Executive Summary
The name of the business will be The Parrain, New Orleans’ slang for “The Godfather” and the catch phrase will be serving the best. The Parrain will be a Food Truck business offering a variety of cold and hot sandwiches, salads and particular healthy recipes.
Studies demonstrate that customers are requesting for healthy food that is inexpensive, available, and from convenient locations. The Parrain Truck will cater for the needs of working class, through a food truck that is portable and can venture out to diverse parts of the New Orleans City Metropolis. The Parrain Truck will give appealing and tasty food, as well as give healthy and affordable choices to what consumers can get at other fast food outlets. The food truck business has picked up across the country in recent years, and projections are that the sector is going to continue growing. Given that there is not much competition for the food truck business in Orleans Metro Area, the monetary potential for The Parrain Truck is extraordinary. Couple this with the creative recipes of renowned Chef Jeb Carter and the imaginative and well- planned marketing strategies to be employed, the rate of return for The Parrain Truck is noteworthy. Mr. Jeb Carter, the owner of The Parrain Truck, made this five-year plan for success to secure start-up financing and to teach stakeholders and workers of the organization's vision, strategies, and methods. The business is still in the planning stage, with the launch expected in February 2015
Mission Statement: Our mission is to provide healthy and delicious meals to the people of New Orleans, at competitive prices while maintaining the highest cleanliness standards possible.
Management Plan: The Parrain will be owned solely by Mr. Jeb Carter and will be registered in the City of New Orleans, Lousiana. The Parrain will acquire a customized food truck from where it will be operating. The day to day duties of running a business is by Mr. Carter and two employees.
Operation Plans: From Monday to Thursday, The Parrain will offer lunch and dinner, while on Fridays and Saturday, it serve dinner and close late at 2am. There will be a variety of foods; sandwiches will be served within 5 minutes of an order being placed.
Industry and Target Market: There is a growing need for food trucks in New Orleans, and the truck will serve the people of New Orleans. Our target market is the workers who do not have enough time, and they want to grab a plate on the go and at a competitive price.
Marketing: The market for food trucks in New Orleans is growing, and there is an increasing demand for healthy and delicious on the go meals. The Parrain will extensively use social media and customized smartphone apps to penetrate and carve its niche in the market.
The Parrain Truck is concerned about profits, as well as the triple bottom line (3BL) (Norman and MacDonald) also, which incorporates monetary, social, and environmental interests.
The Parrain Truck expects year one sales to be $100,987. In the first year a Pre - Bonus profit before taxation, payment of interest rates, devaluation and amortization of 10% is projected. During the development phases of the venture, years two through four, the net revenue is expected to grow to 25% in the second year, 14% in the third year, and 17% in the fourth year. During the maturity phase, from year four to year ten, a stable annual profit of 110% is projected. Total Revenue expected for the second and third year is $20,000. In the third year, the revenues will rise to $30,000 and to $40,000 in the fourth year. The estimated cost of establishing the business is $65,906, and the owner will provide $34,000 while the balance of $32,000 will be raised through a bank loan. The loan is offered at an interest rate of 10% per annum.
The Parrain is a food truck which will be operating in the New Orleans Metropolis, offering unique sandwiches and original recipes which are inspired by the cuisine from Cascadia, Northwest Pacific. The Parrain will offer a different menu every day for the five days it will be in operation every week. A food truck will be serving customers at various locations at various times of the day. By offering a customized menu, The Parrain food truck will curve a niche for itself, our differentiation strategy will be based on our creative, unique cuisine, and competitive pricing. The Parrain, key to success will be convenience offered to customers, original recipes and the flexibility of driving the truck to multiple locations at different times of the day, within the New Orleans Metropolis.
Vision Statement
The Parrain truck helps the working individuals of the New Orleans Metropolis to live a beneficial, more content, and healthier lives by giving fast, healthy, tasty and hygienically prepared food.
Statement of purpose
Company Ownership
Initially, the business will be owned by Mr. Carter, and it will be registered in the City of New Orleans by mid-January 2015. Mr. Carter will be solely responsible for operating the business and at the initial stages he will be hiring two employees to assist him.
The Parrain will own a customized state of the art food truck which will be operating within the New Orleans City Metropolis.
Key Activities
The main activities undertaken in a food truck business are preparation of the food, serving the food to clients, and promoting the company. Advertising is crucial for a food truck business, to primarily inform customers where the truck will be and at what times. To remain competitive, The Parrain food truck will utilize several advertising media to inform its clients the timings and location of the food truck daily.
