Case Study - Growth Strategy development for leading education provider

Growth Strategy development for leading education provider

Case Study Summary

The client asked Archstone Consulting to support their growth strategy development for presentation to an upcoming Board of Directors meeting. Due to the recent economic environment and a changing educational landscape, Archstone was asked to identify sources of future growth, from both the client's current core capabilities and from appropriate adjacent markets, to achieve their target growth rates.

The Client

The client is a $500mm provider of post-secondary education with campuses across the United States.

The Challenge

The client had been facing recent difficulties continuing their revenue and enrollment growth and was looking for direction in three growth areas - from their Core business to open additional campuses and transplant programs across existing campuses, from Adjacent markets that use similar skills and have similar employers, and from Non-Core areas outside their current competencies.

The Solution

Developed Growth Model: Analyzed past performance, projected future organic growth. Growth model highlights source of growth, magnitude of revenue growth potential, and time horizon.
Identified Core Growth Opportunities: For the top 50 cities, analyzed student supply (student population, growth rates, current degrees awarded) and job demand (employment, growth rates, replacement job growth, median wages) to identify cities with unmet demand and determined appropriate campus size. Assessed competitive environment to determine market entry strategy and priority.
Identified Adjacent Growth Opportunities: At the national level, analyzed 13 educational markets with similarities in skill sets and employers for job demand (employment, growth, wages) and competitive environment. Selected 2 markets for additional analysis.

The Results

Identified 8-10 geographies for additional campus expansion. Proposed potential campus size and programs
Identified opportunities for program transplants to existing campuses
Projected additional annual revenue growth from these markets
Adjacent Growth Opportunities
Narrowed Adjacent opportunities to 2 trades for further investigation
Presented results to the Board of Directors and Senior Management