Imagine you've been placed in a sales territory where market share has dropped by 15% in the last quarter. Walk me through the steps you would take in your first 30 days to diagnose the problem and propose a recovery plan.

Situation

During my internship at a local dairy distributor, our key account in the NCR+ region reported a 20% volume drop versus the previous year, and the regional manager asked me to investigate.

Task

I was to produce a root cause analysis and a one-page proposal within two weeks, using available sales data and store visits.

Action

I pulled three months of SKU-level sell-out data from the company's system, created a simple trend chart in Excel, and flagged that two top-selling SKUs had frequent stockouts. I visited 10 high-volume sari-sari stores and learned from owners that a competitor had introduced a similar product at a 10% lower price and gave free display racks. I cross-checked with the pricing team and found our trade margins hadn't changed. I recommended a time-bound "buy 2 get 1" promo on the affected SKUs, reallocation of delivery schedules, and training for store staff on upselling.

Result

The manager approved the promo; within 30 days, sales rebounded by 13%, and the store owners appreciated the direct engagement. The competitor's share returned to previous levels.