Key Resources
Physical, Intellectual and human components are incorporated in the business plan. The truck, kitchenware, refrigerators and cooking equipment form part of the physical elements. Hygienic food is also an important physical component for the company to operate. Intellectual components include the brand name of the truck and the company website and any other internet resources that will be used in marketing the company. The business owner and the staff who will be employed to assist in running the company will form the human resources of the enterprise.
The Truck
The business will acquire a customized food truck at the cost of $50,000, and it will be a hybrid electric vehicle for fuel efficiency. The truck will have an inbuilt recharge system that generates the required electric force for its movement (Eaton.com) and thusly a reduction in expenses.
Key Partners
The owner of the business Mr. Jeb Carter is the key person for this company. Other key partners include the city council of New Orleans, the suppliers and competitors within the same sector. These partnerships are important, and they must be sought and maintained (Rosen, 2011). The Parrain truck will work together with as many neighborhood associations as possible, to cultivate good relations.
Management Team
Jeb Carter is a qualified chef trained at the Culinary Institute of Louisiana with over 12 years of experience in the management of restaurants. Carter is currently the head chef at Mr. B’s Bistro Restaurant in New Orleans and has previously worked as the head chef at Restaurant Zoe, a restaurant specializing in Northwest Pacific cuisine in Seattle. Having managed a kitchen with over six employees and offering an array of recipes, Carter has the requisite skills and experience to run The Parrain food truck business.
Products and Services
The Parrain Food Truck will be offering a lunch and dinner menu, at different locations within the New Orleans Metropolis. The lunch and dinner menu will be made up of different cold cut sandwiches including turkey, roast beef, and ham. The Parrain will also serve freshly prepared salads. The salads on offer will be: The Parrain Caesar Salad, The Parrain Greek Salad, The Parrain Homemade Potato Salad, The Parrain Italian Eggplant Salad and The Parrain Maury Island Cranberry Artic Salad. As a compliment, The Parrain will be giving a complimentary salmon dressing created by Mr. Carter.
Additionally, The Parrain will be offering Mr. Carters’ cuisine inspired by his heritage from Cascadia, Northwest Pacific. The most notable of this cuisine will be, The Parrain Anacortes Seafood Burgers, The Parrain Smoked Salmon Sourdough Bread and The Parrain Whidbey Loganberry Tarts.
Industry and Target Market Analysis
The growth of Food trucks in the United States has been unprecedented in the recent past. Consumers have picked up on the growing trend, and food from the trucks is in demand. Food trucks have advanced over the past hundreds of years to what customers see driving in the cities today. Since the 1960s, food sellers have been found in urban areas offering hot dogs or tacos, and neighborhoods now know the sound of an oncoming ice cream truck (History.com). Advanced Food Trucks as they are seen today, have been changed to incorporate the most recent in kitchen advances, and to take advantage of the convenience offered by mobile trucks. Trendy mobile food trucks are currently seen everywhere throughout the nation with contemporary, delectable foods that are identical to those provided by top restaurants. As this report will exhibit, the New Orleans market is showing a growing demand and customer enthusiasm for foods trucks. Currently, competition is insignificant, and the opportunity for new food trucks is enormous.
The quality of the food truck industry in the last 10 or so years has grown, with the industry emerging as one of the best performing sector in the food and beverages industry. The sector' astounding growth started in 2008; this was the same time that the recession period began. There emerged new vendors who understood that consumer choices were changing in favor of unique and affordable gourmet food. Most brick and mortar restaurants were hit hard by the recession between 2008 and 2009 (Ibisworld.com). However, this served as a boon to the food trucks business as most consumers looked for ways to cut on their spending without compromising quality. According to a research carried out by Emergent Research, the growth in the food truck industry will continue at a high rate and it is expected that revenues from the food trucks will hit the $2.7 billion mark by 2017 (Intuit.com). This is four times more than the revenue recorded of $650 by the National Restaurant Association in 2012.
There are a number of reasons why the truck food industry is experiencing such a phenomenal growth. They key factor is the trends of the modern day consumer. The major ones being: A desire to have a quality, affordable and quickly served meal. Traditionally these qualities were to be found only in fast food or quick serve restaurants but not anymore. A survey by the National Restaurant Association shows that most food trucks are now outperforming the restaurants based on the three attributes. The Parrain Food Truck will take advantage of this trend in its business strategy.
