北京外国语大学网络教育学院学士学位论文诚信声明

Restructuring a Coffee Shop to Attract More Customers

Submitted by (Wang Jin)

Student ID number (0409)

Supervised by (Tang Shimin)

A paper submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements

of the degree of Bachelor of Arts

The Institute of Online Education

Beijing Foreign Studies University

北京外国语大学网络教育学院

学士学位论文诚信声明

本人郑重声明：所呈交的学士学位论文，是本人在导师的指导下，独立进行研究工作所取得的成果。论文所涉及的项目为本人亲自负责或者参与实施的项目。除文中已经注明引用的内容外，本论文不含任何其他个人或集体已经发表或撰写过的作品成果。本人完全了解本声明的法律结果由本人承担。

学士学位论文作者签名：王晋

日期：2011年12月15日

摘要

“喜福会”是位于北京著名的南锣鼓巷，它的主人是本文作者的朋友。它的前身是一家名叫“老咖啡馆”小型个体咖啡店，经营咖啡及西点（餐）。该咖啡馆2008年开业以来，因规模较小、地点偏、管理不善等因素，经营业绩一直不佳。

随着北京旅游业的兴旺，南锣鼓巷的日趋繁荣，越来越多的国内外游客喜欢在此留足，寻找他们心中的北京印迹、享受一种与众不同的京韵京味。为了改变“喜福会”经营现状，我受业主委托，拟对该店进行全面重组，以期企业经营业绩得到大幅提升。

本论文就是我主导的一种重组振兴方案，它包括店铺更名、重新装修、增加服务内容、提高服务水平设等内容，力图把“喜福会”打造成一家具有北京韵味的西式咖啡店，希望在较短时期内使其营业额和利润有较大增长。

重组方案包括三大部分：前期主要通过目标客户分组问卷调查、SWOT分析等研究方法找出扩建设计的方向；中期主要是设计和建设，通过《项目进度流程表》、《项目负责人工作日志》等形式，来检查和保证设计内容得到及时调整和如期完成；最后是店铺试营阶段，主要采取同期营业绩效的对比来重组方案进行评估。重组方案实施内容主要包括硬件、软件两个方面。硬件如：店铺更名、店面装修，软件如：提高服务质量、调整经营商品等。

实践证明，小型咖啡店只要有特色、善经营，且能与时俱进、不断创新，也会做出大生意。关键词：重组、咖啡店、小型企业、经营特色

Abstract

This dissertation presents a detailed report of project of restructuring a small coffee shop, which provides the sales service of a range from coffee, foreign pastry to western food, sitting at Nanluoguxiang, will be named Joy Luck Club (JLC) in the project. Due to smaller scale, worse business circumstance, poor management, the shop has not been prosperous.

As Beijing travel business is booming, Nanluoguxiang is becoming very popular street where more and more visitors go there for wandering, shopping, and drinking coffee. People enjoy a unique leisure, and also find Beijing traditional culture at Nanluoguxiang.

In order to change and promote JLC’s business, commissioned by my friend, the owner, David, I am a project manager, and I wholly will be in charge of the project. The team will be set up, and everyone knows what the responsibility is.

The final result of the project is restructuring the coffee shop which named JLC as a unique place for their customers through high quality of products, good environment, friendly service, and effective management. The project will take two months. Market survey, such as focus group, face-to-face interviews, and SWOT analysis were used in the Project Problem Identification and Analysis section. Flowchart, project framework and several other methods were also adopted in the design, implementation and evaluation of the project. With the efforts of my team members, we achieved our final goal successfully. The renewed JLC will attract enormous customers, and be selected as the “Best New Coffee Shop in the area” by one local public remark web. The results of the project demonstrated that the application of information technologies is an effective approach for small enterprises to get outstanding achievement.

