Andres Quintero
Marketing Strategy
Final Paper – Marketing Myopia
December 12, 2012 It seems every “failing industry” follows the same myopic trend, growth, expansion, stagnation, and then decline. These industries all have a common theme that included a flawed perception that they didn’t have to adapt to their customer needs. The railroad industry made this fatal mistake. They didn’t perceive themselves as a transportation industry, just a railroad industry. They focused on their end product instead of on their customers wants. Meanwhile, other modes of transportation were developed to meet the customer needs at higher levels of quality and quickness to reach their destinations. The railroad industry could have been the first to develop these ideas, instead of staring into a black hole and becoming irrelevant. These growth spurts were brought about because of innovation, they wanted to solve a societal issue that at that point was hindering growth. Before the railroad industry people transported goods, building supplies, and just plain commuters from point A to point B in other modes of transportation. Horses and stage coaches were a vital way of moving items thru their landscapes but they also became myopic and lead to their extinction. The builder of the stage coach failed to recognize he was in the transportation of human capital. The primary assessments that lead to stagnation were the lack of long term strategies by the management of this industry. They failed to look at the larger picture. They didn’t recognize they were a mode of transportation and when other more viable ways were developed it would destroy their fundamental purpose. Could this happen again in the future? I will say most definitely; just recently I read that companies were trying to develop shuttles that would leave the atmosphere to sling shot their way back to their destinations in a fraction of the time. Even today with all the different modes of transportation we always are looking quicker, consuming less time, way to travel. These services would change the way we live today. You could be on one side of globe in half hour instead of a whole day of flying. Do I see the airplane industry investing in these technologies or just shrugging them off and becoming myopic? The owner Virgin Atlantic, Richard Branson, is currently involved in the airplane industry. He is sole person responsible for funding the development of the new technology to travel thru the atmosphere and sling shot back to their destination. He will not let his