rebrand over the years
• Saturation of domestic markets by other retailers.

Among the opportunities that Sears Canada can exploit included:

• The increasing disposable income among its customers.
• Growing products with private labels
• Increasing its online ventures and sales
• Decentralizing its operations.
• Expanding to other offerings such as healthcare in the U.S.
• Acquiring smaller retail stores or chains.
• Tapping the potential of the international market more so in the emerging economies.
• Enhancing focus on customer service.
• Enhancing visibility via advertising.

Some of the threats that this company is facing include:

Increasing competition from other retailers such as Dillard’s, Home Retail Group and Mercuries & Associates.

Low confidence among consumers.

Difficulties in controlling operational costs.

Huge financial problems.

Changing economic situations

SWOT analysis should be performed by the management of this company which includes the operational managers and marketing managers. By performing this analysis, the management can examine where the firm has the ability to compete effectively. The analysis will enable the management to discover the competitive strengths of the firm that may have not been utilized fully. Generally, SWOT analysis is very important because it gives insights into the potential and condition of Sears Canada. For instance, the management of this company may have performed a SWOT analysis when the firm recorded more than double loss about a year ago.

The company can use SWOT analysis in formulating strategies for enhancing its performance. For instance, after knowing the strengths of the company, the management can ask questions like, how can the strengths be utilized to explore the identified opportunities better? How can the effects of the identified threats be avoided or minimized if they become real problems? How can the weaknesses of the company be eliminated or minimized? The real value and use of SWOT analysis lies in bringing the four aspects together in order to exploit the most beneficial or promising opportunities.

http://searchcio.techtarget.com/definition/SWOT-analysis-strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-and-threats-analysis

http://www.sears.ca/content/about-sears-canada

http://business.financialpost.com/news/retail-marketing/sears-canada-loss-doubles-to-118-million-while-sales-fall-almost-10

http://smallbusiness.chron.com/perform-swot-analysis-5050.html

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