| Course | BUSI 446 Retailing and Category Management (BUSI446) |
|---|---|
| Module/Week | 2 |
| Assignment | Retail Management Project Report 1 |
| Paper type | Interim retail strategy report |
| Length | about 637 words, 2 double-spaced pages plus title page and references. Course guide: a report of 500 to 750 words answering prompts based on the course curriculum, in current APA format |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| Points | 50 |
| School | Liberty University Online |
| Program | BS in Business Administration |
| Where it sits | Module/Week 2 in Liberty's published BUSI 446 course guide; current sections can differ |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for BUSI 446 Week 2
Retail Management Project Report 1: Target Market, Retail Strategy and Financial Strategy for Harvest Lane Market
[Student Name]
School of Business, Liberty University
BUSI 446: Retailing and Category Management
Retail Management Project Report 1
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
Harvest Lane Market, its figures and the report prompts are composites standing in for the instructor's questions; the textbook and research cited are real, and the structure follows Liberty's public course guide for BUSI 446.
Retail Management Project Report 1: Target Market, Retail Strategy and Financial Strategy for Harvest Lane Market
The Retailer
Harvest Lane Market is a family-owned grocer with six stores in and around Lynchburg, Virginia. Its stores average 28,000 square feet, about half the size of a typical supermarket, and carry a full grocery line with a large fresh department, a butcher counter and products from about 40 regional farms. Annual sales are $62 million.
Target Market and Buying Behavior
Harvest Lane's core shoppers are households earning $60,000 to $120,000, many with children, who value fresh food and are willing to pay slightly more for it. Levy et al. (2019) distinguish extended problem solving, limited problem solving and habitual decision making. Most grocery trips are habitual, which makes store loyalty valuable and switching costly to win back.
Harvest Lane's shoppers do not buy everything in one place. Fox et al. (2004) found that households spread their spending across grocery stores, mass merchandisers and drug stores and choose among them by trip. Harvest Lane wins the fresh, weekly fill-in trip and loses the large stock-up trip to supercenters. The goal is not to win every trip but to deepen the trips it already wins.
Two kinds of shoppers matter most. The first is the weeknight shopper, often a working parent, who stops on the way home for dinner ingredients and wants to be in and out in 15 minutes; for this shopper, speed and fresh choices matter more than price. The second is the Saturday shopper who visits for produce, meat and baked goods and enjoys browsing local products. Both shop Harvest Lane by habit, which means a single bad experience, such as wilted produce or a long checkout line, can push them to try somewhere else and form a new habit there.
Retail Strategy
Levy et al. (2019) define a retail strategy by its target market, its retail format and its sustainable competitive advantage.
Target market: the families described above, within a 10-minute drive of each store.
Retail format: a compact supermarket that trades breadth for depth in fresh and local products, with full service at the meat and deli counters.
Sustainable competitive advantage: relationships with regional farms built over 30 years, which supply products that national chains cannot source at the same freshness. Ailawadi and Keller (2004) argue that a retailer's brand image rests on its assortment, its service and its store experience as much as its prices. Harvest Lane's image as the local source of fresh food is harder to copy than a low price.
The main growth opportunity is market penetration: selling more to current shoppers through a prepared-meals counter, rather than new stores outside the region. A seventh store would be market expansion, taking the same format to new customers, but the nearest promising trade area already has two supermarkets and a supercenter. A prepared-meals counter, by contrast, serves the weeknight shopper the stores already attract, uses the butcher counter's and the farms' products, and turns the fresh-food reputation into a new reason to visit.
Financial Strategy
The strategic profit model multiplies net profit margin by asset turnover to produce return on assets (Levy et al., 2019).
| Measure | Calculation | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Net profit margin | $1.24 million net profit / $62.0 million sales | 2.0 percent |
| Asset turnover | $62.0 million sales / $20.7 million total assets | 3.0 times |
| Return on assets | 2.0 percent x 3.0 | 6.0 percent |
Harvest Lane earns its return through turnover more than margin, which is typical of grocers. Levy et al. (2019) explain that the model lets a retailer see which path to profit it is following: high-margin specialty retailers earn their return through margin, while grocers and discounters earn it through turnover. The model also shows where improvement is possible. Raising net margin from 2.0 to 2.3 percent, for example through less waste in the fresh departments, would lift return on assets to about 6.9 percent without adding any assets. The model shows the risk of the prepared-meals plan: new equipment would add about $1.5 million in assets, so the counter must raise sales or margin enough to keep asset turnover near 3.0. Report 2 will test whether the stores' locations and supply chain can support it.
