Food And Beverage Management: Key Concepts And Operational Controls Essay.

1. Demonstrate practical application of food and beverage management concepts to 'real-life' food and beverage operations
2. Examine key management and operational controls and procedures used in food and beverage establishments and critically evaluate their impact on business sustainability
3. Discuss the liabilities and consequences that a food and beverage organisation may sustain if not compliant with contemporary legal and safety issues
4. Identify current trends in the food and beverage industry and discuss their potential impact on the long-term viability of a food and beverage enterprise.

Critical evaluation of the inventory cycle products of catering service

The importance of Food and Beverage has been found in the competitive food market.  The producer always thrives on performing better than his or her competitors. The company has to work on complying with regulations of the government, new trends of health and the growing demand for the delivering fresh food and products. The organisation that has been efficiently conducting its activities finds higher margins of sales, satisfactions of the employees and the cost is reduced (Wilson, 2012).  The customers’ satisfaction remains a constant challenge for the company and it meets it offering fresh products. This assignment presents a report to the General Manager of the Gold Coast Convention Centre related to the purchasing, receiving, storage & production activities so that the company will mitigate the comments of the customers to for the improvement of the catering services.

Catering is a type of business of supplying foods & beverage services to the customers at a remote location.  It is considered as the part of the F& B industry.

The objectives of the F& B organisation are to offer high-quality food & beverages. It aims to offer the food in the highly friendly & good environment. The focus is also given to offer professional, hygienic & attractive services. The focus is also on imparting value for money & to retain the existing customers & to attract new customers to the organisation.

The Gold Coast Convention Centre offers catering services for the different events & conference held at the facility. The company finds an annual operation of $800,000 in the initial year. It accounted a 70% of food & a 30% of the sales of the beverage. The financial projection of the company showed a financial success, but on the other hand, the General Manager of the organisation received negative feedback from the customers those who participated in the different events & conferences.  The customers complained about three different issues (Pike & Page, 2014). They are:

1. The customers received the different delivery of the catering service from the kitchen against the order they made.
2. The quality of the food was inconsistent and it varies.
3. The participants became ill after they consumed food at one event and they refused that they would not participate again.

All these incidents show that there was a great need of taking care of the purchasing, receiving, storage & production of the food and food materials in order to mitigate the customers’ need & to improve the performance of the catering service.  The activities related to the management of the food and beverage have not been taken care by the new Food & Beverage manager of the organisation (Geva, 2013).  The manager had little knowledge on the management of the food and beverage. The manager had no idea about the margins of the sales revenue although he knows how to make up the sales revenue.  He felt that there is no need of introducing any system for the controlling of stock or purchases and just believed on the employees (Mc Cartan, Distribution Challenges: Perspective From Hotels, 2017). At the end, it was found that the organisation found negative feedback from the customers.

  There are two types of the inventory system. In the physical inventory system, the manager has the responsibilities of counting the numbers and records the amounts for each and every product that is available in the inventory.  The manager also determines the costs of the products similarly (Kotler, Armstrong, Brown, & Adams, 2008). The physical inventory system has one advantage is that it is based on the accuracy.

Analysis of the key issues and problems

In the perpetual inventory, the counting of the items is made continuously. The manager makes a count of the amount of the products at hand.  After that, all the purchased units are added and issues units are subtracted. In this process, manage is able to know the quantity available in the inventory (Jane, 2013).

The purchasing department of the F&B services takes care of the purchasing, storing,  and also takes care of the issuing the raw materials. The following are the activities conducted by the F & B Company.

The manager remains responsible for the procurement of the products. The manager studies the market and selects the suppliers, wholesalers and also verifies the current price in the market. The liaisoning with the suppliers are made and the goods are procured at the very fair price. The procedures are also made in the process of the procurements (Lyus, Rogers, & Sims, 2011).

 The concern of the manager is to buy the correct products so that the ability of the operation will be correct to serve the target customers. Buying too much will impact the cash flow and more storage space is required. There is also a chance of risks of the quality deterioration. The too little buying also creates problem and shortage of the products disappoint the customers (Characteristics of the Hospitality Industry | Winhotel, 2013).

The suppliers deliver the products to the organisation. The receiver checks the products and sees whether the quality & quantity have been maintained properly or not. The delivery made by the suppliers’ personnel is dealt by the receiver and he or she signs on the receipts of the supplied items (David & Cheng, 2013).

The manager receives quality products that are delivered in the amount and quality as per the purchase order.  The price of the products that is delivered should be verified.  In the case study organisation, the manager has to ensure the quality of the products received in order to avoid wrong feedback of the customers (Bhasin, 2016).

 The stores of the materials are done by the store executive and he or she issues it to the concerned departments.  The stock database is maintained. The new & old materials kept in the stock are also maintained.  The stock till date is maintained.

The purpose of the storage is to ensure that the security & quality of the products stored till they are issued.  The storage area should have adequate temperature facility so that quality will be maintained (Davidson, 2008) .

The purpose of the issuing effective materials is to ensure that the products removed from the store generate the amount of revenue that is expected.  The issue requisition ensures that products are sent to the service area. The requisition documentation is important in order to calculate the cost of the daily beverage (Ody, 2009).

The turnover rates of inventory measure the frequency with which order and selling of the beverages are shown.  The manager calculates & monitors the changes in the turnover rate in order to calculate a number of profits the company will make. This is very important for the manager of the F & B Company.

