Jollibee Foods Corporation: International Expansion

Jollibee Foods Corporation: International Expansion

1.1. What sources of competitive advantage was it able to develop against McDonald's in its home market?

Firstly, Jollibee was the first mover in the sector of burgers in Philippines, shaping customer preferences and expectations, instead of McDonald's or KFC.

Secondly, Jollibee was young, and very small in comparison of McDonald's whose force worldwide is standardization. The burger company serves millions of exactly identical sandwich each year in dozen of countries so that McDonald's customers can find their favourite BigMac taste wherever they go. McDonald's is used to reducing costs by having huge economies of scale. But on new markets, such as Philippines, this strength can turn into a weakness. Indeed, as we said the tastes were not shaped by McDonalds, and the American juggernaut is not flexible enough to adapt to local customer needs.

Jollibee, thanks to its smaller size, its local resources and understanding of the local tastes, took advantage of McDonald's lack of flexibility. The substantial creative menus with unique Filipino recipes and reasonable price brought fantastic consumer feedbacks and a good reputation to the company.

1.2. How was Jollibee able to build its dominant position in fast food in the Philippines?

Back to the oil crisis in 1977, Jollibee handled the difficult situation with smart solutions. At the earlier period, when Jollibee realized that an increase in oil prices has a direct impact on controlling its production cost, the firm decided to change its existing business from ice cream to burgers. This shows that the management