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Bubba Gump Shrimp Restaurant Is A Seafood Restaurant Marketing Essay

Paper Type: Free Essay Subject: Marketing
Wordcount: 4424 words Published: 1st Jan 2015

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Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Restaurant is a seafood restaurant inspired by Forrest Gump movie that succeed in 1994. In 1996, the first Bubba Gump’s restaurant was opened in Monterey, California. The restaurant grew in size over the years and established a franchise brand under the name of Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. International. The Headquarter of Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. is located in San Clemente, CA, U.S.

The quote that very famous of Bubba Gump is “Life is like a box of chocolates, You never know what you’re gonna get”.

The company named was taken from the movie of two main characters, Bubba Blue and Forrest Gump, who had the desire to go into the shrimp industry. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. captured the charm and the American spirit with home interior design of the movie’s setting in Alabama. The setting of the restaurant is very interactive and unique.

The franchise restaurant is spread over 11 international locations and most of the location is the tourist spot. Bubba Gump is a casual family seafood restaurant known for its iconic locations, interactive service and high quality menu variety.

The menu at Bubba Gump is primarily associated with shrimp dishes, but also offers a variety of other seafood. One of the main focuses of the culinary style is southern and Cajun cuisine, as the main characters in the film came from Alabama. As of 2009, Bubba Gump has 33 outlets, with 22 in U.S, 2 in Mexico, and 9 in Asia which located in Japan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, and China.

The restaurant sells one million pounds of shrimp each year. For the owner of Bubba Gump Shrimp Co is Viacom Consumer Products. The company also own Capi’s Italian Kitchen, Mai Tai Bar and Rusty Pelican.

This restaurant is kind a unique restaurant, because of the service, food and design of the restaurant. The portion of the food is kind a big portion, therefore mostly guest will be sharing.

Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Restaurant, Inc. in Malaysia

1.2.1 Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. in the Curve, Malaysia

Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Restaurant Inc. opened in Malaysia in 19 April 2008 by The Naza Group of Companies, which has a 30 year history of success in the Automobile industry. NZ Diners is a head of the Food and Beverage for The Naza Group. The first outlet in Malaysia opened in The Curve, Mutiara Damansara. Bubba Gump restaurant in The Curve is the 32nd outlet worldwide where SM Nasarudin Tan Sri Dato’ Seri Utama SM Nasimuddin, CEO of NZ Diners Sdn. Bhd.

Same as the others outlet of Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., The Curve has interior design of Forrest Gump movie memorabilia, still-photos, and reproductions of script pages, storyboards and costumes. The ambience of this outlet at The Curve has been designed to give all signatures Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. dining experience.

1.2.2 Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. in Sunway Pyramid, Malaysia

Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. opened on 10th March 2009. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., Sunway Pyramid, Malaysia is the biggest Bubba Gump restaurant in Asia; it is covering 9,000 sq ft. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., Sunway Pyramid branch is the 33rd outlet worldwide.

There are several different rooms available in Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., Sunway Pyramid, Malaysia. For instance are gump house, elvis room and main dining. Gump House is the duplicate of Forrest Gump house. 6 tables are available in Gump house which the interior design of Gump house is all about Forrest, Jenny, and his Mother.

Second is elvis room. Elvis room is a memorial of Forrest Gump of Elvis Presley. In the movie, Elvis Presley ever been to Forrest’s house and they ever play, dance and sing together. Furthermore, elvis room has 13 tables and 1 side station called Elvis’s station. Elvis room is available for any party from 20-50 persons.

Third is main dining is the main area of the restaurant. The design is all about Forrest’s Gump story. There are two side stations provided in main dining area which are seaside station and gump station. Coffee maker and hot filter are available in Gump station and elvis station if is opened.

If guest are interesting in doing event in Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., Sunway Pyramid, the guests are required to book in advance. For the birthday party, they will provide Bubba Gump birthday cake and asked the staff to sing Bubba Gump birthday song. The birthday person has to stand on the chair. This is one of the Bubba Gump rules.

1.2.2.1 Rules of Service in Bubba Gump Shrimp Co.

These Rules have to follow by all the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co.

Based on the observation of the restaurant, Bubba Gump has a unique service, which always says “Hi, How Are You?” .This is a concept of Bubba Gump. Bubba Gump has 10 rules that everyone have to follow, by Front of the house and Back of the house.

The 10 rules called top ten, which are:

All actions will display overwhelming care and concern for both the guest and each other.

Be part of the team – look your best!

Attend and participate in the 5 minutes meeting. It’s Showtime!

Smile and say “Hi, how are you?” To every guest.

Greet the guests fast and help them find stuff they will love.

Engage our guests…make them feel at home.

Impress the guest with your knowledge.

Do the right thing even no one is watching and be proud of your effort!

Care about everyone’s safety and health and ensure proper sanitation at all times.

Talk to your manager – before, during, and after your shift.

Because of Bubba Gump is based on the “Forest Gump” movie, Therefore, everyone have to watch Forest Gump’s movie before they start to work. Based on the observation, people who start joining this restaurant have to be trained before serving individually. Means, everyone that come for working either a part timer or full timer have to be trained before they serve the table. Manager will discuss and ask the question in the end of the shift on that day.

