Competitor benchmarking result

The table 2 below summarizes the overall secondary information of Mina Catering and The Caterers as well as the school canteen and sidewalk canteen through net scouting. After making comparison, many conclusions were drawn for the future new canteen model business of the authors.

Mina Catering The Caterers School Canteen Sidewalk Canteen Scale of oper-

ation

Ho Chi Minh City and neighbouring prov- inces

Ho Chi Minh City Internal school campus Certain area

Type of busi- ness

Business to Business Macro Business

Business to Business Macro Business

Business to Customer Micro Business

Business to Customer Micro Business Main Customer Enterprises and public

educational institu- tions

Private and high-qual- ity Educational institu- tions

Students, teacher, school staffs

Walk-in customers

Operation ca- pacity

50.000 meals per day 13.500 meal per day Under 1000 meal per day

Under 1000 meal per day

Main products and services

Industrial meal School meal and event organization

School meals and other school supplies

Meals

Key points of Sales

Reputation, Price, Quality of Products and Services, Food Hy- giene and Safety

Reputation, Price, Quality of Products and Services, Food Hy- giene and Safety

Location Price

Variety of products

Location Price

Variety of products

Widespread with aver- age quality and afford- able price

Marketing

Offer high quality products with addi- tional service

Focus on educational activities and event organization

Marketing Price Range 14.000VND-

50.000VND/ portion

Negotiation 1000VND-100.000VND depend on product category

20.000VND-

100.000VND depend on quantity of foods Food Process Industrial production Industrial production/

Cooking in the kitchen

Cooking in the kitchen Cooking in the kitchen

Advantages Food safety and hy- giene standards of the Department of Health and HACCP standards Professional organiza- tions

Reputation Abundant Capital

Stable customer sources

Food safety and hy- giene standards of the Department of Health and HACCP standards Professional organiza- tions

Reputation

Stable customer sources

Abundant Capital

Good location Convenience

Stable customer source

Location Cheap

Various of dishes Tasty foods

Unstable customer source

Disadvantages Limited of choice Not tasty cause by in- dustrial process

Expensive Limited in school cam- pus

Limited of quantity of meals

Expensive because of rental cost

Small scale

Limited in certain area

Unguaranteed in food hygiene and safety.

Small scale

Unstable customer source

Suitable level of school meal supplier

Elementary and Middle School

Elementary and Middle School

High school and col- lege

High school and col- lege

Table 2: Benchmarking of Mina Catering and The Caterers as well as school canteen and side- walk canteen

These elements are expected to contribute to the development of new canteen model business of the authors. First of all, as a professional school meal supplier with over ten years’ experi- ence, business like Mina Catering and the Caterers have built such a unified and smooth oper- ational system. Besides, they also built such a solid reputation in the local market, which gives them a significant advantage over other competitors. Providing meals in large quantities gives them high profits based on the increase of produces and reduce of expense. With a fixed pro- duction line, the more orders they have, the more profit they gain. Moreover, Business to Busi- ness model gives them a stable source of customer, which mean a certain amount of meals is stably delivered to a certain customer in a long term due to their signed contract.

Nevertheless, this business model also exists drawbacks. For the industrial caterer like Mina Catering, their main product is industrial meal, which are often produced from high-tech in- dustrial kitchen with large quantities, completed in a short time to serve many people at the same time and are often cheap. Taste of food is considerably its largest disadvantage since high-tech industrial production greatly negatively affect the quality as well as the savour of food. Being transported from the factory to the school also makes the dish cool and less tasty.

Furthermore, because of the large of quantity in producing as well as assurance in quality and price, it is difficult to ensure and control the food safety and hygiene, especially for small businesses that without the control of the government.

The second type of catering business such as The Caterer, strongly focuses on quality of their delivery product. They greatly invest on food hygiene, quality and even decoration of dishes.

Besides, with thorough investment and abundant financial resources, these companies not only commit on food safety and diversity on the menu but also offer high service quality, extra attractive educational activities for students. Incidentally, these extra benefits lead to the high in price, which can be seen as a great weakness.

On the other hand, as a totally different business model in school catering, school and sidewalk canteen present different characteristics and strengths and weaknesses. They sell meals di- rectly to students without going through school authority, which makes the customer persuasion of choosing their products become easier. Furthermore, as a small business, they can be flexibly operated in good location, insides or nearby school campus, where most students gather daily.

Because of being directly processed manually in place, the food has a better taste and attrac- tive for students by what called “Mother's food flavour”.

However, this business model is only suitable for business household, which are limited of fi- nance and resources. At the same time, its scale of operation also be restricted in a certain area with a limited source of customer. Besides, except school canteen that under the super- vision of the school authority, food hygiene and safety of sidewalk canteen is not guaranteed because of the lack of professionalism and the control of relevant authorities.

5 Final outcome for the new canteen business model

This chapter is specialized about the business idea of the new canteen model, which named fineLunch. In which, the theoretical background as well as the outcomes from practical imple- mentation have been harmoniously applied in order to accomplish the idea and create an actual business plan for this new kind of catering business.