Volume 6, Issue 8, August – 2021 International Journal of Innovative Science and Research Technology

ISSN No:-2456-2165

Food Sales Strategy by MSMEs During the Covid-19

Pandemic in the Jabodetabek Region
Andi Irnawati
Student of Magister Management, Perbanas Institute
Jakarta, Indonesia

Abstract:- Corona virus disease 2019 or known as Covid- appears is the massive layoffs from various industrial sectors.
19 is currently a hot topic discussed in various media, A decrease in the amount of production or even a complete
both online media including television, radio, newspapers. stop makes the company forced to lay off or lay off its
The news search engine Google search noted that in June employees, to minimize business losses. Furthermore, in
2021, news about "Covid 19 in Indonesia" was very large, addition to the impact of layoffs, other things that the impact
with more than 3.2 billion news stories. The Covid-19 that of Covid-19 on the economy is the disrupted stock market and
is hitting the world today has an impact on various the tourism industry which has been badly hit.
aspects of life, especially health, the social and economic
environment. Covid-19 has made the economy in almost Based on a report from the Central Statistics Agency
all countries in the world experience a sharp decline. The (BPS), the Indonesian economy in 2020 experienced a growth
impact is a decline in purchasing power in the community, contraction of 2.07%. In the first quarter of 2020 Indonesia's
both because people refrain from buying only basic needs, economic growth was still positive because at that time
but also because of the lockdown or Large-Scale Social Indonesia had only experienced the Covid-19 pandemic
Restrictions (PSBB). This has a significant effect on condition in early March 2020, so the economy was still
people's consumption patterns from initially making growing, although it was quite far when compared to the same
direct purchases to online purchases. The purpose of this period, namely March 2019 of 5.02%. Meanwhile in the
paper is to find out how entrepreneurs, especially SMEs, second quarter it was minus 5.32%, in the third quarter it was
make changes to their marketing patterns from direct minus 3.49% and in the fourth quarter it was minus 2.19%. So
marketing to online, including the efforts made to that Indonesia officially entered an economic recession due to
increase their business. The research method used is the the contraction of economic growth in 3 quarters which
inductive (qualitative) paradigm of 3 informants who are experienced negative growth.
MSMEs in the food sector in the Greater Jakarta area.
PSBB also has consequences on people's consumption
Keywords: Impact of Covid-19, MSMEs, MSME Strategies, patterns, being urged by limitations to make people change
Online Marketing. their buying patterns from those who previously came directly
to sales locations such as markets, shops, shopping centers to
I. INTRODUCTION become online or online, so selling and online shopping
developed into a new trend. Even this online shopping
Corona virus pollution or known as Corona virus disease decision and trend has penetrated to a larger and massive
2019 (Covid-19) has hit the world for more than 1 year, since scale. In the business industry, meetings, meetings and
the discovery of the first case in Wuhan, China in December training have been carried out through online media such as
2019. In Indonesia, cases of Covid 19 patients continue to zoom, google meet, whats app group and others, including
continue every day. experienced a serious increase, as of May teaching and learning activities in schools.
31, 2021, there were more than 1.8 million people infected
with the Covid-19 virus since it was announced on March 2, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) are the
2020, as many as 1.7 million patients were successfully cured ones most affected by Covid-19, the PSBB has limited the
and as many as 51,000 patients died ("covid19 .go.id”, June 5, movement of goods and people, thus slowing economic
2021). While worldwide, more than 171 million people have activity. Financial fragility is one of the dominant issues for
contracted Covid-19 and 3.6 million people have died. MSMEs during the pandemic. Alexander W. Bartik in his
research underlines that financial fragility occurs a lot in small
The large number of Covid-19 victims has forced all businesses and their businesses are affected by COVID-19
countries affected by Covid-19 to implement a policy of (Bartik, et.al, 2020). In this pandemic condition, the ones who
closing the area or commonly known as a lockdown. The feel the most impact are small entrepreneurs or MSMEs
impact of the implementation of the lockdown has certainly because the financial conditions of MSMEs are very fragile.
made the world economy decline drastically. The world The fragility of these small businesses becomes more complex
economy in 2020 contracted by 3.3%, much lower than in when they are in big cities, especially Jabodetabek, apart from
2019 which was 2.3%. Many large institutions including the massive number of Covid-19 victims, the purchasing
banks were forced to make corrections to their business power of the people has also decreased.
growth. Due to the economic slowdown, the first thing that