Consumers today are looking for fresh and local food, and most food trucks that offer gourmet meals, have differentiated themselves, with most consumers associating them with cool and local food. The issue of fresh food has come to the fore in the recent past. The number of people that are looking for healthy, fresh and hygienically prepared food has risen significantly because of investigative documentaries such as Food, Inc and books, for example, In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan (Food Inc) This books and documentaries urge people to consume genuine food (Pollan) and have exposed how most big restaurants serve customers with unhygienic food. This exposure and campaign have made most consumers to consider food trucks as an alternative to these filthy restaurants. A different scenario from when the food trucks were called “roach coaches” in the past.
There is also a growing trend for consumers to support local business. The relationship between food truck operators and their customers is personal, and meaningful. In New Orleans neighborhood organizations, consumers, and vendors have come together and formed the New Orleans Food Truck Coalition (Neighborland). The group is advocating opening of more food trucks, and they are supporting food truck owners and other vendors to grow their businesses. The Parrain is poised to take advantage of this goodwill, support, and demand.
Bigger is not always better according to most truck food consumers; more and more consumers are inclined to get a meal from a gourmet food truck. The argument is that food trucks tend to use natural food sources and have best practices, and the Parrain food truck will organize its marketing strategy around this maxim.
The fast-paced nature of today’s world and most consumers are not looking for comfort. All they need is a place where they can grab a meal quickly. A food truck comes in handy for such consumers; it offers instantly accessible, affordable and quality meals. Efficiency will be maximized to ensure that The Parrain Food Truck serves its customers within the shortest time possible.
The growth of food truck business can also be attributed to the exponential growth of the social media and the rising numbers of smart mobile phones users. A parallel can be drawn between the growth of social media and the increasing number of food trucks (Wessel). The Parrain Truck shop will extensively use the social media, to build mutually beneficial relationships with its clients. The Parrain Food Truck presence on both Twitter and Facebook are critical to its marketing strategy. Luckily most target customers use the social media to gather information about the timings, location and meals on offer by food trucks. There is a Facebook page dedicated to the truck food industry in New Orleans where consumers share their experiences. Additionally to posting information on its Facebook page, The Parrain Food Truck will also be using this page extensively.
Use of special discounts offered through the social media will be a key marketing strategy that will be employed by the business to grow both its customer base and its reach on the social media (Caldwell). Other social media platforms to be used include Instagram and Pinterest.
Most cities took the initiative and enacted laws to govern the operation of food trucks and designed special parking slots for the trucks (Martin). The city council of New Orleans had been left behind after realizing that the food truck industry is primary income earner for other cities, they have recently passed regulations to govern the truck food business (Theadvocate.com).
New Orleans is an ideal location for The Parrain Truck food business because the industry is still in its infancy here. Compared to major cities, New Orleans has the lowest number of food trucks, 32, compared with its population of 369,520 (Willett). The median income for New Orleans has grown by +2.13% from last years’ $45,981, (Deptofnumbers.com) this growth is above the national growth. This figures indicate that consumers in New Orleans have a healthy disposable income and therefore demand goods and services is high.
Competition
Because of the nature of the industry that The Parrain food truck will be operating in, competition will be from businesses within the same sector as well as from enterprises in the wider restaurants sector. However, there are no food trucks offering northwest pacific cuisine and only one restaurant does in the New Orleans metropolis. This is a restaurant where Mr. Carter has been the head chef for more than three years and most customers who delight in this cuisine know him by name. Mr. Carter will take advantage of this and ask them to look out for his food truck once the business starts to operate. A survey of the locations where The Parrain wishes to run from regularly, yielded six food trucks that may be considered as competitors. The research on the internet also produced the ten most popular food trucks in New Orleans, which will also be considered as competitors. The six food trucks identified in the physical survey are also in the list of the ten most famous. The food trucks and their signature, according to their popularity are:
Target Market
A survey of 25 truck food consumers was carried out in different zones in the New Orleans are where Truck Foods are permitted. The ages of the respondents varied from 20 to 60 years, both male and female. From the results, it was clearly that most were excited and indicated they will be interested in buying meals, at a food truck offering meals inspired by the Cascadia Cuisine. This was 73% of the group, while 14% indicated they would sample the cuisine as they have never tried it before. 80% indicated they preferred the whole meals to the sandwiches as they are conscious of eating healthy foods. Most workers to be precise 75% reported that they would be buying their meals from The Parrain food truck when it starts operating. 13% reported that they would be buying meals to take home in the evening to share with their families. From the survey, it was clear how the demographics of potential customers would look like
Market Segmentation
The Parrain Truck will be focused on catering for a niche market of healthy eating consumers that is known as Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability - LOHAS (Lohas.com).
