La Flamme Corporation manufactures corrugated cardboard boxes. It competes and plans to grow by producing high-quality boxes at a low price that are delivered to customers in a timely manner. Many other manufacturers produce similar boxes. La Flamme believes that continuously improving its manufacturing processes and having satisfied employees are critical to implementing its strategy in 2015.

Required

1. Is La Flamme's 2015 strategy one of product differentiation or cost leadership? Explain briefly.

2. Portage Corporation, a competitor of La Flamme, manufactures corrugated boxes with more designs and colour combinations than La Flamme at a higher price. Portage's boxes are of high quality but require more time to produce and so have longer delivery times. Draw a simple customer preference map for La Flamme and Portage using the attributes of price, delivery time, quality, and design.

3. Indicate two measures you would expect to see under each perspective in La Flamme's balanced scorecard for 2015. Use a strategy map to explain your answer.