Another strategy, derived from an external perspective, was devised by a U.S. industrial commodity manufacturer. When sales in one of its major product lines declined swiftly following the introduction of a new cheaper competitive product, it decided to find out the teason Through field interviewing with customers, it discovered that the sales slide was nearly over something competitors had not realized. Since sales of the product had dropped off to a few core markets where no cost-effective alternative was available, it decided to put more support behind this product line, justas the competition was closing its plants. The manufacturer trained the sales force to service those distributors who continued to carry the line and revised prices to pick up competitive distribution through master distributor arrangements. It even resisted the move of the trade association to reduce government mandated safety zequirements for handling the newer products. By the time its strategy was obvious to competitors, the manufacturer had firmly established a distributioo lead in a small but attractive product/market segment. The SBU Concept A distinguishing characteristic of Phase Ill planning in diversified companies is the formal grouping of related businesses into strategic business units (SBU) or organizational entities arge and bomogeneous enough to exercise effective control over most factors affectingthilr bistinesses Thesau concept recognizes two distinct strategic levels: corpocate decisiorts that affect the shape and directian of the enterprise as a whole, and business unit dedsions that affect only theindividual SBUoperating in its own environment strategic planning isthus packaged in pieces relevant to individual decision makers, and strateg development is linked to strategy implementation as the explicit responsibility of operating management.