Plan For Healthway Food Shop - Essay Example

A Business Plan for HEALTHWAY FOOD SHOP August 7, I. MARKET RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS Unique Selling Proposition: HEALTHWAY is a vegan food restaurant that caters to food lovers who prefers organic food to maintain their health. Menu topbills vegetarian dishes and meat substitute that guarantees the ultimate food experience. We aim to achieve 100% customer satisfaction and to be able to entice them to come back for more. Target Market The primary target market are the health conscious individuals, 18 to 40 years old, who are either at the last years in the university, already embarking on a career, or are part of what they call mid-life age group who are already beginning to be conscious of their diet. This is particularly a niche market, since traditionally, food shops offer meat foods that really do not emphasize on the health factor in their menus. This particular group needs consciously look for restaurants that cater to their needs, but also offer a variety of menus to make their eating experience more exciting. Members of the younger age group are the ones more adventurous of their food choices, and therefore needs an exciting array of dishes to choose from. The ones belonging to the older bracket have more particular menus in mind, and so they are more discriminating in terms of the ingredients and presentation. HEATLHWAY looks at being able to serve both the needs of these target markets. On top of this, management looks at being able to create a health restaurant that offers reasonably good prices and with good service. The young professionals market will also be a target market, as they need to socialize and find comfortable places to meet up with friends. They may also need a place where they could hang out, check on their laptops or just chill while dining. HEALTHWAY aims to cater to their needs by ensuring a good cozy atmosphere conducive for small talk, quiet reading or for relaxation. Moreover, the healthy options are perfect for this group of people who are also conscious of the food they take. 2. Competitor’s Analysis There are five known vegan restaurants in Trinidad and Tobago (Happy Cow Compassionate Eating Guide 2010): a. Mother Nature – Serves West Indies style of food. Specialty remains to be on soy meat and related products. However, this restaurant does not accept credit cards. b. Mr. D’s Living Well – Specializes on Caribbean Health Food and accepts credit cards as well. c. Sun Eaters Organics – Restaurant/ retail shops for raw health food. This shop caters more to take-out crowds rather than for dine in. They have a relatively small dining area. d. Kariwak Village Restaurant – Offers meat and vegetable menus. This shop is not entirely dedicated to providing healthy foods. It also requires reservations to accommodate dine in customers. e. La Tartaruga – Similar with Kariwak Village Restaurants, whereby menus are not entirely dedicated to vegetarian food. 3. Product Edge HEALTHWAY positions itself as a restaurant with the mission of providing excellent food options to vegetarians and health conscious individuals. All efforts will be geared towards this mission, and as such, management plans to market the establishment with the following features: a. It has versatile food repertoire, with its menus dynamic and continuously evolving. b. It is customer friendly, with a wide area for dine in, and customer service crew who will attend to the needs of the customers c. It is cost-efficient, offering reasonable prices, and will accept credit cards as well as cash d. It will offer a classic homely ambiance, making the customers feel that they are dining at their own homes. Furniture will encourage a relaxed atmosphere. II. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK With technology constantly evolving and with people now having to do so many things in a short span of time, fast food and instant food is very much in demand. But the question is how healthy these foods really are and how beneficial are they to the people? Are these types of food really helpful in terms of nourishing people, enough for them to carry out multi-level tasks that they have to accomplish? Younger people now tend to get ill of hypertension, heart ailments and other related sicknesses associated to intake of food that are not healthy. Fast food chains offer menus that are in sodium and cholesterol. People are dining out more than ever. With this scenario, people have now begun to be conscious of their diet. In the last few years, health drinks have become popular, and so does the coming out of food shops that are dedicated to the niche market. Businessmen are now more confident in coming out with establishments that exclusively cater to this target market. Food businesses are perhaps considered to have the probability to be highly successful. Food remains to be the most basic of all needs, and people will never stop eating. Capped with the fact that there is an increasing demand for good and healthy food, HEALTHWAY is confident that it could conquer the target market by finding the right materials and ingredients to come up with the product line up. It will also target to find the right marketing mix in order to advertise these products to the target market. Customer service is also one of the main areas of concern for HEALTHWAY. The three essential elements will help build the restaurant and move it towards its goal to be a successful food shop for the health conscious individuals. III. MARKETING PLAN 1. Background Having known that there is a need for an outlet that offers a more dedicated health restaurant in Port of Spain, chances for HEALTHWAY to thrive and become successful are deemed to be high. HEALTHWAY desires to capture the loyalty of health conscious people in Port of Spain by introducing traditional vegetarian menus in a concept store that is both modern and unconventional. Management plans to do this by segmenting its menus, depending on the ingredients. The Product Development Team will be tasked to conduct researches to ensure that the raw materials being exported will serve the needs of the company to create a menu that will be both exotic and familiar to the target market. Moreover, apart from health food, specialty coffee, tea and pastries will also be served. HEALTHWAY will operate its first shop along the Business District of, Port of Spain. It will have fully operational dine in area with 10 indoor tables, four sets of which are accentuated with couches, and four outdoor tables. The store will be furnished in such a way that the atmosphere will be cozy and homely, giving its customer a relaxed feel. The thrust is to serve the best healthy food served by the best service crew in the city. The menu will be a dynamic one, with a specialty drink and pastry for the day to be highlighted in the menu board. Initially, there will be coffee and tea (both hot and cold), and pastries that would complement the drinks. Eventually, other snack products such as cold sandwich and pasta will also be offered. The diversity of the products will be the key in obtaining loyal customers. Customers will be able to satisfy their cravings for good food at HEALTHWAY . Management is committed to deliver best healthy food in a convenient location using the excellent customer service. HEALTHWAY will also offer reasonably- priced products compared with the other restaurants in the area. 2. Objectives a. To be able to launch and operate HEALTHWAY with the aid of a bank loan amounting to $ 250,000 with a payback time of one year. b. To create a unique menu that would propel the brand to popularity. c. To expand with two more stores in neighboring cities of Parker and Brighton at the start of its second year. 3. Key Message HEALTHWAY will essentially be the haven for health conscious food lovers. It would be the ultimate food experience for those who want their food healthy, but are also craving for variety and to do away from the bland taste of traditional vegan food choices. The restaurant will offer both nourishment and good experience to its target market. 