The Parrain Truck likewise targets clients that wish to have a healthier eating regimen however they are unable to because of finances and access to healthy foods. The business will also cater to the needs of the working people of New Orleans, who have limited time and will need a place where they can their lunch or dinner conveniently and fast. Another group includes workers who have families and would want to take food home to be shared by the family in the evening.
SWOT Analysis
It is the obligation of The Parrain Truck managers to comprehend and use all its qualities inside the business sector to benefit from the opportunity provided by the New Orleans market. A keen study of the operating environment will ensure that The Parrain Food Truck remains competitive and popular with the consumers. In the meantime, The Parrain Truck should likewise be cognizant that internal shortcomings and threats from outside the business exist. Working proactively and checking the variables in a convenient way will guarantee that difficulties to business operations are solved and surpassed with productivity and viability.
Business Process Model
Business Process Modelling Canvas (Damij)
Operations Plan
Weekly Operations Plan
Financials
The financial plan will be based on the initial amount of $34,000 invested by the owner into the business and a $32,000 loan secured from the bank at an interest rate of 10%. The security offered for the loan is the owner’s estate.
Important Assumptions
Several general assumptions are made in the calculations done herein as shown below
Start-Up Costs
The owner will be providing $34,000 of the startup capital required and the balance of $32,000, will be raised through a bank facility at an interest rate of 10% per annum. The total amount required as start-up capital is $65,906, and the breakdown of the costs shown in table 1.
The sales forecast for The Parrain Food Truck will be as shown in the table below
The initial break-even can estimated as follows
Projected Profit and Loss
Projection for profitability has been adjusted, through non-itemized expenses, to cater for additional expenses that may arise from the running the business, considering that it is a new venture. In case unforeseen expenses arise they will be catered for if they do not, it means that the enterprise will record a higher profit.
Works Cited
Caldwell, Alison. 'Will Tweet For Food. The Impact of Twitter and New York City Food Trucks, Online, Offline, and Inline'. Appetite 56.2 (2011): 522. Web.
Damij, Nadja. 'Business Process Modelling Using Diagrammatic and Tabular Techniques'. Business Process Mgmt Journal 13.1 (2007): 70-90. Web.
Deptofnumbers.com,. 'New Orleans Louisiana Household Income | Department Of Numbers'. N.p., 2014. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
Eaton.com,. 'Hybrid Power'. N.p., 2014. Web. 7 Dec. 2014.
Food Inc. United States: R Kenner, 2008. DVD.
Food Trucks motor Into the Mainstream. 1st ed. Intuit, 2012. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
History.com,. 'From Chuck Wagons To Pushcarts: The History Of The Food Truck ” Hungry History'. N.p., 2014. Web. 7 Dec. 2014.
Ibisworld.com,. 'Food Trucks In the US Market Research | Ibisworld'. N.p., 2014. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
Lohas.com, 'About | LOHAS'. N.p., 2014. Web. 7 Dec. 2014.
Martin, Nina. 'Food Fight! Immigrant Street Vendors, Gourmet Food Trucks and the Differential Valuation of Creative Producers In Chicago'. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 38.5 (2014): 1867-1883. Web.
Neighborland, 'Support Food Trucks in New Orleans'. N.p., 2014. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
Nola.gov, 'Onestop - City Of New Orleans'. N.p., 2014. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
Norman, Wayne, and Chris MacDonald. 'Getting to the Bottom of Triple Bottom Line'. Business Ethics Quarterly 14.2 (2004): 243-262. Web.
Pollan, Michael. Michaelpollan.com. N.p., 2014. Web. 7 Dec. 2014.
Theadvocate.com, 'N.O. City Council Approves New Food-Truck Laws'. N.p., 2013. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
Thrillist,. 'The 10 Best Food Trucks In New Orleans'. N.p., 2013. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
Wessel, Ginette. 'From Place to Non Place: A Case Study of Social Media and Contemporary Food Trucks'. Journal of Urban Design 17.4 (2012): 511-531. Web.
Willett, Megan. 'Step Aside, New York” Orlando Is America's Food Truck Capital'. Business Insider. N.p., 2014. Web. 6 Dec. 2014.