References
Ailawadi, K. L., & Keller, K. L. (2004). Understanding retail branding: Conceptual insights and research priorities. Journal of Retailing, 80(4), 331-342. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretai.2004.10.008
Fox, E. J., Montgomery, A. L., & Lodish, L. M. (2004). Consumer shopping and spending across retail formats. Journal of Business, 77(S2), S25-S60. https://doi.org/10.1086/381518
Levy, M., Weitz, B. A., & Grewal, D. (2019). Retailing management (10th ed.). McGraw-Hill Education.
What the BUSI 446 Week 2 instructions ask
The second week of BUSI 446 covers chapters 4 through 6 of Levy et al., on customer buying behavior, retail market strategy and financial strategy, with one presentation, Discussion Board Forum 2 and Retail Management Project Report 1, worth 50 points. The project report answers prompts drawn from the course material and runs 500 to 750 words in current APA format. It is the first of three interim reports, and all three come back in the final report in Week 8, revised from the instructor's comments, which is why the retailer chosen here should be one the student can follow for the rest of the term. A real or composite retailer both work if the figures are consistent.
How this BUSI 446 Week 2 example is built
A brief sketch of the grocer comes first, and each of the three questions then gets its own heading. The first describes the target market and the buying process its shoppers follow, citing research on how households split spending across formats. The second states the retail strategy in the textbook's three parts: target market, retail format and sustainable competitive advantage. The third builds the strategic profit model in a table, showing how net profit margin and asset turnover combine into return on assets, and draws one decision from the numbers. Each section ends with what the retailer should do next, which gives Report 2 a starting point.
BUSI 446 Week 2 grading rubric: where the points go
Interim reports are graded on how fully and accurately each prompt is answered, the use of course concepts, the support behind each claim, organization and APA mechanics within the 500- to 750-word range. Instructors check that strategy terms are used as Levy et al. define them, that the competitive advantage named is one competitors would find hard to copy, and that the financial figures are internally consistent: margin times turnover must equal the return on assets reported. Reports that state recommendations a manager could act on score above reports that only describe. Because the final report reuses this one, clean structure now saves revision time later.
BUSI 446 Week 2 help: mistakes that cost points
Pick the retailer before writing, and gather or build a consistent set of figures: sales, net profit and total assets are enough for the strategic profit model. Use one heading per prompt so that the instructor can find each answer. Define the target market with specifics such as income, household type and trip type, not a general description. Name a competitive advantage that rests on something hard to copy, such as relationships, location or skills, rather than low prices alone. Check the math, keep the report under 750 words, and save the instructor's comments, because the final report must show that each one was addressed. Keep the figures in a small table so they are easy to update.
Related BUSI 446 sample papers
Other BUSI 446 weeks
- BUSI 446 Week 1: Forum 1: Omnichannel Stores
- BUSI 446 Week 3: Forum 3: Trade Areas and Site Choice
- BUSI 446 Week 4: Project Report 2: Operations
- BUSI 446 Week 5: Forum 5: Category Roles
- BUSI 446 Week 6: Project Report 3: Pricing
- BUSI 446 Week 7: IFL Essay: A Biblical Store
- BUSI 446 Week 8: Final Project Report
More BS in Business Administration sample papers
- BUSI 443 Week 2: Case Study 1: Staffing a New Site
- BUSI 444 Week 2: Case Study 1: Training and Strategy
- BUSI 453 Week 2: QMR Draft 1: Problem and Approach
- BUSI 455 Week 2: Forum Replies and Self-Analysis
BUSI 446 Week 2 questions, answered
What is BUSI 446 Retail Management Project Report 1?
The first of three 50-point interim reports in BUSI 446, due in Module/Week 2, answering prompts on one retailer's customers, market strategy and finances in 500 to 750 words.
Where can I find a free BUSI 446 Week 2 sample paper?
A complete BUSI 446 Week 2 project report is on this page, with the target market, retail strategy and a strategic profit model table for a composite grocer.
What is the strategic profit model in retailing?
A formula from Levy et al. in which net profit margin multiplied by asset turnover equals return on assets, showing whether a retailer earns its return through margins or through turnover.
What is a retail strategy statement?
A statement naming the retailer's target market, the retail format it will use to serve that market and the sustainable competitive advantage it will rely on.
What else is due in BUSI 446 Module/Week 2?
Discussion Board Forum 2, a 500- to 750-word thread and two replies with peer-reviewed sources and Scripture, after chapters 4 through 6 and a presentation.
Use it as a model, or ask for your own
This paper is an original model written by our desk for study. It is not a submitted student paper and not an official Liberty University document. Read it for structure and reasoning, then write your own to the instructions in your Canvas course. If you want a version built to your exact prompt and rubric, the first custom sample is free and arrives in 24 to 48 hours.
Ask for a custom BUSI 446 Week 2 sample · All BUSI 446 weeks · All courses