(abstracted from Krajewski & Ritzman, Operations Management ,6 th edition) Renee
ID: 397800 • Letter: #
Question
(abstracted from Krajewski & Ritzman, Operations Management,6th edition)
Renee Kershaw, manager of BSB food services at a medium-sized Midwestern university, has just decided to expand her year-old pizza service on campus. However, she has just learned that a new food court will be constructed, which will permit operations from Taco Bell, Dunkin’ Donuts and Pizza Hut. BSB is a national food-services company that varies its level of service to suit client organizations. BSB is managing all of the current food facilities on campus. However, there are new entrants to the market. Demographic data for this campus:
City Population
Faculty, Staff, etc.
Students
200,000
3,000
6.000
The campus is not walking distance from any other retail shops or restaurant facilities. Supporting amenities (such as bookstore, bank, food service, etc.) are on campus. There are three food-service facilities managed by BSB. The biggest facility, the cafeteria, is located in the center of campus (the administration building) and is open for three meals daily. On weekdays there’s an upscale luncheon buffet upstairs in the administration building. The third facility is a small grill, open 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily and until midnight on Friday and Saturday nights, is in the recreational building near the dorms.
BSB has been operating food services on this campus for the past 10 years, and Kershaw has worked here for a year and a half. When she came, she did market surveys and found that students were somewhat dissatisfied with the food services. In fact, a large amount of food consumed by students was not from BSB:
% Food prepared in dorm rooms
20
% Food delivered from off campus
36
%Food consumed off campus
44
Students complained about lack of variety and inconvenient cafeteria hours. Kershaw also found:
% Students with cars on campus
84
% Students with refrigerators/microwaves
62
% Students consumed food outside of BSB
43
Kershaw’s response was to expand the grill menu to include pizza, and begin a delivery service (by bicycle). There were a limited number of toppings and combinations, and the grill equipment and personnel were adapted to the new product line.
As a result of the introduction of pizza, sales over the past 10 months had increased, along with profits. Students were happy with the quality of the pizzas and speed of delivery. However, with increasing demand, existing equipment was inadequate, and there were delivery delays. In the past month, sales had leveled off. There were also growing requests for toppings and combinations not on the menu.
Questions:
1. Describe the competitive position of BSB. Who are its competitors? What is the customer value proposition? How does BSB distinguish itself from its competitors?
2. What are BSB’s resources? Include both tangible and intangible resources.
3. Describe the processes of this company. What are the structured sequences of activities? What technologies are used? How is supply matched to demand?
4. What are the competencies of BSB? How are they related to cost, time, quality and flexibility?
5. Is BSB’s strategy well supported by its operations? If so, give examples. If not, give examples.
6. What impact will the new food court have on BSB’s pizza operations? Should its competitive strategy change? What changes in operations strategy, and operations (i.e. resources and processes) would be necessary to support the new strategy? What are your recommendations to BSB?
City Population
Faculty, Staff, etc.
Students
200,000
3,000
6.000
Explanation / Answer
1. BSB is a pizza house in the Midwestern University. The company was catering to the needs of the students on the campus. The competitive landscape for the company comprised some big brands like Taco Bell, Dunkin Donuts and Pizza hut. The USP of BSB is that it varies its level of service based on the customer base that it is serving. The company had a market hold in the Midwestern University and wants to sustain the same.
2. The list of resources of the company are:
3. The company operates at 3 levels in the campus-
No structured technology has been used by the company as such. The company is operating at very generic level. The exquisite demands of the consumers i.e. students is not being met. The consumers have complaint with the limited options served by BSB and the delays in the delivery service.
4. The competencies of the BSB company are:
The competencies of the company need to focus on the requirements of the students on camps. The competency gets reflected in the cost effectiveness dimension, but the company lags in time i.e. timely deliveries, quality and flexibility. The company is serving limited options and is not flexible with the services.
5. The BSB’s strategy is not well supported by its operations. The company’s strategy is to vary its service level based on client’s requirement. However the company is not being flexible with its services to cater to the student’s requirements on campus. The students are quite dissatisfied with the food services. The students felt there was lack of variety and inflexible hours. BSB was not modifying its strategies to cater to the student’s requirements.
6. With the opening of the new food court, competition will increase for BSB. Pizza Hut will be the direct competition to the pizza operations of the company. Also as Pizza Hut is a recognized brand, then the consumer reliability on Pizza hut’s services will be more.
BSB must change its operational strategy. The company needs to increase the options that it is serving, the types of toppings as well as sauces. The company needs to offer more varieties to the consumers. Also, they need to increase the scope of the delivery service. For this, the extra resources needed by the company, will be:
These resources will help the company in offering wide variety of pizzas to the customers. They also need to take the consumer feedback seriously and work on it as that will help in increasing consumer satisfaction and company reliability, thus encouraging the company’s overall business.
Related Questions
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.