PT. Bumi Morowali Marble (BMM) was established in December 21, 2000. The BMM's line of business are quarrying and processing marble blocks. Its business of quarrying marble is legal under License of Regional Quarry (Surat Ijin Penambangan Daerah-SIPDA) under name of PT. Topaz Utama Koral.

The quarry area is located at Morowali, Central Sulawesi, where there lies an area of 50 hectares of rocky mountain. The height of the mountain is approximately 80 meters, which has a solid wall with excellence color quality.

BMM's current business operation is considered to be in infant age. BMM does not have its own marble processing plant on site. Therefore, in order to begin its operation, BMM signed a contract with other processing companies, which are located in Java Island. This processing company will be responsible for cutting and processing the marble blocks into the marble tiles or slabs.

Considering the strategic intention of BMM's management to built their own processing plant in Morowali, they are planning to setup a strategic marketing plan. The Megabrain Group of Executive Class of July 2000 Group Field Project (GFP) proposal was accepted by the board of BMM to conduct a marketing research. The study was basically conducting a usage and attitude marketing survey, analyzing and recommending action plans.

In this GFP, the Group found that one of BMM's main problems is to find out the consumer responds to the BMM's Marble Products. In fact, BMM has conducted a soft launch to the market and the response of consumer to the quality of BMM's Marble is good. The retailer, even refer it to the import product, rather than Indonesian product. BMM is wondering whether BMM should launch its product as an import product or local product, considering its high quality. BMM is also wondering whether the price and its quality are acceptable to the consumer.



The Megabrain has conducted a market survey by themselves in Jakarta, Bekasi and Tangerang. The survey was divided into three types of respondents, consumer, influencer and retailer. Although time and resources were limited however the group managed getting 77 respondents, which statistically is acceptable.

Based on that market survey result, the Group, then, analyzes and creates a recommendation to the company. It is found in the survey that quality and price of the BMM's Marble are important for the consumer to be considered when buying the product. The quality of the product is actually consisted of BMM's marble attributes such as color, texture and glossiness.

Ninety percent of consumers will buy the BMM's marble with a reasonable price and good quality. The color of BMM's Marble is cream, and it is found that the consumer value this color high. The survey also resulted that most consumer agree that BMM's marble pricing around Rp 250.000,00 is acceptable for tile type. For slab type, the price of Rp 380,000.00 per square meter is also acceptable.

One of the recommendations offered to BMM Management is to urge BMM's Management to develop a Branding for its product. The need to develop this branding is based on the reality that in the future, when Indonesia will become an open market based on WTO. The brand is strategic to BMM's product although branding is not a common practice to marble industry. However, by having a good branding, not only the BMM could protect their product from competition of import products, but also could leverage the brand to become a competitive advantage in the future.

At the end, this Group Field Project also proposed an action plan for BMM to be executed. This plan is important that the marketing strategy for BMM needs to be developed.



Reseach Location: PT Bumi Morowali Marble

Supervisor: Ir. Mudzaffar Daud, MBA.

Accepted on 20 August 2002