Small Business Marketing Challenge - Case Study Example

?Third Quarter 2006 Volume 2, Number 3 Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge QUESTION KEY REASONS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEPRESSED SALES AND PROFIT Cafe Bijoux is a restaurant which serves lunch usually in weekdays. The primary target customers for the restaurant were perceived to be the employees of City Hall. The restaurant business of Cafe Bijoux was commenced in the year 2001 by Julie Sanders and Mary Carter who act as manager and co-owner of the restaurant respectively. The business of the restaurant was perceived to be running at depressed level. In this respect, it has been apparently observed that there are certain reasons or factors responsible for such ineffective performance of the restaurant. The restaurant commenced its business operations in the month of October 2001 after the tragic incident which happened on 11th September, 2001 in the United States. This incident is determined to be the major factor for the ineffective performance of the restaurant. The 9/11 tragedy is expected to be responsible for hampering the business environment of the restaurant by a significant level. Moreover, the restaurant is also observed to lack adequate financial as well as human resources. This factor has restricted the restaurant to grow and develop in order to attract as well as retain its existing customers. Additionally, it has been analyzed that at the initial stage, a lot of construction work was performed around the restaurants which hampered the business operations at large (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). Furthermore, it can be comprehended that the restaurant did not adopt any sort of promotional technique in order to create better awareness about the services that it provides to the customers. Additionally, the target customers of the restaurant have been observed to bring food from home. Specially mentioning, the restaurant has been viewed to be facing immense competition from its chief business competitors that were already been in the business market for several years. So, these were the various reasons that are determined to be responsible for the sluggish sales figure and profit margin of the restaurant (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). QUESTION 2: THE PROCEDURE OF CONDUCTING PHONE SURVEY A telephone survey has been performed by Jennifer Coleman who was a professor relating to the field of marketing. Jennifer has performed the telephone survey with the objective of ascertaining the tastes as well as the preferences of employees working in the nearby offices of the restaurant. It has been identified that there are six steps required for conducting the telephone survey in an appropriate manner. The initial step will be to formulate a sampling strategy in accordance with which the survey will be performed. In this regard, the sample of the survey comprised employees from the nearby offices to the restaurant. The second step for the survey will be to develop questionnaire. The main intention of the survey was to obtain relevant information in relation to determine the tastes as well as the preferences of the employees with regard to soup and sandwiches that offered by the restaurant. The third stage of the survey is to perform a pilot test with the intention of ascertaining the effectiveness of the questionnaire formulated. The fourth step will be to conduct interview through telephone. In this stage, the employees are called up with the assistance of telephone in order to acquire their feedbacks and to record their responses. In the fifth stage, the information which is acquired through the telephone survey from the employees is thus required to be stored for making any further analyses. In the last stage, the data that have been collected must be analyzed with the objective of determining the findings or outcomes of the survey. So, this is the procedure in accordance with which Jennifer might have performed the phone survey in order to comprehend the perceptions of the primary customers regarding Cafe Bijoux (The Wallace Foundation, “Conducting Telephone Surveys”). QUESTION 3: THE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF THE CURRENT SEGMENTATION AND TARGETING STRATEGY OF THE OWNERS OF THE CAFE BIJOUX Cafe Bijoux was located near the parking garage of City Hall and nearby public offices. The restaurant was situated on B Street near Hayward City Hall. The owners of the restaurants named Julie and Mary has targeted this particular market segment with the objective of attracting immense number of customers who will be the employees of City Hall and public offices nearby. The owners of the restaurant have been facilitated with the opportunity of performing business operations effectively with quality food at reasonable prices. The major disadvantage of the target market segments is that the market is filled with restaurants providing full services to customers. In this respect, Cafe Bijoux faced immense competition from other restaurants which include Morelia, Silver Spoon and Bst restaurants among others. Moreover, it has been observed that during the hours between 11.30 am till 3.00 pm, there are minimum numbers of pedestrians roaming around near the area of the restaurant (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). The owners of the restaurants majorly targeted the employees of City Hall and public offices located in the adjacent area. The targeted customers of Cafe Bijoux will comprise the employees belonging to the City Hall, ‘the City of Hayward Utility’, the Library, ‘the City of Hayward Police’, ‘the Post Office’, ‘the Bank of the West’ and other residential people residing around the market segment. The major advantage is that the restaurant will be able to execute its business operations with a larger customer base. On the other hand, it has been perceived that a foremost division of the customers bring food from their homes which deemed to adversely affect the business of Cafe Bijoux and can be regarded as one of the key reasons responsible for miserable business performance of the restaurant (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). QUESTION 4: POSITIONING STRATEGY OF CAFE BIJOUX AND THE REASONS RESPONSIBLE FOR ITS WORKING OR NOT WORKING Mary and Julie who were the owners of Cafe Bijoux who have established the restaurant in the market segment of B Street near Hayward City Hall. The market segment comprises particularly commercial sectors with large number of potential customers. In this regard, the key target customers for the restaurant were the employees of City Hall. The owners of the restaurant have planned to provide quality food at competitive price with the objective of performing business operations in an effective manner (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). The positioning strategy of the owners of Cafe Bijoux is seemed to be ineffective which is hampering its business operations and profitability margin. The main factors which are deemed to be accountable for ineffective business performance included intense market competition and lack of effective promotional techniques. It has been apparently observed in this similar concern that there pertain numerous restaurants in the market segment offering full services with quality food at affordable rates. Cafe Bijoux can be viewed as a sort of limited service providing restaurant in which the customers had to avail different services by themselves. The products of the restaurant have been noted to be soups, salads, sandwiches, desserts and pastries. These products were liked by customers but were ineffective to compete with its major rivals and also to enhance superior competitive position in the market segment (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). Cafe Bijoux is also observed to lack effective promotional technique which eventually hampered its varied business operations and competitive position by a greater level. There was no hoarding present depicting the advertisement of the restaurant which eventually restricted the customers of been aware of its presence in the market segment. Moreover, the restaurant with ineffective promotional tools has been unable to acquire better competitive position as compared to its business competitors. These are the various factors which are perceived to be responsible for the ineffective performance of the business operations of the restaurant and thus can be affirmed that the current positioning strategy of Cafe Bijoux is not working at all (Lee, “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge”). Works Cited “Conducting Telephone Surveys.” Workbook F. The Wallace Foundation, 2013. Web. 06 May. 2013. < http://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/after-school/collecting-and-using-data/Documents/Workbook-F-Telephone-Surveys.pdf>. Lee, C. S. K. “Cafe Bijoux: A Small Business Marketing Challenge.” Third Quarter 2006 2.3 (2006). Print. Read More