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Volume 6, Issue 8, August – 2021 International Journal of Innovative Science and Research Technology
ISSN No:-2456-2165
The impact of the Covid 19 pandemic on the MSME market. According to Kotler, technology is the main change
sector has greatly affected the condition of the Indonesian factor of the five elements. Change can create new markets
economy where the contribution of MSMEs to the Indonesian and erase old ones.
economy is very large, including the number of business units
in Indonesia as of 2018 totaling 64.2 million business units, In relation to the Covid-19 pandemic, many MSMEs
with the number of MSME units being 64.1 million (99, 9%) have to do to save their business, namely by changing their
(Abdurrahman Firdaus Thaha, 2020). business strategy or marketing. The old marketing concept,
namely selling by relying on marketing in stores or places of
To deal with the Covid-19 pandemic, in the midst of business, must be modified by selling online or using
sluggish purchases of goods and services by consumers, technology. Changes in marketing strategies need to be carried
entrepreneurs are required to think creatively by changing out by MSMEs considering the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic
their usual marketing strategy, namely changing their sales conditions and the continued development of technology, so
pattern from selling directly (selling products in shops or that online sales and relying on technology are conditions that
houses of business) to selling online. one is through sales must be done if consumers don't want to be left behind.
using social media such as whats app including whats app Consumers themselves are currently so picky and smart in
group, Facebook and Instagram. Although the use of social comparing products or services available on the market
media to sell has been carried out by the community for quite because they are assisted by technology, namely through
a long time, with the Covid-19 pandemic, the use of social social media and e-commerce or market places. The need to
media for selling has increased quite significantly. The Central know changes in consumer behavior towards the era of
Statistics Agency (BPS) noted that in March 2020, online disruption is needed by an entrepreneur in order to be able to
sales jumped by 320% compared to sales at the beginning of follow the very diverse rhythm of consumer change (Dea
2020. The jump was sharper in April 2020, which was 480% Farahdiba; 2020).
from January 2020. The highest sales were in food and
beverage products, and lowest sales on sports equipment. B. MSMEs Business Strategy
(Kontan.co.id, 2 June 2020) The development of MSMEs in Indonesia continues to
grow because the economy continues to increase. MSME
There are several problems from these MSMEs in business actors are required to continue to be creative and
running their business during the pandemic, namely the innovate in their business, to develop effective marketing
decline in people's purchasing power and consumption, strategies, especially in the midst of the current Covid-19
limited financial capital because banks and other financial pandemic. According to Gregorius Rio Alfrian, et al (2020),
institutions limit and are very careful in lending, limited there are 5 strategies that need to be carried out by MSMEs to
intellectual capital, namely the ability to understand business prevent and save MSMEs from the current pandemic
conditions and how develop it, as well as the limitations of condition based on the results of their studies in several
social capital, namely how entrepreneurs can build and expand journals, namely (1) Learning about digital marketing such as
their business networks. This will be the research focus of this creating promotional media through social media. . (2)
paper. Strengthening human resources by embedding learning about
the era of globalization and technology. (3) Creative
The purpose of this study is to analyze how MSMEs, innovation to make consumers interested in buying a product
especially the food sector in the Jabodetabek area, have during a pandemic. (4) Improving service to consumers in
changed their marketing strategy during the Covid-19 more detail and ensuring product cleanliness and safety. (5)
pandemic and the efforts made by these MSMEs in running Government policies towards MSMEs / government assistance
their business. such as providing social assistance or financial assistance to
. keep MSMEs running.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
C. Consumer Behavior
A. Grand Theory To implement its marketing strategy, an entrepreneur
Theories about marketing strategies and theories about needs to first understand consumer behavior. Consumer
change have continued to evolve over the decades along with behavior is the action that is directly involved in obtaining,
the development of the world's economy. The most famous consuming, and disposing of a product or service, including
theory of marketing strategy comes from Philip Kotler. the decision processes that precede and follow these actions.
According to Kotler (2000:93) in Dewi Untari (2018), (Consumer Behavior ebook, Nugroho J. Setiadi, SE, MM,
marketing strategy is marketing logic and based on that 2013). Three important ideas in consumer behavior are (1)
business units can achieve marketing goals. The marketing consumer behavior is dynamic, (2) involves interactions
strategy consists of making decisions about the marketing between affect and cognition, behavior and surrounding
costs of the company. Theory of change is a dynamic factor events, (3) involves exchange.
that determines the external macroeconomic environment,
which in turn affects the organizational strategy formula D. Online Marketing
(Kotler; 2017). In the book Re-thinking Marketing: According to Kotler, online channels (e-marketing) are
Sustainable Market-ing Enterprise in Asia, Kotler concludes channels that a person can reach through computers and
that the anatomy of change consists of five elements, namely modems. Modems connect computers with telephone lines so
technology, legal politics, socio-cultural, economic and that computers can reach various online information services

