Marco’s Restaurant Problem Solving Report
1. Current Business Status
Marcro’s restaurant business in recent years is not as satisfactory as before. Its monthly net profit fell dramatically form ￡3,500 to ￡50 between 1994 and 2005. What is worse, starting form 2006 , the restaurant has been suffering negative profits from -￡200 to -￡50 in 2009. As the poor situation described above, Marcro’s restaurant may face bankruptcy in next half a year. In order to return the company back to be profitable, effective actions must be taken immediately.

In this report, Measures are proposed based on the problems the restaurant has currently in different aspects which are: costing, menu, opening hours, staffing kitchen customer service, restaurant décor and atmosphere, competition and management style.

2. Problems and Suggested Actions
2.1 Cost and Menu
Current problems: ➢ The menu is too elaborate which contains 15 types of pasta 25 types of pizza and 12 types of desserts. This leads to high costs and wastage of ingredients every day. ➢ The Menu is all written in Italian that confuses customers when ordering food. ➢ From the perspective of some customers, the menu is a bit dated which has been kept the same all the time. Besides, they think the food is comparatively higher than food in similar restaurants.

Suggested actions: ➢ Conduct a survey among customers to get feedback about their favorites. According to the survey, simplify the menu and select 8 most popular types of pasta, 15 types of pizza and 6 types of desserts. ➢ Redesign the former Italian version menu with English translation and food pictures beside. ➢ On the basis of original menu, introduce 2 new cotemporary Italian cuisines for pasta, pizza and desserts respectively. Before sold in the restaurant, new cuisines have to been tested for free by a group of loyal customer to see whether it will be welcome. ➢ Try to negotiate with suppliers in order to cut down the ingredient cost and lower down the price similar to competitors’. At the same time, accurately calculate amounts of ingredients needed everyday before purchasing to avoid unnecessary wastage.

2.2 Opening Hours and Staffing
Current problems: ➢ The restaurant is staying open from morning until midnight. However, breakfast and lunch takings are experiencing a significant decline while the restaurant is still presenting the same large menu both at lunch and dinner.
This has caused a lot of wastage of ingredients during lunchtime. ➢ Inappropriate staffing is another serious issue. Usually, it is overstaffed during the day while understaffed in the evening. It can lead to unnecessary staffing costs during daytime. At dinner, poor service or delay of food serving could happen. ➢ Using family members or friends as waiting and kitchen staff can cause big mistake, since they are not trained properly and not professional enough to serve customers or prepare food. Mistakes like poor service may happen which will dispute the restaurant’s reputation.

Suggested actions: ➢ The restaurant can just open in the evening and combine morning, lunch and evening shift staff together to serve dinner. In this case, there is no need to use family members or friends and there will be more time to prepare everything perfectly. It can be a selling point to attract customers just coming for dinner. ➢ If the restaurant will still open from morning till midnight, there are a few adjustments it needs to make: firstly, it needs reschedule the working shifts, reduce number of staff working in morning and at Lunch while increase number of staff at dinner. It can hire some part-time workers during busy times like weekends, holidays. Secondly, simplify the lunch menu and give special offers like free house wine at lunch.

2.3 Kitchen
Current problems: ➢ Ideas for contemporary Italian cuisine by the head-chef Steven can not be implemented because Marco insists on the traditional cuisine which can demotivate him a lot and the restaurant miss out certain fantastic cuisines he creates. ➢ The attitude of the assistant chef Antonio at work is very unsatisfactory. He is often comes to work late and drunk. Besides, the quality of his work is deteriorating recently years.

Suggested actions: ➢ Innovation should be encouraged, Marco can give Steven a chance to show his work and let customers to decide whether the new cuisines are qualified to be listed on the menu. ➢ Antonio’s bad attitude not only affects his own work, but also has a bad influence on other staff. He should be given last warning in terms of his bad behaviors at work. Besides pressures must be given to him, he will be given one month to show his progress. If not, Marco must consider recruit a new and qualified assistant chef to replace Antonio although he is a old friend of Marco. ➢ Strict restaurant’s rules must be established in order to regulate staff’s behaviors.

