Gourmet food restaurants are common restaurants available lavishly around United States of America. It is a part of the western culture where dining in a high quality restaurant with quality meals that includes mouth watering and tasty foods which will be in varieties. The term gourmet can be explained in two related ways where one represents the person whom is interested in good or quality food or drinks. Another way the term gourmet can be explained is with the way the food is being presented especially in a quality way or in an artful manner. Therefore, to sum up all, gourmet food restaurant is a result of a place that offers a very high quality food. Some of the examples of gourmet food are specialty cheeses, sushi, guacamole and many other different kinds of quality dishes.
One of the up and coming gourmet food restaurant that is available mostly in large cities in US is Blue Moon Mexican Café. The restaurant focuses mainly on serving in a high quality manner to families, corporate people and also local communities. The restaurant is targeting mainly families where children are used as a way to promote the main menus specially designed for the children to attract them.
The gourmet food restaurant was established by a family mainly as a family restaurant and it has been 20 years and the business has expanded to four places in United States. Meanwhile, the business has expanded in offering various services as Catering, Parties and even offering Franchise Opportunities. I as the marketing manager for the Blue Moon Mexican Café have been assigned the task to decide whether Blue Moon Mexican Café must do marketing in South East Asia and Internet or not.
The company Blue Moon Mexican Café must do marketing throughout the nation and also international for several reasons. One is to ensure that the brand or the company name builds up a strong foundation and another reason is to get more customers. Based on the question, the company should decide whether to do marketing in South East Asia countries and on the Internet or not. There are few reasons and facts that could back the company’s decision to do marketing overseas and also through internet.
3. 0 South East Asia
South East Asia is usually defined as the part of the Asia that includes some territories and Asian countries all together under one sub category which is known as South East Asia. Some of the countries that includes under the South East Asia are Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, Burma, Vietnam, Timor-Leste, Singapore, Philippines and Laos. All these countries have some common traits such as the climate, religion, economy and even the demographics.
3. 1 Marketing Mix for Blue Moon Mexican Café
Marketing Mix is a tool that will be used by marketers all around the world to improve or to develop their sales of services or products. The marketing mix is consists of Product, Price, Place and Promotion. Product is the meals that are being served by the Blue Moon Mexican Café that can be the centre of service which is being offered by the restaurant. Besides that, the restaurant is offering catering services too and this can be categorized under product which is in marketing mix. Another marketing mix is the price of the meals where the Blue Moon Mexican Café is targeting middle and higher income earners especially families to dine in a luxurious way. Another important marketing mix that is being applied in the restaurant is the place or the location of the restaurant. Currently there are four main branches of the restaurants throughout major cities in US. Besides that, the restaurant will be located mostly at the core or the heart of cities which makes easier for working people and families to locate. Last but not least, it is the promotional part where the restaurant highly depends upon few methods of promoting the menus in the restaurant which is through word of mouth marketing that can be a very low cost and also by using banners as a tool of promotion.
3. 2 PEST Analysis in South East Asia
PEST analysis is a tool that will be used by management and marketing people in an industry to find out the possibilities of expanding the business or the organization overseas or even in some parts of the country. Marketers will use this analysis to find out the possibility of marketing their products and services internationally. PEST analysis stands for political, economic, social and technological. PEST analysis can be used to find out whether it is appropriate to begin marketing for Blue Moon Mexican Café in South East Asian countries. As to begin from political aspects, countries in south East Asia are more politically stable compared to other countries around the globe.
Some of the south East Asian countries seemed to face some struggle within its government and the people but the resolution was made easily with the aid from neighboring countries. From the aspect of economy, South East Asian countries managed to stand back tall after facing a big slump in its economy during the recession. Most of the countries were able to strive back by utilizing the necessities products as a weapon to improve their cash flow within and outside the country. When South East Asian countries are compared from the aspects of social, there can be a lot of common traits where the majority of the people are multiracial and the countries do have different religions. Last but not least, Asian countries are rising up as one of the highest developers in the usage and growth of technology. Almost all the people are exposed with the term called Internet and depend on it to go through their daily lives.
