Report on the business plan

The Rick Stein Group

The Rick Stein Group makes a show of offering the best locally caught seafood. This is still a plus for the service sector. The company has taken steps to ensure that its operations are diverse, growing, and expanding. The St. Petroc’s Hotel and Bistro, which is just up the road, is one of the several hotels owned by the group. Location is important since it ensures that the company will complement the expanding restaurant industry. The company’s diverse commercial operations, which include a café, deli, gift store, patisserie, and cookery school, are a clear indication of its diversity. In ensuring that there presence is felt across many areas, the business has opened different properties outside Padstrow which mean that they have had to expand also their team and recruit new talents from new areas. Even though it is widely acknowledged that the portfolio of the group has mainly been in the South West of the country, there are properties in Winchester, Sandbanks, and Marlborough that expand and get to the different product offering.

Uniqueness and Lack of Uniformity

Uniqueness and lack of uniformity have been a strength for Rick Stein Group. Every other venue is unique and different from the other. By creating hotels with different chain style is a boost on the innovativeness of the business. Each of the operation reflects the local surrounding and has its own design ethos, different menu and unique network of local suppliers. This is a boost for its operations as glitches that may arise are well taken care of.

Talent Management

The other notable strength for the organization is talent management. The business has ensured that there is a clear connection between the talent management and the strategic goals of the business. The clear talent strategies put in place affect the quality of business, customer satisfaction, and profits in a positive way (Chin and Tsai, 2013). Further, the Rick Stein Group has leveraged on a holistic approach to the talent which entails the need for human capital and then putting up a plan to meet the needs.

Learning and Development

Rick Stein Group has also shown commitment in regards to learning and development. This strength is a large part of the employer value proposition of the company. In fact, Rick Stein has ensured that it has also added to it different engagement strategies, different positive stories regarding the manner in which individuals have progressed with the company to provide more evidence that support the employer brand image. The other strength of the organization is that it has embedded training in all the operations of the group and this helps in forming the organizational culture that is linked to the company.

Weaknesses

The business has few formalized policies making the business to be at risk. The businesses also face the challenge of working within the industry for long and unsociable hours. There are also unclear progression opportunities that remain as a challenge for the business. The company has adopted a method of recruiting individuals who want to still develop and this makes sure that recruitment of persons for senior and managerial positions remains difficult.

Opportunities

The Rick Stein Group enjoys a good location in regards to its setting. The area has so much of freshly caught fish and shellfish that has ensured that the hotel enjoys an international reputation for serving the finest seafood. The affinity for fish as well as the passion for local produce has been critical in ensuring that there is the development of business and mainly the restaurants. The capability and the room for the business is an opportunity that ensures growth of the business and hence profitability. The town in which the company is located is small, hence it has taken advantage of this by increasingly being innovative.

Threats

The concept of applying family connotations remains a threat to the operations of the company. The high turnover of employees in the hospitality industry, in general, remains a threat. This is because the high turnover means high financial costs for the business. Additionally, the industry faces shortages in skills and this means that any form of labor turnover results in recruitment burden to the team as they will be progressively looking for persons to join their teams.

Idea to be Developed by Rick Stein

Promotion of products by a company remains one of the best and most necessary ways to ensure that the brand gets attracted to new customers. In fact, there exist several ways of promoting a product or a service. Some companies employ the use of more than one method while others use different approaches to market their products. Without any consideration of the products or services of the company, a strong set of promotional strategy can help in positioning the company in a favorable way with both the current customers as well as the new ones. For the Rick Stein Group to develop, there is a need for them to inculcate different marketing strategies and theories into their products and services. For every product or service, there is always some level of uniqueness as each of the strategies work in varying ways to each of them. Half of the marketing dollar is wasted but the problem is which of the dollar is wasted.

Segmentation

Different products and services are crafted to help meet the need of the customers and solve their problems as well (Chung et al., 2004). Given that not all customers share the same needs and will buy the same product, market segmentation will be ideal for the Rick Stein Group. Market segmentation refers to the presentation of products of a company to the segments that want it, can afford it and are aware of how to access it (Bowen, 1998). It is recommended that for Rick Stein Group to grow, it needs to identify the segments depending on the demographics, the behaviors and the desires of the customers (Yüksel and Yüksel, 2003). Rick Stein Group has then to design the marketing mix strategy to attract the consumers, to be appealing to the needs of the consumers and ensure extension of the profitability of the products.

Marketing Mix

The Rick Stein Group needs to employ the use of different marketing mixes. The concept of the marketing mix is beneficial as it ensures that all aspects of the marketing plan are positioned around the habits of the people, the desires and the psychology of the target market. In this case, the application of the 4Ps is critical for the organization.