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First day training, trainee will be in the stage one that called “the basic” which include pre-shift, safety, knowledge, conceptual, table maintenance, and post sift. Second stage is called “expo”, in this stage trainee will learn about pre-shift, front desk (1 hour), market (1 hour), expo (2 hours), Bar expo (2 hours) and post shift. Third stage called “sales”, trainee will learn about pre-shift, knowledge, experience, engaging, and post shift. Mostly, sales stage is focus on recommendation for customer. Forth stage is “solo”, solo is the day that the trainee will be independent and will have a table but still using the trainer’s card. After the stage of Solo, the trainee has to do the written test and oral test by manager. If the trainee passed the test, the manager will give the card under the trainee name.

For the information, tips that the customer give is belong to the server. Uniqueness of the restaurant is number of the table all started with 1, so there is no number 0, for the examples table number 11, 21, 31, etc. In Bubba Gump culture, there is no cashier. The cashier is the server in-charge of the table; therefore every server needs small notes for changes. Every staff has to wear a proper uniform. Based on the observation, normally server has minimal 2 tables and maximum of 3 tables. Servers have to refer to host for the floor plan, which is a plan of the section of table in the restaurant.

Bubba Gump has its own culture especially in greeting the guest. There is a license plates on every table in the restaurant. The license plates consist of 2 plates which are Run Forest Run and Stop Forest Stop. The purpose of these license plates is t convenience the guest to call the server when they need assistance. This is one of the interesting parts of Bubba Gump, the uniqueness of services. Guest just needs to flip the license plate to get the attention of server.

All the sauces, vinegar, Tabasco, and wet tissue are available in bucket on the table as well as small plate. This table designed for the convenience of guest and server. Each table has to have 3 colors of plates, which are red, blue, and white. There have 3 colors of plates is because this is a culture of Bubba Bump.

Steps of greeting table

Smile and say “Hi, how are you?” and perform the coaster shuffle

Ask whether the guest is first timer or they had dine in before at Bubba Gump

If yes, do explain about license plate and ping pong paddle. If no, ask the guest, Do they still remember how the license plate work

Ask them do they want a food recommendation? If yes, give a food recommendation and explain about the menu.

Give the Guest some time to have a look at the menu.

Taking order

Key in the order

Play trivia

Send the drink and food

2 minutes check back, ask about the food.

Always do pre-bus. Pre-bus means clear the empty plates, ask them is it possible to clear the plate?

Give the bill.

Clear the table

Set back the table

Get ready for revenue

Trivia is a quiz about Forest Gump’s movie. In Bubba Gump, the part-timer (server) can be a trainer if the manager saw the ability of the staff. Servers are able to move to Bar if they really have an interest in bar. In this case, before they went to bar, the manager will test the knowledge of the server. .

Introduction of Service Quality

2.1 Definition of Service Quality

Service is the performance of work or duties of a staff. Quality is an ability of a product of service to meet a customer’s expectations of the product or service. From this statement can be concluded as service quality is a level and process of performance during and after to satisfy the customer expectation which do not add value for customer. The service quality is based on the responsiveness and availability of the staff.

According to Abdullah, Rozario (2009), Service quality is an attitude or global judgment about the superiority of a service that achieve a quality service that exceeds customers’ expectation. Service quality also determines a customer’s satisfaction. Service quality is influenced by expectation, process quality and output quality. Service of the restaurant is try to improve and provide quality service to meet satisfy the customer. Zeithaml (1988) views quality can be defined as superiority or excellence.

2.2 GAP of the Service Quality

Figure 1: Conceptual Model of Service quality

This Gap analysis of services quality was found by Zeithaml, Berry, Parasuraman (1988). This gap analysis of service quality explained about customer and marketer which is restaurant. This Gap analysis is known as SERVQUAL Model.

Gap1: Difference between customer expectations and management perceptions of consumer expectations.

Gap2: Difference between management perceptions of consumer expectations and service quality specifications.

Gap3: Difference between service quality specifications and the service actually delivered.

Gap 4: Difference between service delivery and what is communicated about the service to consumers.

Gap 5 : Difference between consumer expectation and perception. This depends on the size and direction of the four gaps associated with the delivery of service quality on the marketer’s side.

Mostly, people who going to restaurant is expected the service and food. In this case, people come to restaurant has many reasons. Based on Zeithaml, Berry, & Parasuraman (1988), customer come is because of inside their personal needs, past experience and some is because mouth communications.

They need an expected services form the restaurant. In the other hand, the marketer (restaurant) should learn how to do deliver the expected service to customer, by learning employee and customer behavior.

Gap 1: Difference between Consumer Expectations and Management Perceptions of Consumer Expectation

Theoretical Constructs

Specific variables

Marketing research orientation

Degree to which marketing research focuses on service quality issues

Extent of direct interaction between managers and customers

Upward communication

Extent of employee-to-manager communication

Quality of contact between top managers and contact personnel

Table 1: Service quality management Gap 1

In Gap 1, there are few clearly defined and fact cues for services; the gap between what consumers expect and what managers think they expect may be considerably larger than it is in firms that produce actual goods (Zeithaml, Berry, and Parasuraman 1988). An operation orientation diverts focus from consumers and reduces effort to understand their needs and expectation.