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Volume 6, Issue 8, August – 2021 International Journal of Innovative Science and Research Technology
ISSN No:-2456-2165
(Kotler, 2008). E-marketing is doing business online whose Based on the results of interviews with 3 informants and
most obvious form is selling products to consumers online. field studies conducted by researchers, there are several
Simply put, it is to create, manage and expand commercial strategies carried out by MSMEs, especially 3 informants in
relationships online (Kienan, 2001). their strategy to survive during this covid-19 pandemic,
namely:
E. Theoritical Framework 1. Continue to improve skills or expertise in producing
Based on these theory above, it could be described a products that are sold.
theoritical framework for these titles as follows: 2. Dare to innovate on the product. Buyers will usually be
attracted to new products even though the products are
actually the same as the old ones, but with a little innovation,
for example in terms of shape, taste or raw materials, it will
look like a new product. In this case, the informant as a cake
producer often innovates by trying new recipes that produce
new products.
3. Marketing products on social media as often as possible
(continuously) so that it is hoped that followers will continue
to remember our products and will order when they want it.
4. Make the packaging or product packaging as beautiful as
Fig 1: -Theoritical Framework possible, neat, attractive and clean. This is also one of the
innovations, namely how to package products differently from
III. METHODOLOGY competitors or what other manufacturers usually do. With
attractive packaging, which are usually ordered by customers
This research uses descriptive qualitative research. as hampers or delivery or gifts for friends or relatives on
Qualitative research is unique and can be used to explore birthdays or other events, make customers happy and will re-
issues in public relations and marketing communications order. On the product packaging, the seller's name card is
(Daymon & Holloway, 2002). The results of qualitative usually affixed with the product name and mobile number,
research are contextual and caustic, where the research which has an attractive design.
produced is valid at a certain time and place when the research 5. Always prioritize the taste or quality of the product, so that
is carried out. The time of the research was carried out for customers will continue to be reminded of the quality of the
several months, namely from March 2021 to July 202. In this products sold, even though the products sold are expensive,
study, the study of literature or documentation carried out was because customers already feel comfortable with the products
to collect various kinds of library data, published news, purchased.
digitally stored archives, related to the driving factors changes 6. Focus on the target market, when we dare to sell products
in MSME strategy and economic conditions during the Covid- that are different from most products on the market, we must
19 pandemic. In this study, researchers have not been able to focus on our target market, lest we have premium products but
conduct Focus Group Discussions because of the difficulty in are sold in bulk or the same as most products. Focusing on the
uniting the time of 3 informants, so that research data target market is adjusted to our efforts in capturing customers
collection from informants is carried out only by direct and the data base we have.
interviews with informants one by one and at different times.
Related to research questions about what things must be
IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS owned by MSMEs to be able to run and develop their
business, capital is needed. Working capital for MSMEs is
Based on the results of the researcher's interviews with 3 very important. Sources of capital can be obtained from own
informants and the literature study conducted, the researchers funds, such as savings, reserves and retained earnings, if you
tried to integrate some of the research that had been done. The already have a business, and capital from loans, either
condition of the covid-19 pandemic that has lasted for almost bank/non-bank loans or personal loans. In essence, the capital
2 years has forced MSMEs to have to think about strategies is used to develop the business. According to Atmaja (2003) in
that must be done to be able to survive and develop their Mentari et al (2017), working capital is the funds used to
businesses. because banks and financial institutions limit their finance the procurement of assets and operations of the
lending due to the sluggish economy during the pandemic, company. In addition to working capital, an entrepreneur also
banks prefer to keep their money in SBI which is considered needs intellectual capital and social capital. According to
safer than being channeled as credit to the public, the public's Bontis (1998) intellectual capital includes all knowledge of
purchasing power is reduced due to people trying to restrain employees, organizations and their ability to create added
their consumption in shopping for necessities that are only value and lead to sustainable competitive advantage. While
deemed necessary, including the existence of some people social capital according to Lang & Hornburg (1998) in Fathy
who have been laid off due to the impact of covid-19, reduced (2019) is social capital generally refers to the availability of
supply of raw materials due to restrictions on movement in mutual trust in society (stock of social trust), norms and
several areas, resulting in raw materials being expensive. networks that can be utilized in order to solve common
problems. . So that Usman (2018) in Fathy (2019) states that
economic or financial capital is associated with efforts to
manage, increase, allocate and use owned funds as monetary

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Volume 6, Issue 8, August – 2021 International Journal of Innovative Science and Research Technology
ISSN No:-2456-2165
resources to obtain economic benefits or social benefits [7]. Fathy, R. (2019). Modal Sosial : Konsep, Inklusifitas,
through productive activities. Human capital, which is dan Pemberdayaan Masyarakat. Jurnal Pemikiran
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