John Christ is an entrepreneur in his early 20's and the owner of Wil's Grill, a small street food business in Flagstaff, AZ, serving customers throughout Northern Arizona. The critical decision he must make is whether to expand in the street food business, add catering to his existing business, or do something else entirely different to make a livelihood. Wil's Grill was founded in January 2014. $129,000 in revenue had been recognized from January 2014 through December 2016. Wil's Grill was highly portable, and targeted two main markets: 1) college students who were tired of chain-based fast food and wanted good, reasonably priced, late night food, and 2) community events, where organizers and customers wanted reasonably priced, "clean", high quality street food. "Clean" food was characterized by locally produced, organic foods and sustainable practices. In January 2017, John had to decide how he was going to grow revenue if Wil's Grill was to provide him with a livelihood. He was determined to make a strategic decision to either expand his focus on the street food business upon which Wil's Grill was founded, add a catering business, or do something else. The Instructor's Manual offers suggestions for leading a class discussion of these alternatives using both a VRIO (Valuable, Rare, Costly to Imitate and Organized to Capture Value) framework and a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) Analysis framework to evaluate the current resources, capabilities, core competencies, and distinct competitive advantages for this small business. A Venn diagram is used to illustrate the differences between and transferability of resources and capabilities between the street food and catering segments. The Instructor's Manual provides Net Present Value and Breakeven analyses to quantify future revenue growth opportunities. This case provides an opportunity for identifying and defending the "best" strategic decision for this small business.
Swot Analysis of "Wil's Grill" written by Leonard R. Hostetter, Nita L. Paden includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Wil's Grill facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Wil's Grill case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurial management, Marketing and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Wil's Grill casestudy better are - – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, geopolitical disruptions, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Wil's Grill case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Wil's Grill, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Wil's Grill operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Wil's Grill can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Wil's Grill case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Wil's Grill
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Strategy & Execution field.
4. Making a Strategy & Execution topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Wil's Grill
Strengths Wil's Grill | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Wil's Grill in Wil's Grill Harvard Business Review case study are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Wil's Grill has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in, as mentioned in case study Wil's Grill - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Wil's Grill is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Wil's Grill in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– Wil's Grill has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Wil's Grill to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Learning organization
- Wil's Grill is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Wil's Grill is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Wil's Grill Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Training and development
– Wil's Grill has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Wil's Grill Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Wil's Grill in the sector have low bargaining power. Wil's Grill has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Wil's Grill to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Wil's Grill
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Wil's Grill does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Wil's Grill are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Wil's Grill has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Wil's Grill Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Innovation driven organization
– Wil's Grill is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Wil's Grill Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Strong track record of project management
– Wil's Grill is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Weaknesses Wil's Grill | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Wil's Grill are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Wil's Grill is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Strategy & Execution segment. Wil's Grill needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Wil's Grill to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Leonard R. Hostetter, Nita L. Paden suggests that, Wil's Grill is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Wil's Grill has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Wil's Grill 's lucrative customers.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Wil's Grill, it seems that the employees of Wil's Grill don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Wil's Grill is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Wil's Grill can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Wil's Grill that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Wil's Grill can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Wil's Grill is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Wil's Grill, in the dynamic environment Wil's Grill has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Wil's Grill has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Lack of clear differentiation of Wil's Grill products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Wil's Grill needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Wil's Grill, is just above the industry average. Wil's Grill needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Wil's Grill needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Wil's Grill has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - Wil's Grill should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Wil's Grill | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Wil's Grill are -
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Wil's Grill to expand its talent hiring zone. According to McKinsey Global Institute, 20% of the high end workforce in fields such as finance, information technology, can continously work from remote local post Covid-19. This presents a really great opportunity for Wil's Grill to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Buying journey improvements
– Wil's Grill can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Wil's Grill suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Wil's Grill can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Strategy & Execution segment.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Wil's Grill to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Wil's Grill to increase its market reach. Wil's Grill will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Strategy & Execution industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Wil's Grill can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Wil's Grill can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Wil's Grill in the consumer business. Now Wil's Grill can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Wil's Grill can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Wil's Grill operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Strategy & Execution sector.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Wil's Grill can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Wil's Grill has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study Wil's Grill - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Wil's Grill to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Strategy & Execution industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Wil's Grill can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Loyalty marketing
– Wil's Grill has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Wil's Grill to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Threats Wil's Grill External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Wil's Grill are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on Wil's Grill demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Wil's Grill business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Wil's Grill high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Wil's Grill in the Strategy & Execution industry. The Strategy & Execution industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Wil's Grill will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Wil's Grill.
Environmental challenges
– Wil's Grill needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Wil's Grill can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Wil's Grill needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Strategy & Execution industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Wil's Grill, Wil's Grill may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Strategy & Execution .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Wil's Grill with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Strategy & Execution field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Wil's Grill can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Wil's Grill in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Wil's Grill Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Wil's Grill needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Wil's Grill is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Wil's Grill is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Wil's Grill is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Wil's Grill needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
