UK bottled water market is priced at over £1.5 billion. It is a rapid developing sphere of the soft drinks industry in the UK. UK bottled water intake per person gained 36 litres in 2007, which is up from 26.9 litres in 2001 and 29 litres in 2002. Nevertheless, research from Zenith International discovered that comparing with bottled water market in Italy, where consumption of bottled water are 199 litres per person (2007), there are huge growth possibilities in the UK market (britishbottledwater.org). Highland Spring is one of the leading suppliers to the UK bottled water market and it is the second brand in the UK (2006), number one brand of sparkling water and the number one brand for children. Porter’s Five Forces model was used to determine an industry’s potential for profit in UK and India markets (Appendix 1). The company produces 2.3 billion litres of water per annum. It focuses on quality of product and service; nevertheless, to becoming a low cost producer, company has invested excessively in operations and supply chain management. In 2006, exporting represented 5 percent of the company’s sales. Main competitors in UK market (by estimated brand shares in the bottled water off-trade for 2006) for company (7 percent) were Volvic – 16 percent, Evian – 14 percent and Buxton – 4 percent (Appendix 2). For expanding in UK market the point that Highland Spring brand has been carefully nurtured and developed over the years and is widely recognised all over UK, places it in competitive range in UK market. Nevertheless, SWOT analysis data shows that Highland Spring is one of strongest bottled water brands and producers in UK already, it has a strong Scottish orientation, and a brand support budget of nearly £11 million may give huge opportunities develop brand more outside the Scotland (Appendix 3).
Opportunities in UK
According to British Soft Drinks Association data tea is the largest single drink choice in UK – 35 percent, and it is drunk each day by 59 percent of people. Hot drinks overall made up 55 percent. Nevertheless, the popularity of fruit juice and smoothes has been growing (Appendix 4). …
