Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant
Wild Chef Limited (Wild Chef) was a multi-cuisine restaurant operating a take-away and delivery format in Delhi's National Capital Region. It adopted the emerging concept of cloud kitchen in July 2016, considering the promising opportunities offered by the rapidly growing food-technology market in India. Key strategic decisions helped Wild Chef achieve its operational break-even point in its third month, and after one year, the owners were considering options on how to scale-up the business further. The choice of markets to enter, and arriving at the right permutation of scale-up options were the key decision areas under focus. Servjaeta Verma is affiliated with Institute of Management Studies Ghaziabad.
Swot Analysis of "Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant" written by Servjaeta Verma includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Chef Wild facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
increasing commodity prices, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Chef Wild, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Chef Wild 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Chef Wild
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Sales & Marketing field.
4. Making a Sales & Marketing topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Chef Wild
Strengths Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Chef Wild in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Chef Wild is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant case study a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Chef Wild has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive segment. Secondly the value chain collaborators of the firm in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Chef Wild 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 Chef Wild is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Chef Wild
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Chef Wild does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Chef Wild is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Chef Wild has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Chef Wild has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Training and development
– Chef Wild has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Chef Wild to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Chef Wild to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High brand equity
– Chef Wild has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Chef Wild to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– Chef Wild is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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
– Chef Wild is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Chef Wild in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Chef Wild, firm in the HBR case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant HBR case study mentions - Chef Wild takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Sales & Marketing strategy. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Chef Wild is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant, in the dynamic environment Chef Wild has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Chef Wild 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 Chef Wild products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Chef Wild needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Chef Wild has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant, it seems that the employees of Chef Wild 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Chef Wild has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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 Chef Wild 's lucrative customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Chef Wild has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Opportunities Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant | 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Chef Wild can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Chef Wild 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. Chef Wild 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Chef Wild can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Chef Wild is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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. Chef Wild can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Chef Wild 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Chef Wild 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Chef Wild to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Chef Wild can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Chef Wild in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Sales & Marketing segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Chef Wild can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Chef Wild 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 Sales & Marketing segment.
Buying journey improvements
– Chef Wild can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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.
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 Chef Wild in the consumer business. Now Chef Wild can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant are -
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 Chef Wild in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Chef Wild needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Chef Wild in the Sales & Marketing industry. The Sales & Marketing 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.
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 Chef Wild.
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.
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. Chef Wild 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.
Increasing wage structure of Chef Wild
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Chef Wild.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Chef Wild is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Chef Wild 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant, Chef Wild may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Sales & Marketing .
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Chef Wild has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Chef Wild needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Sales & Marketing sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Sales & Marketing field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Chef Wild can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Chef Wild business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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 Wild Chef Limited: Scaling Up a Cloud-Based Restaurant 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 Chef Wild needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.