2.4 Customer Service
Current problems: ➢ Inconsistent of food serving: food is served at different times for the customers at the same table. In that case, some people need to wait for long time until everyone has their own meals while theirs have been cold. ➢ Slow service and wrong order taking: service staff sometimes messed up the orders and serve drinks or food to a wrong table. It could be small or big mistake depends on which kind of customers you meet. Some people can be very angry about it. ➢ Overall, these two kinds of service problems will have very negative effects on the restaurant’s reputation and business. Since it is not a fast-food restaurant but a fine dining restaurant, people pay high not only just only for food but also service. Therefore measures must be taken to improve the service situation

Suggested actions: ➢ Yearly service training: the average amount of training given to the waiters or waitresses should be 5 hours at least a year. It can use professional service training company in Birmingham or invite professionals major in Hospitality from college to give lectures. ➢ Three types of evaluation form: Staff performance every month will be evaluated based on staff evaluation form from managers, peer evaluation form from colleagues and feedback form from customers. Bonus or rewards of each year will be given according to results from these three types forms.

2.5 Restaurant Décor and Atmosphere
Current problems: ➢ The restaurant décor is a bit out of date which hasn’t been changed since the 80s. Besides, the staff uniform is too formal. All these create very stuffy atmosphere in the restaurant.

Suggested actions: ➢ Before starting to decorate the restaurant, you need to identify the target patron. If the customers are mainly young people, the design can be more fashionable. Or if they are old age person, the design can be mild and historical. ➢ Then, you need to create a theme, For a Italian restaurant, you may have a street café theme or an old world theme, both of them will create enjoyable atmosphere. ➢ Once setting up the theme and atmosphere, you can start to refurnish the restaurant. Floors and walls are main element affecting restaurants’ atmosphere. Earth tone color is very popular in Italian restaurants nowadays. Then about the type of tables and chairs, you can choose the ones depict modern and classic art. Greenery is also very important in a Italian restaurant, plants can be placed in special locations to not only compliment the decoration, but to give the customers the feel of semi- private tables. ➢ Overall, the restaurant’s decoration is as important as the food on the menu. Comfortable environment will allow customers to lose themselves for the duration of their meals.

2.6 Management
Current problems: ➢ Marco is too controlling and does not allow his staff to do their jobs independently and properly. ➢ Maria who is supposed to be responsible for the front of house is always late and absent. She also spent too much chatting and relaxing.

Suggested actions: ➢ Marco should change his management style from centralization into decentralization and let the staff to develop their ideas freely and independently. ➢ Maria, as the front house manager should discipline herself and must be punctual and serious at work in order to build a positive image in front of her staff.

2.7 Competition
Current problems: ➢ The opening of Guiseppe’s, an Italian restaurant which opened in 2003 has threatened Marco’s business directly. However, Marco has not realized its threats and believes his restaurant is better than Guiseppe’s.

Suggested actions: ➢ First of all, Macro must change his attitude and be objective towards his competitor’s growth. ➢ From the analysis, Guiseppe’s is using pricing strategy to attract customers like offering lunch-time deals to local offices. In order to win back the customers, Marco must offer some promotions: - Bouncebacks: it is a way to bounce guests from peak times to off-peak times and can also work to encourage frequency of customers. Eg: offer bounceback certificates that can only be used during lunch hours. - Big events promotion: offer great deals for birthday parties, wedding parties, etc. - Business socials: socialize with outside organizations at their establishments or anniversaries. If you choose the right companies, you can leverage their resources to promote the restaurant and get the core markets.

3. Conclusion
To sum up, Since Marco’s business is declining gradually, in order to change current situation, it needs to improve its weaknesses, take advantage of its strengths, handle external threats and make full use of opportunities.

References:
Restaurants service standard available at: http://www.ehow.co.uk/facts_6816009_restaurant-customer-service-standards.html Decorating your Italian restaurant available at: http://www.buzzle.com/articles/decorating-your-italian-restaurant.html Restaurant promotions available at:
http://www.quantifiedmarketing.com/learning_center/restaurant-promotions.php