IntroductionIn 1913 Henry Ford designed and implemented a new strategy to meet the needs of his customers by revolutionizing the automotive industry and the manufacturing process. By September 1927, Ford had transformed every phase of the manufacturing process, from refining raw materials to final assembly of the automobile, significantly reducing assembly time per vehicle, lowering costs, and simultaneously increasing productivity (AAM, 2003 ). Managing and innovating productivity while understanding core business competencies is just one way operations management provides competitive advantage and differentiation. Starting with Henry Ford's innovative processes, many business strategy models have been designed to give customers more value with their purchases of goods or services. The value chain is the latest proven strategic model that consists of a sequence of activities that create and build value while improving an organization's positioning relative to its competitors (Robbins & Coulter, 2012). Croc's, Inc., an innovative branded retail footwear company founded in 2003, has incorporated a value chain strategy that has had a dramatic effect on market demands and helped lead to a dramatic increase in revenues. The purpose of this article is to analyze Croc's value chain strategy and how to use vertical integration to combine the assembly and distribution process under one ownership (Khoi, 2007). Value Chain StrategyAs a new company starting Croc's leadership understood that success in footwear is based on customer needs and is demand driven. The main product sold by Croc are shoes made from a closed-cell resin called Croslite that offers the wearer high comfort and almost cu...... middle of paper ......09/11/30 /verticale -integration-the-pendolo-swings-back.htmlHoyt, D., & Silverman, A. (2008). Crocs: Revolutionizing an industry's supply chain model for competitive advantage. [Case study]. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford Graduate School of BusinessKhoi, L. (October 2007). Vertical integration as an alternative governance. Retrieved from http://webh01.ua.ac.be/cas/PDF/CAS55.pdfQuickMBA. (1999). The value chain. Retrieved from http://www.quickmba.com/strategy/value-chain/Robbins, T. P., & Coulter, M. (2012). Management. (11th ed., pp. 516-526). Prentice Hall.Thompson, J. (2011, April 5). Fantastic plastic: the crocodile snaps back. Retrieved November 24, 2011, from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-features/plastic-fantastic-the-croc-snaps-back-2262599.html