AdWords Hotel Ads

First, to market the products, Rick Stein can make use of the AdWords’ hotel ads for the hotels and the meals. Having the hotel ads in place allows the establishment to appear in the exclusive section of the SERP alongside the other hotels. This will definitely help in increasing the presence of the hotel online and make them very prominent and visible for the individuals who would like to use the services. The hotel ads offer the user so much information which includes the star rating, the review summary, the average rates that are charged, the image of the hotel (Zhou et al., 2014). Having this kind of information allows the prospective guests to identify the potential places just through a glance making it easier for them to narrow the many lists of choices and make a decision that aligns with the objectives (Tong et al., 2014). Using the hotel ads remains one of the best for the hospitality businesses and therefore, Rick Stein Group needs to take advantage of it (Michael, 2000).

Focus on Ideal Customers

The other issue is that the Rick Stein Group needs to figure out what the ideal customer that they serve really wants. Each business has the perfect customer and the hotels are no exception. However, just as every other hotel has its ideal customer, it is necessary to figure out what the ideal customer really wants even though the client base might be wide (Barsky and Labagh, 1992). Many hotels focus so much on their amenities in an attempt to appeal to as many people as possible. This kind of approach makes a lot of sense on the surface. This is because most people are looking for minimal quality of comfort from the accommodations without factoring the reason for their trip (Chin and Tsai, 2013). Even though it may be seen as counterintuitive, there will be a need for the Rick Stein Group to just focus on the narrower subset of customers and their individual needs.

For instance, if most of the best customers of Rick Stein Group are frequent business travelers, there is a lot of sense in just concentrating on what may appeal to the specific demographic. On the other hand, if a hotel runs a bed and breakfast kind of service then there is need to exclusively focus on the peace of the surroundings, the area location and the history of the establishment. For the case of Rick Stein Group, the focus is on the quality of fish and other meals that they offer. There is a need to identify the ideal customers and their different needs and then make the needs be at the core of the advertisements (Ekinci, Prokopaki and Cobanoglu, 2003).

Contests as Promotional Strategies

Rick Stein Group can introduce contests as one of the promotional strategies for the services and the products that they offer. Most of the contests do not need a purchase. The concept of the contests for Rick Stein Group is to help in promoting the brand as well as the logo and name of the company to the potential consumers and the general public. It is the nature of human beings to like winning prizes hence sponsoring of the contests helps in bringing attention to the product without the overtness of the company.

Leverage Social Media

Also, the company can consider leveraging on the strengths of social media. Through the use of Facebook and other social media platforms such as Google+, the company will get a new way of promoting its products and services in an even relaxed environment (Miguéns, Baggio and Costa, 2008). This is a direct way of marketing the products. Through the social networks, the products can easily connect to the world and potential customers in different perspectives (Kim. Li, Brymer, 2016). Instead of seeing the company as trying to sell something, the social network needs to see the company that is in touch with the consumers at more of a personal level (Wei, Ruys and Muller, 1999). Through this, Rick Stein will ensure that there is lessening of the divide between the company and the buyer which in turn presents an appealing and familiar image of the company.

After-sale Customer Surveys

Rick Stein Group should also consider introducing after-sale customer surveys (Kim, 2016). This can be done through contacting the customers through telephone or after the sale as a promotional strategy to put into consideration the significance of customer satisfaction while at the same time offering the opportunity for promotions. This strategy will ensure that Rick Stein Group markets itself as a company that cares while at the same time striving to provide the best service and product.

Ways in Which It Has Relied on Entrepreneurial Activity of the Family

Rick Stein group has relied on the entrepreneurial activity of the family to develop the business. There are different qualities that have helped the individuals and the business to be successful and most of the traits are aligned to the family background. The Group has taken advantage of the family members and ensured that within each of the new openings, both Jill and the eldest son Ed Stein taking the lead role of being creative designers hence designing each of the properties to ensure that the properties match the surroundings. The surroundings are also to remain fresh and at the same time inviting. Also, the youngest son Charlie who is a wine merchant has been very instrumental in developing wine lists at each of the properties. On the other hand, the middle son of Jill and Rick, Jack has been instrumental in helping drive the business forward. Jack is the executive Chef and takes the role of overseeing all the restaurants, the cookery school and the many chefs that are employed within the business. The commitment that Jack has shown towards the business has been significant in driving the Rick Stein Group forward so that every restaurant maintains a unique offering in keeping with the family’s passion for food. In fact, from the efforts and different support that the individuals offer, it is evident that Rick Stein Group leverages in resource-based theories (Alvarez and Busenitz, 2001). The resource-based theories focus on the manner in which individuals leverage different types of resources to get the entrepreneurial efforts off the ground. This is just the case with the individuals. The company leverages on a human resource such as the individual skills that the persons have to boost the business (Hoopes, Madsen and Walker, 2003). Notably, the individual members of the family seem to have a vision for the business, the need for high achievement which seems to be the required psychological traits to push the business. These characteristics seem to have been part of the individual members’ upbringing hence helping in the growth of the business (Baron, 2000). In fact, it is no doubt that even though the family runs the business, there is so much emphasis on a high standard of excellence, self-reliance among persons and low dominance by the father (Shane, 2003).

References

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