4. 0 Internet
Marketing have been everywhere around the globe and constantly improving in ways that is being used by organizations to reach consumers and get more sales for literally fewer cost. Internet marketing is one of the way or method that is used commonly by marketers everywhere to promote their products or services. It is important for gourmet food restaurants nowadays to use internet to access millions of people with just few clicks away. This revolutionary technology has changed the way businesses operate.
4. 1 How to use Internet to do marketing
Internet can be a powerful tool to promote one’s businesses or organization effectively. It is powerful due to the fact that it connects billions of people all around the globe to communicate with each other easily and especially the time taken to communicate can be magnificent for it only take few seconds to let the words reach people. There are a lot of websites out there that promotes the restaurants and their food. The review websites are becoming an important websites for most people and this can be used by Blue Moon Mexican Café to promote their restaurant. Someone living in South East Asia can find out about the restaurant in the food websites and will be able to reach the restaurant when he or she visits the country. Some of the examples of sites that can be used to promote is tourism websites, food review websites and also business listings online.
5. 0 Conclusion
Marketing is an important activity that must be taken under serious consideration by every single organization that intends to grow and attain a positive brand review from customers. The marketing must be consistent and easily approachable by consumers. The Blue Moon Mexican Café has extra ordinary and delicious menus where it is the ultimate weapon for the company. The restaurant will be able to keep the customers for as long as they can only if the customer tries the food once. All the restaurant has to do is to attract more and more customers by doing marketing in South East Asia and also by utilizing the ultimate leverage tool which is the Internet.
The both ways are highly recommended for the Blue Moon Mexican Café as the company’s history proves that it was able to last more than 20 years just with the same menus. Definitely there will be demand from the South East Asians as the countries are constantly developing and will soon be demanding better or high quality food in a luxurious restaurant. The restaurant will be receiving positive feedbacks if they follow all the rules and regulation especially by taking in their minds PEST analysis where the social part needs more attention due to the fact that most of the people there are Muslims and they will be anticipating for Halal foods.
Therefore, by simply making some adjustments in the food menus so that will be suitable for the people, it is a guaranteed success for Blue Moon Mexican Café to promote in South East Asia and also through Internet.
1. 0 Introduction
There must be two things running in the minds of business owners from the day they begin their business operations which is to give complete or quality customer service that would satisfy and solve the problems of customers. Another concern would be very important which the growth of the business is. It all depends on the entrepreneurial skill of the business owner and the capability of the founder to foresee the business and its future way ahead before anyone else. This is a problem that must be solved by every business owner before going international. Now the term international means that there is a deep root connection within the organization that is related with one or more nations or countries. It revolves around the connection formed by the organization with its subsidiaries in more than one country.
There are many companies and organizations out there performing successfully in global arena especially when it comes to fast food restaurants. Some of the companies that are running globally and successfully are McDonald’s, Burger King, KFC and many more. One of the companies of my choice that captured my attention is Subway Restaurant which sells submarine sandwiches. It has more than 34, 000 branches globally and operating in over 90 countries. The business was founded by Fred DeLuca and Peter Buck in 1965 with only $1000. Now the business is generating revenues of more than 9 billion US dollars. It was in the mind of Fred earlier to bring this brand worldwide and create recognition by making it a global brand. The goal was achieved in just a few years of time when Fred DeLuca and his partner Peter Buck decided to franchise the business model. That was the secret of the business for now they are operating in more than 90 different countries and territories. Now the question arises on why do firms as Subway decided to go international and the reasons behind it.
2. 0 Why do firms Market their Product Internationally?
There will be a time where firms will decide to grow out of their boundaries and to be larger than ever. That is the point where most of the companies under various industries will come out with a decision to reach the global arena. It is where the International fragrance reaches the stakeholders of the business. Same incident happened when Subway Restaurant made its decision to go global by making the business model a franchise workable model. The decision which was taken in the year of 1972 made the business to be the fastest growing franchises in the world. There are several reasons on why Subway and many other firms like it market their products internationally.
