HBR Case Brief: Chase Sapphire

Chase Sapphire
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

Chase Sapphire
The President of JPMorgan Chase Branded Cards, Pam Codispoti, and the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Chase Card Services and Senior Advisor, Eileen Serra, were astonished after Chase Sapphire Reserve Cards hit the company's one-year sales target within two weeks in 2016. The fascinating thing was that many of the cardholders were people under 35 years (Santana, Avery, & Snively, 2018). Millennials were attracted to the new Chase Sapphire Reserve cards and talked about them on social media. Despite this product being in high demand, Chase's primary problem was how to differentiate it from other similar or substitute products to sustain its competitive advantage for an extended period. Chase's opportunities were based on Millennials who preferred the Chase Sapphire Reserve cards for online shopping and travelling, among other things. Nevertheless, significant threats were posed by competitors, such as American Express, which offered Platinum Card, and Citibank that provided its customers with Prestige cards. As a result, Chase created a good product for its consumers, but the problem was maintaining those customers so that Chase Sapphire Reserve cards would remain their preferred option.
The first strategy that Chase would have used to solve its problem was differentiating Chase Sapphire Reserve cards from similar products provided by its competitors, Citibank and American Express (Santana, Avery, & Snively, 2018). In particular, this method required Chase to add new product features, portfolio, and benefits that were hard for its business rivals to imitate. The advantage of this strategy is that Chase Sapphire Reserve cards would remain highly competitive for a long period. In addition, Chase is likely to keep its existing customers who will renew the card, hence making the company generate more revenues. However, the primary disadvantage is that Chase would use more resources in product differentiation and did not know whether existing consumers will respond as expected. If Chase’s competitors imitated the new product features and benefits, they would neutralize the firm’s competitive advantage. Another alternative for Chase was to introduce new products to address the needs of new customer segments and capitalize on them. The primary benefit of this strategy is that ...