What It Takes to Run a Successful Cafe and the Role of Technology in This Business

1 What it takes to run a successful cafe and the role of technology in this business.

Running a successful cafe

After a 20-miunte interview with a local cafe manager, we have gained more knowledge on how local cafes become successful in this industry. It is hard to compete in today's market as a cafe shop as there are more and more emerging businesses that works with providing coffee products to the customers. Prices are very competitive and there are much bigger names that is very difficult to compete with.

To be able to run a successful cafe, the cafe manager said that good customer service is the most important. It is essential that they keep their customers happy with their products and services. This way, customers will keep on coming back to the cafe and buy their products. They always make sure that the customers are always right and they follow what customers want for their orders. For example, if they want to modify their coffee, they modify it to what the customers indicated. They also hire customer-friendly staff that will be able to serve their customers with a smile that says "I am proud to work here to serve you as our customer".

Quality products attract customers. As a cafe, they also sell bagels, muffins, sandwiches and other food that most cafe customers look for. It is important that their products are up to the quality standard that will make customers happy. They make sure that their products are always fresh and the coffees served are made fresh as customers order. Their range of products begins from coffees, frappucinos to sandwiches to merchandise. Selling merchandise items are very vital for the cafe as this attracts tourists to buy their products and at the same time get a souvenir from New Zealand or maybe a way to attract people who just like to buy this kind of merchandise to show off their individual status.

Cleanliness is the key. Shop presentation is very important to customers. The manager said that they always keep the shop as clean and hygienic as possible. They do not leave any table cluttered with used utensils for more than a minute as this makes an impression to customers. They sanitize equipments to kill any unseen bacteria before, during and after work hours. Customers want to eat in a clean and safe environment so cleanliness is definitely at the top of the list to ensure you run a successful business cafe.

Competitive pricing. They keep their product prices at a reasonable cost. Customers like affordable quality products. However, the cafe cannot always have the best price out there. They ensure that their product prices give their consumers their value for money and they are getting what they paid for.

Role of technology in this business

Today, there are a lot of businesses that are located on hotspots that attracts consumers to sit down in their cafe, grab a coffee, and browse the internet at the same time. As many individuals now own a Wi-Fi enabled device, the cafe has started a Wi-Fi service to attract customers.

They are also currently making a trial run on a barcode-based payment method. This is an application for both android and smartphones where consumers can pay transactions directly from their mobile. This trend has been happening in the US since January of this year and is now currently being tried out in New Zealand. If this method of payment works very well in New Zealand, the cafe business will implement this permanently in the hopes of attracting more customers and therefore gaining more sales.

2 Porter's three generic strategies

Differentiation Strategy

A threat of a new entrant concerned employees on the performance of Broadway Café. The differentiation strategy may be the best way for us to address employee concerns, build customer loyalty and remain competitive in the market. It allows us to change our approach in the market and develop our products and service that perceives to be better than the upcoming competitor.

Starbucks is a highly recognised cafe worldwide. As a runner of a small local cafe, it is critical for us to be able to compete to their level of performance and on what they offer consumers. Significantly, Starbucks is a business that has evolved and relied on the changing technology.

Broadway cafe has not adopted this yet to the business. Since Broadway Cafe started its operation in 1952, they have not kept any single record of important information on files that can easily be restored other than the grandfathers mind. Orders are taken manually, recipe is kept on mind, inventories are not kept track upon and there are no records of the employee payroll. By purchasing a computer and adding it to the business' assets, the employees will find it easier to perform tasks and get orders so the business will run more efficiently. A proper step by step procedure of making products should also be developed so that old and new employees know how to create a product by following the recipe. This will also make the taste of the products consistent. Broadway Cafe should create a separate database that records their inventory and employee payroll. Marketing coupon will still be implemented, however, a more mobile way of distributing these coupons will be implemented and loyalty card will be sent thru mobile. A website will also be designed for consumers to be able to view the cafe's different products and services. Suggestions and comments can be placed on the website on how the cafe is doing as a local business in their area. Every suggestion made by the consumer will be heard and they will receive a special offer from the cafe if they have sent their words on the website. Advertising will start off from word of mouth but Broadway Cafe will try to enter on a more broad way of advertising such as advertising on the local newspapers, emails and such.

3 Protecting personal information

After conducting a survey answered by 10 correspondents, we found out that even though users have very strong passwords, we still found out that 60% of the correspondents have had their accounts hacked. It is not surprising as 9 out of 10 of them have given out their password to someone else. Even though they made combinations