The restaurant industry entered an era in
2013 where customer counts were down and industry same store sales slipped
according to Black Box Intelligence. Where recycled CEO’s simply did not get
the job done. Is it time for Outside
Eye’s or simply a Non-Boomer CEO? The
restaurant industry appears to be lacking innovation of late and consumers are
migrating to Non-traditional avenues of fresh food distribution.
So it’s time to ask is your company
thinking like a legacy boomer CEO holding on to what worked in 1980, 1990, or
2000? Are you still utilizing benchmarks
from 2000 or 2005? At the intersection
of consumers, technology, Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared is new innovation: new avenues of distribution and filled with consumers
with the psychological mindset of today not 2005.
Is your restaurant business model expanding
both brand and profits gaining customers counts and top line revenue? Some
restaurant business models and products have been around so long that we just
take them for granted, while others concepts that are becoming new business
models are so new that we’re not quite sure what to expect. The easiest to
explain why is important by looking at a few examples.
Here are some examples we came across that involve challenging our
orthodoxies that we think you might want to think about.
1. Coffee Shops In the typical
coffee shop pretty much anywhere in the world, the business model works like
this – you buy a coffee and it comes along with it the right to take up a place
at any table in the café for as long as you want. So, coffee buys you time. An
article I came across on NPR highlights an entrepreneur in Moscow that has
opened a restaurant that loosely translates to the Clockface Café where instead of buying coffee and
getting time, you instead buy time ($4/hr per person for the 1st hour and $2 an
hour after that, up to a maximum of $12 after 5 hours) and get coffee for free.
Ivan Meetin, the founder, plans to open his next café in London. Meanwhile I
have heard of similar operations in Paris, and by now they can probably also be
found elsewhere. So, in your business what do people get for free, and what do
they pay for? And is there an opportunity to change around what you charge for?
2. Waste Disposal In many
businesses, and in the creation of most products, there is waste. And in most
cases, businesses pay to have this waste removed from their premises. Or there may
be waste that the customer has to pay to have removed. But this doesn’t always
have to be the case.
KFC,
McDonald’s, Burger King, etc. used to have to pay to have their used fryer oil
picked up, but now thanks to the rise of biodiesel they may even make money
from this waste product.
Chicken
processors used to throw the feet away after processing a truckload of
chickens, but after they discovered that chicken feet are a delicacy in several
Asian countries, they stopped throwing them away and instead started exporting
them. In fact, chicken feet sell for more per pound than chicken breasts in
China.
Broken OREO’s
used to have no value before Cookies ‘n’ Cream ice cream (and now Cookies ‘n’ Cream OREO’s) were
discovered.
We came across
an example of a bottle cap concept created
by designers from the Lanzhou University of Technology in China, intended to
give poor children access to building blocks for play, from what was previously
thrown away.
3. Discounts for Data Data security
and privacy is becoming an increasingly hot topic, and in the past companies
would either ask customers for their data and not give them anything for it, or
just not ask for it. But now we are seeing some interesting models of companies
asking customers for data and instead giving them something of value in
exchange. For example, Urban Outfitters rewards
users that respond to promotions inside their mobile app or to users
that allow its app to connect to their Twitter or Instagram accounts with
points that can be redeemed for sale previews, concert tickets, or early access
to new pieces. What data do you want from your customers? What is it worth to
you? How could this exchange be made engaging and not be seen as a purely financial
transaction?
4. The Soft Drink Category is
Saturated and Cold Soft drinks… How many people out there think
that the soft drink category is a blue ocean full of incredible opportunities
for unbounded growth for established soft drink makers? Most people would say
that this is a mature category and a tough place for companies, full of
merciless competition. But yet, people continue to innovate and challenge this
orthodoxy. Witness a couple of interesting new concepts.
Britain has
always been a hotbed of innovation, and the country that brought us Pret a
Manger and Innocent smoothies brings us this tasty treat. Mr. Sherick’s Shakes brings
people a little bit of luxury to their day in the form of their high quality
milkshakes.
Meanwhile
in Japan, there is a growing trend manifesting in a wave of product launches in
the soft drink category that are not cold, but instead hot. Witness this
example of what has always been a cold drink, Ginger Ale, being brought into
the Japanese market as a hot beverage by Coca Cola’s Canada Dry unit.
Consumers
always love something new and different, even if it the new is something old
that has disappeared from the market then reappeared. This is why fashion runs
in cycles, and in a mature category like soft drinks there is no reason why we
shouldn’t keep these principles in mind. Is it time you bring in Outside Eye’s?
www.FoodserviceSolutions.us specializes in outsourced business
development. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food
retail segment opportunities or a brand leveraging integration strategy.
Foodservice Solutions of Tacoma WA is the global
leader in the Grocerant niche visit Facebook.com/Steven Johnson,
Linkedin.com/in/grocerant or twitter.com/grocerant
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