CMS Business School students learned about designing a channel network for a product under the able guidance of Dr Ravishankar S Ulle, Dr Vinoth Kumar V, and Dr Yogananthan S. The session was held on 4th April to help students develop and design a channel network with various channel partners and suitable distribution approach for the chosen product portfolio. The motive of the activity was to create a template that helps the organization to successfully achieve its distribution objectives and goals. It also aimed to plan a company’s organizational capacity, resources, volume, storage and order management system in real-time.

Students were divided into teams for this activity and were given 120 minutes to prepare the chart with the channel design and distribution network. The process was divided into 4 stages, starting with choosing a product portfolio and designing a channel network specific to product portfolio requirements in order to reach the customers. In the second stage, the team had to select the ownership models and profit concerns from various options like: Own, Franchise, Strategic Alliances and Joint Ventures.

Stage 3 required the students to select the distribution type and approaches appropriately, based on the product chosen. In the final stage, the team had to decide on the channel network planning with capacity requirements, financial and other resource requirements, volume requirement, storage, order delivery, and order frequency. Once the planning phase was over, each team was given 10 minutes to present their chart. Students received feedback on their work and encouraged to learn more about channel network. It was a great learning opportunity for the students that provided them with hands-on experience that will be useful in the future.