Case – Catalan Bar and Grille
Josh Martin is writing a business plan for starting a new restaurant. His concept is to
create a restaurant that will serve Spanish cuisine such as paella, steak and other
traditional dishes in a family atmosphere in a resort community along the North Carolina
coast. His vision is stated as “We will be a profitable, responsible, and customer-driven
team that supplies high-quality food and service while maintaining sensitivity to our
employees and the community. We are committed to hiring, developing, and rewarding
people who are enthusiastic, intelligent, and hard-working team players dedicated to the
Josh has come across the Baldrige criteria and attended a brief presentation by the
local Chamber of Commerce, and is wondering how it might help him to design a
management infrastructure to build a successful business. Some of his initial and
somewhat random thoughts are outlined below.
• Design the menu and food presentation to clearly differentiate from competitors.
• Have weekly shift meetings to relay information about current issues and generate
ideas for process improvements. Review this information at monthly
• Use an Enterprise Resource Planning system to manage information, along with a
Customer Relationship Management module to process customer intelligence.
This system will help to generate accurate forecasts of demand and manage the
supply chain.
• Learn about industry best practices for supply chain management and work with
suppliers to reduce inventory requirements and costs.
• Use wireless handheld computers to capture orders and send them to the kitchen.
• Use marketing research to understand age, ethnicity, income, and marital factors
of customers. Hand out coupons at Junior Achievement functions.