The Next Course Newsletter

The Next Course Newsletter News you can use.   Customer Service Technology Operation Strategies August,2015 The Main Ingredient . There is a cost for service. Making it easy for your customers to get excellent service delivery to enhance their experience with your operation depends on the style of service you design base on your menu, meal period, staffing level, occasion, service segment and customer expectation The cost for service, as it is for the cost of ingredients, cost of production, and cost for preparation, assembly, presentation and packaging is no different to the airline recent a la carte pricing structure for travel to any destination. Early boarding, check bags, more legroom, purchase of Food and Beverage, aisle or window seats incur additional charges. It's your choice to choose the level of comfort you desire to experience. Similarly, for food service operators, airplane equal restaurant and destination equal menu dishes. To go, dine in, buffet, a la carte, action stations, open bar, cash bar you choose the service level and experience you desire to have. A good bean counter will quantify the cost of each task it takes employees to handle the ingredients to add value. The purpose is to assign the time and cost to ingredients as they are handled along the value chain of turning raw materials into a wholesome dish. Knowing this cost, managers can pass on the cost to a meal depending on the level of service a customer request. Each service segment has it standards for service with a little tweet here and there as the competition gets crowded with new players. When this process is calculated then it becomes easy to develop a standard for service with the menu you serving, and by extension each dish. Furthering your knowledge of how many dishes your kitchen staff can produce per hour base on the menu. Additional metric can be determined with this new information to measure the efficiency of your service staff and operation The Chef Table I travelled to Hampton, Virginia with my sisters to visit a relative and a childhood friend.  My sister informed me she works in Hospitality.  I was looking forward more to meet and talk shop with our childhood friend who manages the western region hotels for a major national brand.  it was exciting to meet and talk shop  digging into operating  strategies for here company. We covered topics such as choosing Flags, Brand management, Operating procedures and processes, metrics and quality assurance. We also touch on the Food Service area and the challenges. On the other hand, it was the first time my sisters and I were in the same place at the same time in a long time so we engaged in a marathon talk fest over three days with some great food and wine to fuel the conversation.  Now that's out the way back to the focus of this article. Combine the meeting with our childhood friend with a new research study published in the Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly that I read or should I say studied because I read it several times on restaurant failure rate and the reason for failure.  Media and other literature have bandied about failure rates of restaurants as high as 90% in the first year to 75% in the third year. What was unique about these findings was the size of the sample population  used and access to primary information to generalize the finding to the general population.  I know how difficult it is to get primary information in research studies. Based on this report the failure rate has not changed much since their earlier report more than a decade ago. It's  25% in the first year to 60% in the third year. This is close for both national chains and independents. What has delighted my neurons cells to do a happy dance was how spot on their findings were in the elements of success and failure was to all my articles the previous three years of this newsletter. Here are there finding 7 Elements of Success Have a distinctive concept that has been well researched. Ensure that all decisions make long-term economic sense. Adapt desirable technologies, especially for record keeping and tracking customers. Educate managers through continuing education at trade shows and workshops. An environment that fosters professional growth has greater productivity. Effectively and regularly communicate values and objectives to employees. Maintain a clear vision, mission and operation strategy, but be willing to amend strategies as the situation changes. Create a cost-conscious culture, which includes stringent record keeping. Elements of Failure Lack of documented strategy; only informal or oral communication of mission and vision; lack of organizational culture fostering success characteristics. Inability or unwillingness to establish and formalize operational standards; seat-of-the-pants-style management. Frequent critical incidents; managing operations by "putting out fires" appears to be a common practice. Focusing on one aspect of the business at the expense of others. Poor choice of location. Lack of match between restaurant concept and location. Lack of sufficient start-up capital or operational capital. Lack of business experience or knowledge of restaurant operations. Poor communication with customers. Negative consumer perception of value; price and product must match. Inability to maintain operational standards, leading to too many service gaps. Poor sanitary standards -- almost guaranteed to kill a restaurant. The study also examined restaurant turnover rates based upon the density of restaurants compared to population.. Restaurant turnover was highest in areas with higher concentrations of restaurants. In other words, the greater the number of restaurants for a given population, the greater the failure rate. The questions remains what is the right mix of restaurants to support a specific population density.  Perhaps one of their graduates student can begin this research. Just Desserts               Please feel free to pass this email along to friends and colleagues who could benefit from this information. They'll appreciate it and so will I!    The Next Course" is the news letter of Hospitality Scorecard Solution Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without the written consent is prohibited.   Hospitality Scorecard Solutions is a Global Food Service Consulting Company that offers proven solution in Operation Management and Design Operating Procedures to fit Independent owned full service restaurant style of service, menu, location and market segment. Peter is a Certified Food Executive .    To your continued success.    Peter HSS Inc   Office # 347-240-1939 Cell# 917-504-4377

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