Key words: restructuring; coffee shop; small enterprises; unique style

Table of Contents

Pages

1. Project Introduction 8

2. Project Problem Identification and Analysis 8

Project problem 8 Problem analysis9 Results of problem analysis 9 3.Project Objective and Hypothesis10

Project objective10 Project hypothesis11

4. Project Rationale11

5. Project Design 11

Planning activities 11

Costing

15

Risk analysis

17

Management and control 18

6. Project Implementation18

General introduction of time, place of project implementation 18 The working steps of implementation18 Monitoring 18 7. Results and Discussion 19

Project Finding 19 Results 21 Discussion 21 8. Conclusion 22 Bibliography 24 Appendix I. Questionnaire of Customer Survey for Joy Luck Club 25

Appendix II. The Project Framework 28

Restructuring one coffee shop

to Attract More Customers

1. Introduction

In 2008, one small Coffee Shop, Joy Luck Club (JLC), was operated by my friend, David. It located at Nanluoguxiang, which is famous leisure place in Beijing, hustle and bustle every day there. Various interesting small shops attract people from all over the world. However JLC was not prosperous. In the area, it was unknown and not running well.

JLC is small because it has only 16 square meters. There are only 4 employees including the owners in the shop. It has not being running well due to the location, the service, and the management. However, I believe that JLC’current problem will be solved after the implementation of project. It could attract more customers visit.

Based on the hypothesis of the project can change and promote the business of coffee shop. It will start from the research what the problem of the shop, then, do it from the plan, design, implementation to opening step by step within the time-scale. It will take two months.

Before putting the plan into practice, I will also devise some measures to control and manage potential risks. Meanwhile, the analysis is very important. It will be used not only analysis the current situation of the shop but also analysis the customers’ needs and wants in the project.

The output of the project is a whole renewed JLC, a unique style coffee shop, which can meet various tasted of visitors from all over the world.

In the process of this project, I will use some helpful knowledge I have learnt. Scientific research methods of customer survey is one of the way, such as focus group, face-to-face interviews, and SWOT analysis will be used in the identification and analysis of the problems.

The total cost of the project is 300,000 Yuan. It includes design, decoration, purchase of materials and equipments, recruitment, and so on.

Finally, the project found that the young people are significant for JLC through the questionnaires of customers’ survey.They are more interested in JLC the others. So JLC will be focus on them.

2. Problem Identification and Analysis

Problem

I problem is that JLC has not been prosperous because of the smaller scale, worse business circumstances, and the poor management.

Problem analysis

2.2.1 .Company’s current situation

? Physical resources

JLC is small, has limited rooms to offer visitors, it totally can provide service for 26 persons. It only has 16 square meters to do business, and square meters outside. It includes 3 front seats around the main counter, 6 tables which is enough for 15 persons inside, and 4 tables for 8 persons outside. However, the outside garden is out of use in winter.

? Human Resources

JLC is a mainly family-operated enterprise, which the husband is owner, and the wife is

co-funder, general manager. The husband is a food maven who comes from the USA, and his wife is a Chinese girl, who grows up in Hutong of Beijing. The couple has a little business management experience and professional expertise. There are three employees in the shop. One of them is an intern who will return to study after 5-months internship. In addition, they are all young who have few professional services training and practical working experiences.

The financial resources

Funding capital is mainly from the owner. JLC has a few bank loans. The capital of enrollment is RMB 30,000 Yuan.

2.2.2. Needs and wants analysis

A.focus group

Focus group will be used. We are going to gather 6 young people, to use the interview of face to face way, to understand their habits and favor, to help running the shop.

B.customer surveys

The questions will be designed to have several parts, such as: basic information, service information, suggestion and the customer’s information.

Questions

1) Which one do you prefer of our shop present? A. environment B. products C. service

2) Which one of the background music would you like? A. classical B. popular C. light music

3) What do you think of the prices the shop offers?

4) Are you interested in the new coffee shop?

5) Do you have any suggestions for us to improve our service?

Complaints

1. The coffee shop is out of the way, so they find it difficultly. On the other hand, there is no place to park their car.

2. They have few choices, and they don’t like the taste of coffee.

3. The coffee shop is not unusual. Many customers have ever been there but they almost hardly remember it.

4. The price is so high that they don’t accept it.

5. The shop assistants are not friendly, and they are lack of experience.

2.2.

3. SWOT analysis

Know yourself as well as the enemy position. SWOT analysis is the good way to understand either internal or external of the shop.

Strengths:

1. The couple is the owners. They have the mixed culture backgrounds between the east and the west.

2. The staffs are young and friendly.

3. The shop is situated in the famous street, Nanluoguxiang, Beijing.

Weaknesses:

1)The shop is new and unknown.

2)The products and service will be improved.

3)Be lack of the unusual.

Opportunities:

4)People’s life level is getting better and better.