Inventory cycle procedures

In this phase, the food is prepared and fresh beverages are made. The cooks of the organisation prepare different foods. The food is presented with much décor and in an attractive manner.

It is always important for the Food & Beverage depart of the organisation to maintain the standard of F& B. The guests always like quality food & beverage and along with that, they require quality service.  The guests prefer to come again only when they get the best services. The word of mouth of the customers becomes very important for the organisation. The customers speak high about the organisation if they get appropriate service (Service Characteristics of Hospitality and Tourism Marketing, 2014).

 Serving the hygienic, safe, clean & fresh food are the most important responsibilities for the management of the F& B industries. The customers express their major concern when they do not get healthy food.  The consumers of the food question on the healthy and fresh food.

In order to ensure safety food, the organisation requires making hazard analysis. The purpose is to make an analysis of the physical, chemical & bacterial hazards to the food.  The company requires following the guidelines & principles on the production of healthy & safe food. Thus it is very important to adhere the safety & quality of the production of the food (Four Factors That Distinguish Services Marketing - MarketingProfs, 2017).

Every event requires appropriate management. The managers of the organisation make a plan before they organise the events.  The manager requires knowing what kind of event is going to be conducted.  This must be cleared that whether the event is a meeting or conference etc.  The requirements of the events have to be organised.  Then the most important thing is that how the décor has been done.  The décor attracts many people those who join the events.  The menu is also very important for the organisation.  The food menu must be hygienic, and it should be in line with the event and the food should meet the standards of the service establishment of the F & B.

The servicing equipment also plays an important role. The requirements of the guests and serving style are required to be maintained.

The food is required to be served at the right time with right temperature.  The entire display should be very neat and clean, attractive. The company should ensure that food is properly stored and managed. The area of banquet and cleaning of the buffet should be done properly. The plates, cutlery, glassware etc should be properly cleaned.

The manager takes all the decision related to the functioning of F & B establishment.  The managers access the data, reports and they learn about the trend in the market. The manager does the financial analysis in three different ways. The expectation of the budget is made and it is prepared based on the input of the manager. The current & future market trends are taken into consideration for the forecast of the expenses.

The responsibility of the manager is to make an analysis of the current situation. The fixed costs and variable costs are taken together for studies.  The profit and loss of the company are analysed after this. In the case study organisation, this has been found that the manager has not made any analysis of the current financial position. The financial statement of the company shows in details the sales and costs of both food and beverage.  Although the expectation of the company for the turnover of $ 800,000 has been made, the company did not achieve in its operation. The costs of food sales could have been lowered and more attention was required to be given to minimise the costs.

Purchasing process

The most important responsibility of the manager of Gold Coast Convention Centre was to remain alert for the quality of the food. There are some ways the manager can avoid the negative feedback of the customers.  The possible areas of taking care were:

1.  The manager requires making the evaluation of the ongoing product analysis checklist.  The manager can focus on aroma & taste of the ready dish, appearance, quantity, serving portion & presentation. This could have helped the manager to avoid any unpleasant situation and the customers could have served the better dish with elegant taste.
2. The manager requires seeing that the food has been served in a safety environment. The safety during the time of the consumption of the product is very important.  The customers have complained that the delegates of the conference got ill after they had their food here. Thus the manager requires finding out the cause of the situation.
3. The complaint regarding the delivery of different products on actual order is also a very server complaint made by the customers.  The manager requires taking much attention to finding out and he should also make a review of product deviation. The product deviation includes date, the name of the product, issues, solutions and the recommendation (Gronroos, A service quality model and its markeing implications, 2007).

Food and beverage industry requires focusing on providing quality food and healthy food to the customers. The priority must be given on hygiene and healthful diets. The environment must be healthy and out of risks. The food and beverage industry should promote food that will support the customers.  Sustained, multisectoral & integrated efforts are required for achievement of healthy diets. This includes industry leadership & the initiative. The providers of the services require meeting the expectation of the customers. The success of the Food and Beverage industry depends on the efforts of the manager of F&B in managing the purchasing, receiving, storage & production related activities.

The manager of the Gold Convention Centre requires focusing on the following things in order to avoid the negative feedback of the customers in the future.

The manager requires in identifying the problem. The manager should see whether it is related to menu problem, taste, price, serving a quantity of any issue related to the quality. All these problems have been found in the case study and the manager did not make any step for the resolution of the problems (Cristina, 2007).

The manager requires identifying the reasons for the customers’ dissatisfaction.  The reasons identification will help the manager to take necessary steps to sort out the problems.  In the case study, this has been found that the quantity of the food, exact order food and the wrong food and even the quality of the food have not been judged.  The manager requires identifying the causes and working on it (Chapter 2: Service Characteristics of Hospitality and Tourism Marketing, 2017)

The most of the feedback given by the customers are related to the quality issue. The food preparation and inventory management have to be taken care by the manager sincerely. The best solution to the problems should be taken care so that the management will not make any delay in resolving the issues related to the customers of the company (catalogue.pearsoned.ca, 2017).  

Conclusion

 The manager of Food & Beverages of the catering services requires being alert to satisfy the needs of the customers. The perceptions and expectations of the customers are required to be taken care by the manager. Thus it is important for the management of the organisation to sensitise the manager to work as per the policy so that the catering centre will cater the needs of the customers.

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