Are You Going to Have a Job for Me? Creating and Growing a Freedom Business in Bolivia
Cara Strauss Contreras had moved from the United States to Bolivia and spent the last 13 years pouring herself into creating a freedom business she named SutiSana. SutiSana employed women who had left sex trafficking and trained them to make fine leather handbags and accessories, which were then marketed to women in the United States and around the world. Cara felt like she was finally in a position to grow her business, but she struggled with identifying the right strategies for growth. She felt like she needed to make some improvements in the company’s distribution channels and an increase brand name recognition. But she had no idea how to go about making these changes with her limited budget and whether these changes would actually increase sales.
In analyzing this case, students should be able to:
1. Explain the concept of a freedom business model and how it differs from a more traditional business model
2. Describe the cultural and macroeconomic factors that make women vulnerable to sex trafficking
3. Apply contextual information in constructing marketing mix strategies
4. Outline channel structure and judge the intensity level of the channel structure
5. Devise strategies for channel growth
6. Assign a current level of brand awareness to a company and develop strategies for growing the company’s brand awareness