5)The Nation Day’s is comin g.

6)The attractive power of the East culture, specially, china traditional culture, Beijing

local unique tradition.

7)In China, coffee has become a popular diet culture.

Threats:

8)Fierce competition in the line of the business.

9)The effect of 2008 financial crisis

10)Rising prices have affected the costs increasing.

JLC is facing the opportunity and challenge. We will catch the focus of the market through using JLC’s strengths and avoiding the weaknesses to promote the business.

3. Project Objective and Hypothesi s

Project Objective

1) The problem I am facing is that the coffee shop is unknown, small area and limited areas.

2) The goal of my project is expand my shop and make the customer feedback.

3) The objectives for the first year of operations are:

a. Become selected as the” Best New Coffee Shop in the area” by the local public remark we

b.

b. Turn in the profits from the first month of operations. Maintain a 60% gross margin. Project Hypothesis

The culture of the coffee shop will make its best effort to create a unique place for their customers. Every customer will feel its comfort and relaxing environment while enjoying the best brewed coffee or espresso and pastries in town. Offering the customers relax the daily stresses by our good products, friendly service, graceful environment, and so on.

4. Project Rationale

I’m a project manager, I have studied the knowledge related the business project from the

“Business English”(1) and (2). I remembered deeply concept of the “product adaptation”in the book. It means to “Modify existing products to make them more suitable for a new market.”I knew that conforming standard of living in the target market is one of the reason for product adaptation too. I studied the way of SWOT analysis, and use it in my project. In addition, I still consulted some books or articles to do it. I read the report from the “China Economic Weekly” by written Tan Songning. He analyzed the ten years of coffee market in China, and proposed the advice of doing unusual the coffee shop.

5. Project Design

Planning activities

Activities with time-scale

There are a series of activities planned to take place:

1) Programming and put forward the demand of the project with our manager.

2) Negotiate and sign contract with the company which named QinZhou Decoration.

3) Start to design layout of the coffee shop

4) Making the system of the coffee shop

5) Purchase facility and furniture from the market of the Home of JuRan.

6) Decoration and test.

7) Open the coffee shop

Meanwhile, there are some important things have to do.

Firstly, in order to build our team, we must recruit the employee. Next, ordering new original of the coffee to enrich the kitchen. After then, carrying out some activity of extending the coffee shop is necessary.

I would like to use the advertisement in the news paper to inform the public. I think the news paper which is named “JingPin Shopping” is a good choice. It is not only very popular among the younger, but also the fee is cheaper than the others.

It will take 7 weeks to implement the project when it has been approved. And the Activity Flow Chart with time-scale can show how these activities are arranged.

By the end of Week One

Programming and put forward the demand of the project, and making the budget.

By the end of Week Two

Negotiate and sign contract, and raisin money.

By the end of Week Three

Start design layout of the coffee shop.

Between the Week Four and Five

Implanting the plan, including:

Make the system of the coffee shop,

Purchase facility and furniture,

Build the team,

Order some material of the coffee,

Give publicity to the customers.

By the end of Week six

Decoration and test

In the Week seven

Open the new coffee shop

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29

People involved and responsibilities

The couple is the coffee shop’s owner. Although, they both have experience in the running shop, in order to increase the efficient human resource and reduce the cost, they have to do something follow as:

First, they need to reconfirm the responsibility. David’s responsibilities will include developing a marketing strategy and perform other daily managerial duties. Wang Fang, His wife’s responsibilities will include managing the staff, ordering inventory, dealing with suppliers.

Second, the recruitment is their next job. They decide to rehire two staffs which have qualification for the experience of the restaurant service. The couple must shift on working to keep one person to stay at the coffee shop every day.

Costing

The budget of the project is about 22,000 Yuan (RMB). The cost involved can be divided into two categories: fixed and variable.

Fixed costs are expensed t hat don’t vary with the level of sales, such as rent, payroll, utilities, insurance and other operation expenses.

Variable expenses are directly related to sales and include terms such as raw materials or purchases to be sold, and direct labor.

The table below outlines the costing of the coffee shop.

