Kristen\'s Cookie Company Will Be

KRISTEN'S COOKIE COMPANY will be a small business conducted from the campus flat and run by two roommates. Its aim will be to sell fresh and delicious cookies to students. Two particular features are worth mentioning as they will give the operations a net competitive advantage over other competitors. First of all, all cookies will be fresh just out of the oven. This is possible due to the ordering system implemented that ensures that no cookie will be baked until an exact and clear order is made for it. This strategy is beneficial for both seller and customer as the first is sure he will not be left with unsold merchandize that will generate loses, and the second is sure that the product purchased is fresh. Then, the second advantage Kristen's Cookie Company holds over the competition is the fact that they personalize the order. In other words, when placing the order for the cookie, the client will be presented with a wide variety of ingredients and flavours to choose from. This possibility once again has a dual character as it ensures the customer that the cookie will be baked according to specific demands (it will be extremely appealing to students that have allergies to several ingredients, such as cocoa or nuts). The baker is also ensured that by baking the cookie in conformity with the demands, his product will be sold and he will not register financial loses.

The average time for an order to be picked up will be of approximately one hour, but each client will be told when to pick up his cookie when the order is placed and confirmed. For instance, in a slow evening with no more than 3 or 4 orders, the customers could pick up their cookie in about 45 minutes; in a crowded evening, when the bakers have to deal with 7 or 8 orders, the cookie would be picked up in one hour and 20 minutes. However more orders imply reduced time, this is quite impossible to achieve in the given conditions and with the possessed technological appliances; foremost, the two associates do not wish to compromise on the quality of the cookies.

The two roommates possess one food processor for the mixing of the ingredients (three dozen cookies at one time), spoons, treys and an oven which bakes a dozen cookies at a time. The bills are paid by the building administrator and so the business owners do not have to include these costs. The baking process commences with the preparing of the ingredients, the washing of the processors, the mixing of the ingredients, to continue with the placing of the cookies onto a trey and into the oven, baking them and finally removing and culminates with the placing of the cookies onto a box. The process and the adherent times are presented in the flow chart below:

Wash Processor and Place Ingredients (6 minutes) -> Form Cookies in Treys (3 minutes) -> Place Trey in the Oven and Set the Timer (1 minute) -> Bake Cookies (9 minutes) -> Take Cookies out and Let them Cool (7 minutes) -> Pack the Cookies (2 minutes) -> Accept the Payment (1 minute)

This totals to seven steps to be taken in an approximate time of 29 minutes. Considering that the two roommates work a total of 4 hours every night, it means that they could process up to eight orders a night.

Another aspect that must be taken into consideration is the order processing. In this particular instance, taking and confirming the order also takes a certain amount of time and another important feature is the actual steps taken in doing so. As such, the orders will be sent online via email and the bakers will confirm with a reply. The actions should not take as much as to interfere with the previous calculi, but it is important to have a system that announces the bakers when a new order is placed. In other words, they cannot constantly pay attention to the computer display and see if they have a new mail or not. Therefore, they would have a system that rings or makes a particular noise whenever email is received.

In terms of financial data, the company already possess the machineries needed in the processing process. Other viable information reveal that for baking one dozen of cookies, the roommates will have to spend $0.60 for ingredients and $0.10 per box, totalling to a sum of $5.6 for one night of eight orders. The time spent must also be valued and it would be estimated at $0.70 per dozen cookies. Also considering that the cookie business has to register profits, they will implement a mark-up of 60%. The final retail price of one box of cookies will be of $2.24. During a night with eight orders, the small business will make sales revenues of $17.92 with a profit of $12.32, 6.16 for each of the two roommates.