Additions to the book "Systems Design and Engineering" by Bonnema et.al. Subjects were chosen based on the Systems Engineering needs for Small and Medium Enterprises, as researched in the SESAME project. The
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Every year I talk to many entrepreneurs about business transfers and acquisitions. Only rarely do they tell me that it was a cinch. Buying or selling a business is complex. For a start, a business should be shipshape from an organizational and administrative perspective, while several legal and fiscal matters also affect the transaction. Moreover, many parties are involved in a business transfer: the buyer and the seller, of course, but also the employees, the spouse and/or family of the entrepreneur, the customers and suppliers. Emotions and trust also play a central role in selling a firm. Many owner/managers find it hard to abandon their business. The fact that a transaction of fixed assets may also be involved is another complicating factor. Is it a good thing to include fixed assets in the sale, or in fact the reverse? Considering that most people find it quite hard to sell their own house, engaging an estate agent to do it for them, it is understandable that buying and selling a business is a transaction fraught with difficulties.
The purpose of the research we undertook for this Conference Paper was to investigate whether marketing campaigns for specific types of drinks could be directed towards age cohorts rather than towards intercultural differences between countries. We developed consumer profiles based on drinking motives and drinking behavior by age cohorts. We hypothesized that differences between countries in the youngest age groups are smaller than in the older age groups, where country specific tradition and culture still plays a more prominent role. We, therefore tested, from the data obtained by the COnsumer BEhaviouR Erasmus Network (COBEREN), the hypothesis that the extent to which the age specific profiles differ between countries increases with age. The results confirm our hypothesis that the extent to which drinking motives differ between countries increases with age. Our results suggest that marketing campaigns which are directed towards drinking motives, could best be tailored by age cohort, in particular when it concerns age group 18-37 and more particular for beer, spirits and especially premix drinks. Marketing campaigns for non-alcoholic beverages should be made specific for the British countries and the Western countries, but even more effectively be made specific for the age cohort 18-37.
