My Biz Café Simulation Learning Experience Davenport University Abstract This paper will cover a reflection of my experience with the Biz Café simulation. After reading this paper, one should have an idea of what I learned from the simulation and how it works. I will be talking about the challenges my team and I dealt with and how we overcame these challenges. Most importantly, I will be talking about how we made Coffee Connection run as a successful coffee shop. In this paper, I will also discuss my thoughts on teamwork and the significant factors of running a small business. My Biz Café Simulation Learning Experience Taking part in the Biz Café simulation has been one of the most motivating, enjoyable and enriching learning …show more content…
The furniture we chose for our coffee shop was the used furniture which was cheaper for us. Choosing the used furniture proved to be a good choice that in the long run worked for our coffee shop. We also decided that purchasing the high capacity espresso machine would be very convenient for the business. The machine turned out to be a great investment that served Coffee Connection very well. Challenges We Overcame A challenge that we faced with our coffee shop was making the staffing decisions. We struggled with trying to figure out a sufficient number of managers and servers to hire and an appropriate pay for them. Around the beginning of the simulation, we had a nice amount of servers which resulted in us receiving an award for best staff. After we extended hours, things seemed to go downhill with our staff. As a result, this had an effect on the overall service of the workers. They were not as happy or productive as we had hoped. Our managers were becoming stressed out and our servers were being overworked and even a couple of our servers quit. This lead to us hiring more servers, another manager and giving our managers a raise. These necessary adjustments were a must in our attempt to increase productivity. We also thought that by giving the managers a pay raise, it would make them feel appreciated and motivate them to work. Recognition is what is needed to inspire employees to do their best.
I believe that this simulation was a great tool in helping us as MBA candidates to see just how companies succeed and/or fail to achieve their growth targets in revenue and profitability. However, an organization heightens the probability of achieving profitable growth whenever it has a clear expansion strategy and a strong execution infrastructure. One without the other impairs the probability of success. I conclude that there are two main reasons for such: 1) inadequate consideration of opportunities within the core business, adjacent to the core business or within new customer sub-segments; 2) an organizational infrastructure that cannot support successful execution.
This week’s key learning areas have been eye opening and worthwhile. Our game simulation has taught me how to manage the human resources (HR), capacity planning, receiving, production, and shipping departments. One key element that caught my attention was bottleneck issues. Although reputation and meeting goals is important, I must pay attention to the machines that are causing bottleneck issues; performing a cost/benefit analysis can fulfill this. It is necessary to manage mistakes made in strategy during the game, which can resolve issues down the road to have a successful business plan. There were three questions posed in our case study: What are the highest three unit profits?; What are the lowest percentage mark-up items?; and How would you use this in determining your business plan? These key areas will be discussed throughout the journal to express my understanding of the experience.
1. What countries represent the largest global business opportunities for the next decade? What factors determine the size of the opportunity?
3. Many multinational companies market products under different brand names when conducting business overseas. For example, Unilever’s Axe Body Spray is called Lynx in the United Kingdom and Australia. Research some of your favorite brands (or products that you buy on a regular basis), and list if and how they use alternate product names when conducting business in foreign markets. Then, explain why a company might use a different brand name abroad.
For this project, I have decided to open a coffee shop that serves regular and specialty coffee, and small pastry items that is located in a prominent neighborhood near a train station or a high foot traffic area. Coffee has become a popular beverage where it is not just needed in the mornings but throughout the day, whether they are on their way to work or just to sit and relax. I am a coffee drinker myself and it is uncommon to find a coffee place that has a warm, home feeling atmosphere. It is important to have one of these types of coffee shop in any neighborhood. My goal is to provide every customer coffee and pastry whether
Marketplace Business Simulator is an on-line marketing simulation that incorporates all the marketing principles I have learned over the course of this semester and apply them into real world marketing practice. Simulation was used for the sake of instigating effective results and in that regard, this paper analyses the manner in which each quarter was carried through. The circumstances surrounding each of the decisions made are analyzed intricately and hence a manifestation of the impact of each for each of the quarters is laid bare.
There were two main start-up decisions. The first is the choice in furniture. The option was given to choose either Used Furniture for $2,000, or several other choices for $4,000. These others were New Modern, New Green, Urban, and New Elegant. So, sticking with my theme, I went for the Used Furniture. Being located where my new coffee shop is and well as my expected general customer classification, I don’t have the liberty to charge a premium for coffee. According to Kate Taylor in her article Some Starbucks locations quietly raised prices on brewed coffee and cookies on Pumpkin Spice Latte launch day, she says, “Starbucks just quietly raised prices at a sizable chunk of locations.” Starbucks can reach a much larger crowd than my simulated shop, therefore, I decided to take my approach differently with the cheaper route.
Forbes credits staff recognition as the “[s]ingle most influential cause of great work”. Staff recognition also creates a positive culture which increases productivity. 2 In turn, this culture improves performance. 1
The customer simulation exercise of Minnesota Micromotors Inc, was a very intriguing one. It exposed me to a variety of moving pieces that enable a successful business performance across different objectives and parameters.
For my project, I ran Coffee-Roma, a coffee shop located in the business district of a large city. My simulation ran for 60 days. Over this timeframe, I hired 7 employees and earned gross revenues of $89,984.20. From those revenues, my net profit totaled $14,046.83. Below are the details of how I attempted to best run my business.
In conclusion, the Broadway Café faces a strong buying power and rivalry among competitors due to the large volume of shops offering the same products and services. The threat of new substitute products and alternatives is also high for the same reasons for buyer power. The Café also faces the threat of new entrants due to the lack of insignificant entry barriers. One upside is the relatively weak supplier power. The coffee industry is huge as stated above and vendors are more than ample. With this information we can conceive our business focus. The Broadway Café is best suit for a focused differentiation strategy. We plan to achieve
Since quarter one was the first quarter of this simulation, I was unaware of how difficult it was going to be to make all the different decisions. Firstly, I had to choose a Company name. Because I was selling computers, I thought that the name “Dev-Tech” was a perfect fit being that this simulation was about development and technology. Next, I had to choose a target segment. I knew going into this simulation that it would be better to invest in the more expensive goods as it would benefit me in the end. The segment that didn’t care about price was Mercedes, so that is the segment that I made my first priority.
Recently, Tricia-Mart opened new branches to its existing ones. The management are keen on improving efficiency and services of the company. There are many ways in which this improvement can be done using simulation software: higher quality and efficiency from capital assets, better management of inventory, higher return on asset, this list is endless. But some of these improvements could be made without simulation, so the real question is ‘Why use simulation instead of another method such as real life experimentation?’
The provision and use of personal protective equipment could include using gloves, glasses, earmuffs, aprons, safety footwear, dust masks.
During the business simulation course, we organised a team to become an automotive start-up company and introduced four new products, vehicle models, to satisfy the investors who invested us £500M. Each 4 rounds, we had entered board room to report our initial result and upcoming plans.