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McCollum Center | About

renamed Conoco, was a multinational energy conglomerate with assets of $2.3 billion. Conoco’s growth stemmed largely from McCollum’s innovative and expansive business strategy, which led to exploration of foreign energy resources and new View Details

January 2004 (Revised January 2005)
Case

Delta Air Lines (A): The Low-Cost Carrier Threat

By: Jan W. Rivkin and Laurent Therivel

The top management of Delta Air Lines must decide how to respond to the threat posed by low-cost carriers such as Southwest and JetBlue. Among the options considered is the launch of a low-cost subsidiary by Delta itself. Prior efforts to launch a low-cost subsidiary,... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Cost; Decision Choices and Conditions; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Air Transportation Industry

17 Aug 2021
Op-Ed

Dispensing Justice: The Case for Legalizing Cannabis Nationally

Insurance Corporation—if they participate in a federal offense. Because cannabis businesses operate in a penumbra of selective state legitimacy, but face federal illegitimacy, banks are extremely chary about extending capital to them.... View Details

Keywords: by Ashish Nanda and Tabatha Robinson

May 2013
Case

Altius Golf and the Fighter Brand

By: Robert J. Dolan and Sunru Yong

Altius Golf is the clear leader in the golf ball market despite a long-term decline in the number of golfers and a drop in sales following the financial crisis. The firm has maintained its position by introducing generations of advanced, super-premium golf balls that... View Details

Keywords: Governing and Advisory Boards; Competitive Advantage; Decision Choices and Conditions; Distribution Channels; Sports; Financial Crisis; Brands and Branding; Segmentation; Sports Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

January 2021 (Revised March 2022)
Case

Arçelik: From a Dealer Network to an Omnichannel Experience

By: Ayelet Israeli and Fares Khrais

Arçelik Turkey, the country’s market leader in household appliances, was at an omnichannel crossroads in January 2020. Arçelik was a B2B player utilizing a dealership network with an umbrella of brands and had one of the largest brick-and-mortar store networks in... View Details

11 Jan 2010
Research & Ideas

Mixing Open Source and Proprietary Software Strategies

nature of the competition is. They should also weigh the importance of user innovation for their market and the value of their complementary good. In the case of some software products, the complementary product is very important. For instance, a server View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Web Services

12 Oct 2022
Research & Ideas

When Design Enables Discrimination: Learning from Anti-Asian Bias on Airbnb

Airbnb hosts of Asian descent had significantly fewer stays early in the COVID-19 pandemic—and the design of the travel site may have inadvertently enabled discrimination that shut Asians out, says new research by Harvard Business Professor Michael Luca. Hosts with... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds; Technology; Travel

01 Aug 1998
News

High Honors

Executive Vice President,The Seagram Company Ltd. During Ellen Marram's distinguished 28-year career in the packaged-goods industry, "growth" has always been the operative word. Whether she has focused on growing profits, expanding... View Details

30 Mar 2020
Research & Ideas

The New Rules for Remote Work: Pandemic Edition

researched how to fix broken global teams. “They may not be able to completely reassure workers about what will happen tomorrow, but they can provide a glimpse of the big picture from their perspective,” says Neeley, who is writing a case about a leader of a US company... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

September 2015 (Revised March 2016)
Case

Intuit: Turbo Tax PersonalPro - A Tale of Two Entrepreneurs

By: Shikhar Ghosh, Joseph Fuller and Michael Roberts

The case provides a vehicle for teaching about both corporate intrapreneurship and the use of lean startup methods. It tells the story of a product manager within Intuit who develops an idea for a new product that spans two of the company's existing business... View Details

Keywords: Business Units; Business or Company Management; Applications and Software; Accounting; Product Development; Financial Services Industry

July 2017
Case

Magpie: Developing and Using Buyer Personas

By: Frank V. Cespedes

The founders of a start-up platform for publishers have developed preliminary personas of target customers and are evaluating the implications for initial target buyers, messaging, and marketing programs. The case is useful for discussing the process of developing... View Details

Keywords: Buying Process; Marketing; Sales; Distribution Channels; Segmentation; Entrepreneurship; Social Media; Consumer Products Industry; Fashion Industry; United States

04 Dec 2023
Blog Post

My Summer of Joy with the National Parks Service

WWII planes, boat docks, and everything in between. My role was to help them design a more sustainable operating and funding model to ensure their long-term viability within the park service. Before I started at HBS, I was a medical... View Details

01 Oct 1997
News

Brice Cutrer Jones

people questioned the need for another wine operation in California. I decided - primarily out of fear - to do my best on a single product, focusing exclusively on Chardonnay. I had faith that somebody would always want our best effort."... View Details

Keywords: Judith A. Ross

February 2022 (Revised October 2022)
Case

Ample Hills Creamery

By: Tom Eisenmann, Lindsay N. Hyde and Tom Quinn

Ample Hills Creamery started in 2010 as a temporary ice cream pushcart in Brooklyn, New York City. On the strength of inventive flavors and clever marketing, husband-and-wife founders Brian Smith and Jackie Cuscuna built a premium, artisanal dessert empire of 16 retail... View Details

Keywords: Brands and Branding; Business Growth and Maturation; Partners and Partnerships; Logistics; Profit; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Food and Beverage Industry

October 2003 (Revised January 2004)
Case

Burberry

By: Youngme E. Moon, Erika Kussmann, Emma Penick, Susan Wojewoda and Kerry Herman

In 2003, Rose Marie Bravo, Burberry's CEO, is debating how to maintain the currency and cachet of the brand across its broad customer base, while entering new product categories and expanding distribution. In the past five years, the brand has become one of the hottest... View Details

Keywords: Brands and Branding; Management Teams; Luxury; Product Launch; Distribution; Product Positioning; Advertising; Market Entry and Exit; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Fashion Industry; United Kingdom

August 1993 (Revised April 1997)
Case

Southwest Airlines: 1993 (A)

By: James L. Heskett and Roger H. Hallowell

Southwest Airlines, the only major U.S. airline to be profitable in 1992, makes a decision as to which of two new cities to open, or to add a new long-haul route. Provides windows into Southwest's strategy, operations, marketing, and culture. View Details

Keywords: Decisions; Cost Management; Profit; Marketing; Service Operations; Organizational Culture; Corporate Strategy; Expansion; Air Transportation Industry; United States