4. Staffing HEALTHWAY operates under sole proprietorship, and the owner will serve as its Chief Executive Officer overseeing operations and support teams. He will employ the services of one Finance Officer to directly assist him with the Finances of the store, and one Marketing Officer who will manage the advertising campaigns and needs of the store. There will be one store manager who is in charge of daily store operations, one main chef who will plan for the menu and handle the kitchen operations. There will be a total of two full time staffs and eight part time staffs to provide assistance backroom (kitchen) and dine in areas. The store manager will supervise the operations crew to ensure that they deliver excellent service to the customers. He will also be in charge of training the staff with regards to customer service. HEALTHWAY aims to have an image of providing the best service in the city. The company is willing to incur additional expenses for the training of its staff to ensure that they serve the customers the right way. The chef, on the other hand, is in charge of preparing the food and pastries. He will have a daily regular menu that he will adhere to. He is also in charge of developing the menu to eventually diversify and offer more menu choices. He is in charge of Product development, and would be given support in terms of research and training. Two full time staff will act as senior personnel rendering service to the customers. They will be deployed on a different shift schedule. Together with the part time staff, they will be the front liners who will conduct sales, take orders and deliver the food to the tables. They will also be trained to ensure that they perform the right services to the customers. HEALTHWAY will adopt the self-service system whereby customers will need to line up for their orders. Food however will still be delivered to their tables. This is what HEALTHWAY management intends to do – minimize the need for more dining staff without sacrificing their objective to provide their customers with a personal type of customer service. This way, the staff will still have the chance to closely interact with the customers, giving them a sense of belongingness to the store, thus encouraging repeat visits and purchases. There will also be one cashier who will report to the Finance Officer regarding all transactions. He is in charge of monitoring daily income and expenses, collecting money and remitting it to the Finance Officer. 5. ADVERTISING A successful launch is always accompanied by a tri-media campaign to ensure that the target market is reached. However, due to the limited advertising and promotions budget, it chooses to advertise mainly via radio plugs in local radio stations in Port of Spain. Repeat exposure via radio advertisements would spark interest among listeners. Among the three mainstream media, radio is considered to be the most cost efficient as it requires the advertiser a fixed advertising cost, yet it allows the product to be continuously stimulating the consciousness of its listeners. Strategic merchandising is the key to promote the new business. Billboards and signage, announcements in key points within the city play a vital role in the company’s promotions plan. HEALTHWAY will ensure that the brand, as well as the restaurant details is displayed in two major billboard sites in two main entry points to the city. It will also display mini billboards and signage in public places such as shopping centers, supermarkets, subways, train stations and bus stations. There will be merchandising activities along nearby roads and villages using announcement banners and streamers where applicable. These materials shall already be in full display two weeks prior to launch. The company will seek the assistance of two or three media personalities who will announce the store in their media appearances in exchange for privileges in the store. This way, traditional media may still be tapped despite limited funds for advertising. There will also be newspaper advertisements one week prior to the launch. This is to be able to announce the launch date and the concept, and spark interest among the local market. The ads will not be sustained anymore with more print ads due to limited number of resources. The internet will be an important tool to captivate the market. There will be an official website for the company which will feature the menu choices. A health options club will also be launched simultaneously. This club will aim to provide privileges to its members. To become a member, customers should be able to meet the minimum purchase requirements. Members are entitled to obtain materials such as limited edition shirts and other items. They will be given privilege cards for them to use while they are in the store. There will also be loyalty programs to encourage the customers to return for next day purchases. There will be discount and privilege offerings for frequent patrons, and a loyalty card to ensure repeat purchase among the market. Patrons who dine in at least three times in one month gets the HEALTHWAY membership card which entitles them to special privileges and incentives on their next purchase. Periodic promotional programs such as raffle and discounts will also be implemented. There will also be thematic celebrations such that customers will be given value added products and service in celebration of certain occasions such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentines and the likes. Word of mouth is an important tool to expand the market. As such, it is important to the company to be able to make each customer’s visit very satisfying and remarkable for the store to be able to earn referrals. The manpower and staff are the main assets of the store. They will form part of the advertising team in such a way that they will be trained to establish good customer rapport. They key is make the customers very comfortable to make them decide not to trade the HEALTHWAY experience even with the most established restaurants in town. HEALTHWAY will also partake in local activities and will seek to sponsor civic and non civic events. This way, there will be sampling opportunities and the company will have a way to touch base with individuals and groups as well. The objective is to build a solid group of returning customers to be able establish sales and generate returns. It will also partner with local merchants to be able to maximize advertising efforts at a minimal budget. Other merchandising and points of sale materials such as shirts, caps, pens and other premium items will also be available. These will be used as gifts for loyal customers and may also be sold from time to time. Reference List “Health Food Stores and Vegetarian Restaurants in Trinidad and Tobago.” Happy Cow Compassionate Eating Guide. August 10, 2010. http://www.happycow.net/north_america/caribbean/trinidad_and_tobago/ Read More