Question

Marketing management generally is related to creation of demand. However, in certain situations, the manager has to restrict the demand. The job of Marketing Managers, in these situations would be to find ways to reduce the demand temporarily by reducing the expenditure on promotion or increasing the prices. This concept of demand being more than what the company can or want to handle is called ..............

• A. Overfull Demand
• B. Irregular Demand
• C. Seasonal Demand
• D. Negative Demand

Hint:

Demand exceeds supply/handling capacity $\rightarrow$ Overfull Demand.
The corresponding strategy to temporarily reduce demand is known as Demarketing.

Answer 1

The Correct Option is A

Concept:
Marketing management involves regulating demand levels, timing, and characteristics to help an enterprise achieve its operational and financial goals.
Managers must handle different demand scenarios, ranging from non-existent demand to demand that exceeds organizational capacity.

Step 1: Examining Different States of Demand:
$\bullet$ Overfull Demand: Occurs when the demand for a product or service exceeds what the firm can supply or wishes to handle. The marketing response is “demarketing”, which aims to temporarily curb demand by raising prices or reducing promotional activities.
$\bullet$ Irregular Demand: Refers to fluctuations in demand across seasons, months, or days of the week, resulting in periodic underutilization or overutilization of capacity.
$\bullet$ Seasonal Demand: A subset of irregular demand where consumption patterns are tied to specific seasons of the year.
$\bullet$ Negative Demand: A condition where consumers dislike the product and may even pay money to avoid it.

Step 2: Matching the Definition:
The question describes a situation where “demand is more than what the company can or want to handle”, requiring managers to restrict demand through higher prices or reduced promotion.
This corresponds directly to the definition of Overfull Demand.

Step 3: Verification of Options:
Option (A) is the accepted technical term in marketing management for this condition.

Step 4: Final Answer:
Therefore, the correct choice is (A).