Question

Healthy Foods Restaurant Healthy Foods is a restaurant that is located in the centre of Hana Town. It provides a variety of food that customers can choose from. Along with other Operations Manager decisions, the Operations Manager makes the following decisions on a regular Basis.

1. Scheduling

2. Quality

3. Human Resources

4. Location

5. Inventory controls

Although the restaurant does not have a written mission statement, its main aim is to provide a healthy alternative for its customers. Although competition is intense in the town area, healthy foods is doing well and is expanding annually. Management has been considering ways to expand operations.

QUESTIONS

1. Which components do you consider to be the most important components in a mission statement?

2. What strategies can the management of Healthy Food Restaurant use to ensure that the quality is of the highest standard?

3. How can Healthy Foods Restaurant differentiate itself from its competitors?

4. How can status value be added to the restaurant?

5. If Healthy Foods Restaurant were to enter the Indian market, which international operations strategy would you recommend and why?

Answer 1

1. Mission Statement is defined as a short statement what organization actually does, what is the overall goal of the business and why the organization exist. There are two types of Mission statements i.e. Customer Oriented and Product Oriented. Customer Oriented mission statement is defined as meeting the customer needs and expectation or providing solutions to them. It provides more flexibility than Product oriented mission statement and it can be easily adjusted as per the changing environment. Product Oriented Mission statement is focused on the product or services offered to the customer rather than to provide solutions for those products.

Below are the components which are most important for mission statement:

• Customers: Who are the customer of Healthy Foods restaurant
• Products or Services: Which product or service they offer to the customers
• Markets: Who are the competitors of the restaurant
• Technology: What is the basic technology used by the restaurant
• Concern for profitability, growth and survival: Restaurant commitment towards economic objectives
• Philosophy: What are the basic beliefs, values, philosophical priorities and aspirations of the restaurant
• Self-concept: What are the restaurant strength and competitive advantages
• Concern for public image: What is the restaurant public image
• Concern for employees: What is the restaurant orientation towards employees

2. The first thing that can make or break the restaurant is Food Quality. The quality which is offered to the customer can help you to shape the restaurant reputation and image in the market. There are various ways to ensure that the food quality is of high standard:

• Setting a Standard: Healthy Foods Restaurant must ensure to have set standards for their recipes and meal. Proper monitoring should be done to ensure that these standards are met every time a meal is served to a customer.
• Ingredients specification: It is very important to develop the ingredient specification before meal is served at the customer table. It is also very important to have this clarity with the supplier as well. The ingredient specification should be documented to maintain the consistency.
• Approved Supplier: For each ingredient, it is very important to have a supplier list with every individual who is responsible for purchasing the same to have a quality control. Supplier list must have all the information related to name, address, ingredient name etc.
• Product recipe: Every food product should have a written document of the recipe so that it should be available to all who are working in shifts, batches etc to assure consistency amongst every staff member.

3. The Healthy Foods Restaurant must differentiate with their competitors to have a place in the market and to meet the customer expectation. Here are few ideas that can help them to differentiate:

• To overcome the competition, Healthy Foods Restaurant must know who their competitors are. This can be done by visiting the other restaurants, finding how their ambience is, food taste etc. The Healthy Foods Restaurant can compare their food quality with themselves.
• Pricing should be right on the menu comparing with the prices that the competitors are charging with the customers.
• Healthy Foods Restaurant can have a signature dish, award winning chef, diet menu etc that can make them unique and special in the competition.
• Train the staff member’s right from the valet to the front door, waitpersons and host to be polite and courteous with the customers.

4.  The Healthy Foods Restaurant can add status value in the following ways:

• They can offer franchise for their restaurants so that more people can come to know about the brand. More presence across the country will add status value to the business.
• They can appoint a famous personality as brand ambassador which will help them to add status value to their brand.
• The can introduce premium menu or section in the restaurant which will only cater to premium customers.
• Live music from famous bands and performances by artists will help Health foods restaurant to attract status value for their brand.

5. If Healthy Foods Restaurant were to enter the Indian market, which international operations strategy should they adopt:

• Offer Indian cuisines: People in India love Indian cuisine in the menu.  Healthy Foods Restaurant should definitely include authentic Indian dishes as their offering, this will help them to create a place in the heart of Indian customers.
• Theme restaurants:  Healthy Foods Restaurant can come up with theme restaurant for a market like India where culture and tradition is given special importance. An authentic Indian cultured theme restaurant can do wonders for Healthy Foods Restaurant.
• Quick service restaurant: Healthy Foods Restaurant can also opt for a QSR which serves customers quickly. Life in India is very busy and people love to have their food quickly with great variety.
• Multi cuisines: Apart from selling Indian cuisines, Healthy Foods Restaurant can bring in the native taste of their country to India which will help them to diversify their menu. People will try something new and will have a different meal to have.