The Reckitt & Colman Consumer Products Company is located in northern New Jersey. It manufactures and distributes household cleaning products, personal care products and a variety of food products globally. It is an internationally known company for its name brands. Some of these brands are the leaders in the categories in which they compete, such as: Lysol Cleaning Products, Resolve Carpet Care, Woolite for Fine Washables, Wizard and Stick Ups Air Care Products, Mop & Glo Floor Care, French's Food Products, Durkee French Fried Onions, Frank's Hot Sauce, Chubs Baby Wipes, Olgalvie Hair Care, Binaca Breath Sprays, and a host of other name brand and regional brand products (e.g. Lavender Sachet for Hispanics). The company has various plants and outside vendors who manufacture its products across the country and worldwide. There are three distribution centers that receive the manufactured goods and distribute them to their customers in the United States. These centers are located in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Phoenix, Arizona; and Springfield, Missouri. Annual sales in the United States are $1.2 billion and worldwide sales are in excess of $3.5 billion American dollars. There are approximately 19,000 employees worldwide and 2300 are located in positions in the United States.
The purpose of this thesis is to improve the inefficiencies that are related to promotional dollars budgeted and spent on trade promotions. These offers are not consistently allocated to field sales in time to allow for maximum performance on trade promotions. The objective of this thesis is to enlighten the company practices and to allow a better decision process, while having a fundamental understanding of how trade spending is utilized and impacted at various stages of the business cycle with the retail trade.
There are three divisions in the United States that report to the President and Chief Executive Officer of North America. The CEO reports dire...