2. 1 The Potential of the World Market
One of the prominent reasons why firms decide to go global is that they can see the potential of the world market which can be used for the benefit and growth of the business. Most organizations will do a thorough research of other countries and the potential of the business to run successfully there in the meantime can offer other great benefits too. The concept is very simple where if a particular are or territory have the population of 100, 000, then the firm can only target that amount of people after deciding on the demographics or the segment of target market to focus upon.
The profit or the return will be very less. This will change when the firm decides to go global where the general market would be very high and significant in number resulting in greater or higher profit margins. This is what Subway restaurants did by entering international market to attain a greater brand recognition which will allows for expansion and also greater profits in the world market.
2. 2 To Diversify Geographically
Most companies at a certain period of time will eventually decide to diversify geographically for some reasons. One of the reasons is to stimulate growth which will improve the financial performance and the productivity of the business. Some of the companies will tend to diversify internationally to attract more customers which in return will increase the sales volume that will generate more profits to the company or the organization.
Same thing happens in Subway where the Subway restaurants diversify geographically even to remote places such as war zones in Afghanistan and even in Iraq where the greatest expectation is to fulfill the demand and the needs of the customers no matter where they are. This small little sales but increasing in the number of quantities will lead to the increased financial and brand value for the firm.
2. 3 New Ideas and Products could be generated
There are other ways where some companies will decide to go international just to get a better idea or for a new product innovation. Such companies will tend to fail in the long run due to the fact that the particular product or idea will only work in the particular are, territory or country. That is the reason why most companies that goes international will not go mainly for new ideas and products but to improvise and mend their product based with the culture of the nation or country that will lead to product innovation.
This will support the company from getting a good and strong foundation to run successfully. It happens to Subway when it was launched in Muslim countries such as Malaysia where it sells Halal foods to meet the requirement of the country. Besides that, Subway managed to attract global market by coming out with new ideas and product when they introduced new menus for breakfasts and even a very new concept which is called as personal pizzas that allows customers to completely alter the meal based on their needs.
2. 4 Taking Advantage of Low Cost Manufacturers and Resources
One of the greatest strategies that will be used by most companies that run their business internationally is to take advantage of low cost manufacturers around the globe. What some companies will do is that they will open up another branch or a very new outlet in a country at a very specific territory where the cost to manufacture the products will be very cheap. There are several reasons behind it where the companies will get their products or goods to be manufactured at a very low price as it depends on the country that the company is operating. This will give in a greater profit margin as the cost to manufacture the product will be very less.
Same way Subway restaurant operates where it will operate or open a new branch that could be near to the suppliers’ place where the transportation costs and even the manufacturing cost will be less. Subway began to target Asian countries when the realization came that the operating cost in Asian countries will be less thus will enable the restaurant to generate more profits. Besides that, the restaurant also was able to handle labor costs where they were able to hire a very low skilled people and can provide them with wages that will be fulfilling both parties beneficially. This is where the company begins to diversify drastically especially in developing countries where there will be manufacturers ready to provide a very low and competitive price as suppliers are increasing in numbers in most countries. This will eventually benefit the restaurant solely.
3. 0 Conclusion
There can be various reasons why companies go international to market their product and services. To sum up all the benefits into one it is solely for the growth and expansion of the business. As the business grows, the stakeholders will increase, the profit will increase, there will be higher sales volume and eventually the business will have a longer lifespan or a very long product lifecycle. There are some factors too that affects many companies to go international but at the end the main objective of businesses to go international and grow rapidly is for survival. It is an infallible truth that besides objective, profitability and increase earnings per share is another factor too.
As years ago countries were having wars to prove who can be the best but as the time goes by and the world develops, the whole ideas changed and companies begin to have their very own wars in terms of business, success and growth. There are some companies willing to penetrate into international market by all means such as acquiring other international companies which can be considered as a shortcut. The most basic benefit that the companies wants to seek is to access an increased marketable numbers of customer.
Therefore, it is a conclusion that most international marketing organizations receive their profits from their foreign operations. This can be seen as the critical element or requirement for upcoming organizations and companies especially for marketers to go international.