Lululemon Athletica: Harmonizing Expansion

Christine Day, newly appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Lululemon Athletica, glanced at the mounds of paper on her desk. It was a beautiful spring day in Vancouver and despite Lululemon’s healthy lifestyle Mantra, Day knew that the closest she would come to enjoying the sunshine was through the large windows at Lululemon headquarters. Hailing from the corporate powerhouse Starbucks itself, it was Day’s mission to increase Lululemon’s share in the global athletic apparel market, specifically in the extremely competitive US athletic apparel market. As she flipped through pages of historical data and annual reports, Day was generally pleased with the company’s success thus far, however, despite a complete upheaval of Lululemon’s information technology systems, supply chain and inventory issues still persisted. As a young company in the midst of an aggressive expansion plan during a tumultuous economic period, Day was aware she must strategically balance her priorities and investments to maintain low costs and subsequently optimize potential revenues without sacrificing the high service and product standards that Lululemon was staking its growing reputation on.