SWOT SOCIAL MEDIA ANALYSIS

Carolina Bellido.Lazaro SantiagoLindsay CastroNicola Torko

• Founded by Steve Ells

• Open his first Chipotle in 1993 in Denver, Colorado which was 880 square feet.

• 1995 : Elis opens his second chipotle in Denver.

• 1998: 16 total restaurants were open and soon after McDonalds invested $36,000,000.

• 2005 : With the investment they were able to opened 500 restaurants by 2005.

• 2006: Became a publicly traded company.

• They stand for “Food with Integrity”

CHIPOTLE MEXICAN GRILL

STRENGTHS• First to focus on fast-casual Mexican restaurant, which allows it to maintain a steady

demand/supply-chain.

• No steroids or growth hormones, All dairy products come from open-pasture cows.

• Invest and purchased ingredients from local farmers.

• More than 1,600 world wide chipotle restaurants open, however most are inside the U.S., mainly around areas with high traffic volume.

• Low start-up cost requiring only 2000 – 2,500 square feet of space and using environment friendly materials in constructions.

• Average 150 new locations annually.

• Market Presence: as of 10/26/1015 $649.86 per share. Strong.

• Positive brand image and customer loyalty.

• Online order and cater.

• Social and content marketing powerhouse

SOCIAL MEDIA STRENGTHS

Social Media

• Chipotle takes a lighthearted, youthful, trendy approach to their social media content.

• Adding a human element to their social media strategy.

• Strong influence:

• Chipotle is changing the way people think and eat fast food.

WEAKNESSES

• More expensive than traditional fast-food restaurants because of natural and organic ingredients used.

• Limited menu.

• Slow international expansion with only 17 restaurants outside the U.S. mainly because many thought the food was overpriced for their area.

• Slow expansion in the UK due to their unfamiliarity with Mexican food also many locally owned burrito chains began to open around the same time.

• Slowest expansion was in France with only being able to open one restaurant a year from 2012 – 2014.

SOCIAL MEDIA WEAKNESSES

Social Media

• Very limited menu-size to advertise on social media

• Chipotle menu technically consists of only three options (burrito, tacos, and burrito bowl)

• Lack of brand awareness

• Almost no traditional promotion and advertisement

• Only recently run their first ad run on Grammy Awards (02/10/2012)

OPPORTUNITIES

• International Dimension: possible areas of expansion with little space required.

• ShopHouse Southeast Asian Kitchen is an Asian fast-casual restaurant chipotle opened.

• Home delivery.

• Menu diversification.

• Targets growing trend of Health consciousness.

• Sociocultural Dimension : Food with integrity – striving for better quality and ethical standards. Build relationships with local farmers.

SOCIAL MEDIA OPPORTUNITIES

Social Media

• More interactive content

• Positive response to its social media strategy so far

• Continue the same way!

THREATS

• Political-Legal Dimension: Securities Fraud Lawsuit – Chipotle issued materially false statements regarding the company’s business and prospects causing CMG stocks to trade at fake inflated prices. Also 2010 Audit – revealed illegal workers

• Economic Dimension: Chipotles is pricey and consumers have been spending less in the last few years. Threat for economic instability. Raw material prices can also fluctuate.

• Chipotle is trying to break into a slightly saturated market segment of fast-food restaurants trying to introduce healthy options.

• Low barriers to entry for new competitors.

• Loss of brand loyalty if food is not made “with integrity”.

SOCIAL MEDIA THREATSSocial Media

• Controlling all social media interaction can become difficult.

• Chipotle become too large to stay as engaged on all its social media platforms.

• Top management is very open about strategy, easily copied by competitor.

• Bad press on issues that undermine value may infiltrate social media causing bad word of mouth.

2.7 Million Facebook LIKES

711k Twitter Followers35k Youtbue Followers

253k Instagram Followers

SOCIAL MEDIA FACTS• Chipotle responds to 83% of Facebook posts — more than any other quick-service

restaurant. Likewise, about 90% of the company's activity on Twitter is responding to customers through @-mentions. "We love to have conversations," says Joe Stupp (Chipotle's new media manager).

• Chipotle employs a three-person social media team to staff its main platforms: Rusty Partch, Myra Ryder and Joe Stupp.

SOCIAL MEDIA FACTS• 3 – identities on Facebook and Twiter

• “each team member signs his or her name at the end of a tweet/post, allowing community members to get to know the different voices on the team in a personal way.

Marketing strategy goal“to change the way people think about their food.”

“Likes and retweets are great, but what matters most to Chipotle is genuine conversations with customers.” – Joe Stupp

TARGET MARKET• Chipotle has targeted millennials for its primary customer segment.

• Target Segment: 18-24 y. olds, well educated, middle class

• Targets people that are environmentally conscious. Consumers follow a “Food with integrity” mission. Active lifestyle, socially focused, tech savvy, image conscious

• Customers are financially cautious.

• Late generation Y (1977-1998) and generation Z (1999 – present)

• Financially cautious because they lived through the recent recession of 2008.

The targeted consumer segment, matches very well with a strong social media marketing strategy.

HALLOWEEN SPECIALEach Halloween, Chipotle hosts a community-centric "Boo-rito" contest. Last year, community

members could take a photo of themselves dressed up as a family farm animal, submit the photo via Chipotle's website and receive a ticket to buy a burrito at a local Chipotle restaurant

for $2. The $2 would go toward FarmAid, a non-profit organization dedicated to family farmers.

YouTube Video Website

SOCIAL MEDIA SUCCESS

• In less than a week after the “The Scarecrow” campaign video released, Chipotle attracted 3,100,000 views on YouTube, about 20,000 likes and more than 4,000 comments.

• Several media sources such as Slate, the Christian SCIENCE Monitor and NPR picked up the video.

ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT• Chipotle should work on more innovative content marketing projects.

• Creating a media division to focus on targeted content to change perceptions about sustainable living may help.

REFERENCES

Chipotle Mexican Grill. (n.d.). Retrieved October 26, 2015, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chipotle_Mexican_Grill

Burke, C. (2014, October 21). Chipotle Case Study. Retrieved October 26, 2015, from https://carolinemburke.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/chipotlecasefinal.pdf

Chipotle Mexican Grill | SWOT Analysis | USP & Competitors | BrandGuide | MBA Skool-Study.Learn.Share. (n.d.). Retrieved October 26, 2015, from http://www.mbaskool.com/brandguide/food-and-beverages/3062-chipotle-mexican-grill.html

Chang, T. (Ed.). (2014, September 8). Chipotle Marketing Plan. Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://de.slideshare.net/TonyChang16/chipotle-marketing-plan-38849044

REFERENCES

Klamm, D. (2012, March 21). How Chipotle Uses Social Media to Cultivate a Better World. Retrieved October 20, 2015.

Team BMC. (2015, June 1). Chipotle's Lighthearted Social Media Strategy is Helping to Build a Lot More Than Burritos - Brower, Miller & Cole. Retrieved October 20, 2015.

Semtei, E. (2015, April 30). Consumer Response to Chipotle Going GMO-Free. Retrieved October 27, 2015.

Aversa, S. (2013, September 24). Consumer Brand Perception of Chipotle’s Ad Campaign. Retrieved October 27, 2015.