The Tarkett Case

The Tarkett case justifies its place in the present collection for several reasons. While most of the other five cases have dealt with industrial goods having commercial clients as their end-users, Tarkett’s flooring products to a large extent have households as end-users. Thus, this case relates to consumer capital goods (sometimes instead called durable consumer goods). The Tarkett case is not only about how to save a deeply troubled company. It also demonstrates how a Scandinavian-based company managed to systematically break out of its Scandinavian home base, and become truly international. This was to a large extent achieved through two very substantial and rather courageous foreign acquisitions, resulting in the location of group headquarters to the European continent, with the Tarkett shares quoted on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. Thus, in the last ten years, this company has not relied primarily on ‘organic growth’ by a gradual increase in its ‘export activities’ from its original domestic base, but on bold strategic leaps. These leaps have been associated with radical, multiple changes in strategic concepts, sometimes successful, sometimes less so.