Decoration: RMB 100,000 Yuan（including the lights, tables, curtain, tablecloth, audio

and so on）

Equipment: Coffee machine, RMB 15,000 Yuan

Computer, RMB 15,000 Yuan(including cash software)

Air condition RMB 8,500 Yuan

Chairs, RMB 10,000 Yuan

Shop counter, a set of professional auto coffee machine, RMB 20,000 Yuan

Coffee cups, RMB 15,000 Yuan

Coffee spoons, knives, RMB 2,000 Yuan

Disinfection box, RMB 1,000 Yuan

Juice Extractor, RMB 600 Yuan

Micro-wave oven, RMB 800 Yuan

Toast machine, RMB 1000 Yuan

Water and electricity, RMB 3,000 Yuan/Month

Food, RMB 10,000 Yuan/Month

Payroll, RMB 5000 Yuan/month

Rent ,RMB 8500 Yuan/month

Others, RMB 4500 Yuan/Month (such as the fee of advertising, etc.)

Risk analysis

Location related (good wine needs no bush酒香不怕巷子深)

We all know that Nanluoguxiang is an inch of land in the busy section is worth an inch of gold in Beijing. However, JLC is located the corner of the hutong, that is out of the way, so it is very difficult to appeal to people visit here.

Competition related

According to incomplete statistics, there are more than 105 coffee shops around Nanluoguxiang. They are sharing this area market. You could often see the new shop opening if you were frequenter of Nanluoguxiang. And at the same time, some shops are also dropped out due to some running problems. Under the fierce competition force, ” Natural selection and survival of the fittest. “

Product or service related

Reopened the coffee shop is still small and unknown. The significant things are to pay attention to the quality of the products and service. That is why the coffee shop can attract more customers visit.

. Management and control

Facing the risks, I strongly believe that using the Chinese characteristic name of the JOY LUCK CLUB, doing best with a great service and product will help the shop to control the risks. The specific strategy will be follow as:

Chinese Characteristic Name

Renamed the shop is JOY LUCK CLUB which comes from Chinese famous film, and it has good, traditional meaning in China. We believe the new name should bring the luck for the coffee shop.

Special Products and Services

As the proverb goes, Good wine needs no bush. Great products and services are the critical key to success. J LC is a unique shop will cater to people who want to get their daily cup of great-tasting coffee in a relaxing atmosphere. Maybe you can eat the Beijing snacks if you would like.

Special Activity

The activity of sale promotion is one of important strategy. We will hold the special interesting activities to attract the customers. Example: 10% discount during the raining day, 20% discount during the raining day if you were wet, and so on.

6. Project Implementation

General introduction of time, place of project implementation

The project implementation will be designed during March 1st to April 26th, 2010 (about 7 weeks). All of the things of project will be taken place in the shop.

The working steps of implementation

We not only has a clear task for every participant but also implement the project with the time-scale seriously.

David will take charge of the project outside work. Such as programming and putting forward the demand of the project with our manager, Negotiate and sign contract with the company which named QinZhou Decoration, recruitment, etc. Wang Fang will take part in the design and order product activity, and so on.

Monitoring

Under the leadership of David, we should be in strict accordance with the time- scale to monitor the project plan. No matter time or process are both necessary for us. We need to know every the problem project in time, and feedback how to solve them as quickly as possible. First, we require the project team members to keep in touch with the mobile- phone in 24 hours during the implementation stage. Second, we require all through the meeting resolution, in case of unforeseen problems. Last, we require every morning with a short meeting to start our work day, and everyone must attend it.

7. Results and Discussion

Project Finding

This result from the focus group interview, due to the aged 25-35 customers is significant for us .so we made the category and figure:

As above, we can find that quality of the products among China consumers definitely plays an important role in the recent growth in all industries, and the coffee shop is no exception. Additionally, price, service, and environment are other main factors too.

We contrast data of the customer visiting of the same time. From the survey, the data shows that is obvious that the customer visiting number dramatically increased by %. Especially, the number of young customers is increased by %. The table of category and figure3 as below will be showed these data:

quality of the product 43%

price 29%

service 14%

environment

14%

figure1: The Favor of The Customers Aged

25-35

figure 2: comparison of the number of

customer

Number of visiting customers(Person)

Number of the new customers visiting for the coffee products

660

585

380

245

138.78

50

Sep.-Dec,2009Sep.-Dec,2010Rise or Down(%)

In figure 3, the data shows that the turnover is increased by %, but the cost is declined by %, so the profit is dramatically increased by % (see the figure 2 as below)