Benefits and Drivers Paper

Benefits and Drivers Paper MGT/445 Organizational Negotiations March 24, 2013 Kudler Fine Foods is a food company that specializes in selling fresh grocery products with simple ingredients used to make gourmet meals. Nearly everything a customer could want would be found within Kudler Fine Foods. Currently Kudler Fine Foods operates from three locations each offering the same service. The company is a privately held, but seeks to offer stock publicly to increase capital. The increase in revenue will allow Kudler Fine Foods to pursue avenues of innovation that can increase profit margins and spark new growth.

In this paper Team A will be exploring the internal and external driving factors that influence the innovation at Kudler Fine Foods as well as an overview of how these practices benefit the company. This information is important in ensuring that Kudler Fine Foods will be able to meet their organizational objectives. Kudler Fine Foods’ will continue to make it the company’s main priority to provide customer satisfaction with the selection of fresh products. Kudler Fine Food External Drives of Innovation

External innovation is the comparison of a company’s own to a competitor’s product or service. The external drives of innovation within Kudler Fine Foods are frequent shopper program, website, and catering. Kudler Fine Foods has created a program for their customers where they sign up to receive news about the stores events, featured products, and sales (Apollo Group, Inc. , 2011). With competitors they do not provide such access to information for frequent customers they receive preventing customers from knowing critical news the organization makes presenting.

With the Kudler Fine Foods website formatted into a way not only local customers can view, but also customers outside of the counties to view the website. The website has also developed an e-commerce system that will provide the organization with ability to automate all inventories and ordering systems to track sales and order replacements made (Apollo Group, Inc. , 2011). The last external innovation of Kudler Fine Foods from other organizations is catering the organization provides (Apollo Group, Inc. , 2011). The catering aspect has ot been fully constructed into the business organizational structure, so their approach will stand out from other competitors. Their goal is to provide a link to customers on their website that will allow them to view and order specifics requirements for the event needed to be catered. The website will provide every aspect of what meals, desserts, amount needed, specific arrangements or design the customer desires for the event. With other competitors they require customers to come into the store location to make arrangements, whereas Kudler Fine Foods is providing options for the busy individual to make arrangements via Internet.

Internal of Innovations Internal drivers are events that occur inside the business sector; the drivers are the success of any organization. The internal drivers of innovation for Kudler Fine Foods are the experienced, helpful, knowledgeable staff, and how they strive to make their customers experience delightful as well as a pleasing shopping outing. The first internal driver is the experience, and this is about Kudler Fine Foods ensuring they provide customers with a good experience to grow the business.

To grow the business and to make sure, they have a good experience the employees must be helpful and knowledgeable to their customer base. It is important for management and the staff to focus on the internal drivers that will ensure the success of the organization. According to Kudler Fine Foods mission statement, they shop around the world for the finest products. Kudler’s management team goes through extensive lengths to ensure they have the best products for their customers who aspire to purchase the finest epicurean delights. Innovation, Design, and Creative Thinking

There has been several years’ worth of Survey Results from the Sales and Marketing department at Kudler Fine Foods. From 2011 and 2012, invaluable sources of information directly from the customers telling Kudler Fine Foods exactly the types of changes they would want like to see in the company, and it is always important to give the customer exactly what they are asking for. There are some areas that can be confirmed that Kudler is definitely on the right track, such as the high customer approval on the available store hours and the knowledgeable service staff is consistently high on customers surveyed.

Unfortunately, there are other areas where customers are clearly stating that they are unhappy with the price of the merchandise and are not receiving courteous customer service on a consistent basis. Some area surveys will show that customers are satisfied with the decor and product selection at these stores, which are definitely areas of opportunity for improvements to get higher customer satisfaction. Brainstorming with local owners and managers on the survey areas where the ratings are low probably would result in some good ideas or suggestions that could be implemented across the chain.

After reviewing the customer’s survey results, it becomes all the more important to focus on increasing efficiency. This can be a cost reduction on the goods sold at Kudler Fine Foods, which seems to be on the top of the list of complaints by current customers over the last several years. Increasing efficiencies could include minimizing food stored and un-sold at each store, finding ways to keep low shelf-life on products in efforts to decrease cost.

This might have some impact on the available products but could be weighed as to which products sell the most and lease by using some software programs for point of sale purchases and reports. By analyzing the sales and shelf-life of goods at Kudler Fine Foods, it is possible that product price could be dropped if fewer products were wasted by going bad and not being sold in-time at some stores. Innovation is a huge factor in determining Kudler’s success. To be competitive in the market, Kudler has to think outside the box.

What will get people in the doors and what is going to keep them coming back? In today’s society there are so many options and choices that, one bad experience can cause a customer to never return. Innovation is what is going to keep consumers coming back. Being able to market effectively and get people in the doors is the first step. Keeping them coming back is a whole new challenge in itself. Hiring people with creative thinking, innovation, and good marketing skills will help Kudler Fine Foods stay a step ahead of the rest and keep consumers come back for more.

Kudler Fine Foods recognizes the need for innovation and acts upon the creativity of not only their employees but also their customers as well. Kudler ensures that their on-site staff is operational, knowledgeable, and experienced, thereby providing support throughout innovations such as website design improvements, new catering concepts, and frequent shopping programs. Customer feedback through surveys, prove that Kudler is providing services that customers appreciate but also have identified areas that may be improved upon.

Kudler Fine Foods strives to meet their organizational objectives by continually seeking innovations that will expand their customer base and ensuring that they remain a favorite among the current clientele. ? Reference Apollo Group, Inc. (2011). Kudler Fine Foods. Innovation, Design, and Creativity – Overview. Retrieved from, OI/361 – Innovation, Design, and Creativity for a Competitive Advantage course website. ScandinavianMinds. com. (2009). Innovation: Internal & External. Retrieved from http://www. scandinavianminds. com/innovation-internal-external