The factor that influenced the degree to which marketing research focuses on service quality issues is an extent which top manager can interact with the customers (Zeithaml, Berry, Parasuraman 1988). In Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. the manager have done do a greeting to a guest and ask about the perception of the food, and restaurant.

top manager’s understanding of the consumer may depend largely on the extent and types of communication received from customer-contact personnel and from non company personnel. The important of the upward communication is its quality or effectiveness; for instance, face to face communication and written report.

Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Collected business card from customer who willing to put it into bucket to do a lucky draw for each month and the winner will get a present. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. was communicating with customer by doing a lucky draw. Face to face communication can be done by greeting the customer at their table and have some small talk.

Most of the factors were involved communication and control processes that implemented in organization to manage employees. Communication is important for every company to be success. Without communication, people would not be able to interact with others.

From the researcher observation, in Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. in Sunway pyramid all the managers are friendly. This is because each manager has a basic of Top ten number 10, which is talk to your manager-before, during, after your shift. From this basic of top ten, it made a family background of Bubba Gump.

The purpose of this Gap is to identify a reasonably to complete set of factors potentially affecting the important situation and direction of the four gap on the marketer’s side.

Gap 2: Management Perception- Service Quality Specification Gap

Theoretical Constructs

Specific Variable

Goal Setting

Existence of a formal process for setting quality of service goal

Perception of feasibility

Capabilities / system for meeting specifications

Table 2: Service Quality Management Gap 2

Goal setting, Based on the research of Zeithaml, Berry, Parasuraman (1988) service is performance, goal for service delivery are usually measured the performance.

According to Ivancevich and McMahon (1982) goal setting is not only improve in both organizational performance and individual achievement, but it will increases overall control of the organization. Goal setting is a speed of answering the phone call, handling complaints, bills was correct.

All restaurants have their own goal to achieve the quality of service. Same goes to Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. which set a standard quality to achieve the goal. For instance, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. had trained the staff before they serve the guest. This is the way Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. doing to achieve the service goal.

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Perception of feasibility, time required to provide a service is cannot forecast. For the example is delivery food, when the restaurant do have a full house, the food delivery is going to slow. It was because all the order keep coming in and amount of kitchen’s staffs are still the same. To get the customer’s attention back, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. create a trivia services, which is asking some question about the Forrest Gump movie and some bar trick.

Gap 3: Service Quality Specification- Service Delivery Gap

Theoretical Constructs

Specific Variable

Teamwork

Extent to which employees view other employee as customers.

Table 3: Service Quality Management Gap 3

Teamwork, value of team work is employees and managers pulling together for a goal (Zeithaml, Berry,; Parasuraman 1988). According to Lawler and Cammann (1972), high performance of group is to accomplish the goals, people will allowing the group to participate in decision making.

In Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. all the staff do have a team work, it proved by the top ten number 2 “Be part of your team, look your best!”. For the example of this Top ten number 2 are first is uniform, uniform is a big frame of the restaurant. This has means togetherness. Second is “Flat tire”. It is because when the person drops something, they would not be able to move until another person has come to help.

Gap 4: Difference Between Service Delivery and External Communications

Theoretical Constructs

Specific Variable

Horizontal Communication

Extent to which contact personnel are aware of external communication to customer before they occur

Table 4: Service Quality Management Gap 4

Horizontal communication, horizontal communication is the side information flows that occur both within and between departments of an organization (Draft and Steers 1985).The purpose of horizontal communication is to coordinate people and departments so that the overall goals of the organization are achieved.

An important aspect of horizontal communication is the coordination or integration of departments in an organization to achieve strategic objectives (Anderson 1984).

All the company has horizontal information which not all people can in. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. and NZ Diner had horizontal information which other people not be able to access.

2.3 Flower of Service

Figure 2: Flower of Service Model

The Flower of service has been found by Christopher Lovelock & Jochen wirtz (2004)

The flower of service had divide by 2 which are: Facilitating element and Enhancing elements.

For the Facilitating elements are:

Information

Order-taking

Billing

Payment

For the Enhancing elements are:

Consultation

Hospitality

Safekeeping

Exceptions

The explanation about the facilitating elements and enhancing elements

Information

Customers are requiring information about how to obtain and use a product or services. The information could be service and information about the food and beverages. Restaurant information should be given by the employee to guest without any miscommunication. The information should match the actual of food and services.

Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. in Malaysia is a “halal” restaurant, but in the menu there is some beverages that contain an alcohol, therefore in the recommendation of the food and beverages there should be explained which beverages is “halal” and “non-halal”.

Order taking

Since the staff has information about the entire menu of food and beverage, meaning they are ready for taking order. This information is to help the server to give information, while the guest asked.

Bubba Gump culture is if the guest has ready for orders just turn back the license plate, which is “Stop Forrest Stop” to order the food or beverages. After all order taking has done, the server will repeat the order to double confirm the order.

Billing

The price should be clearly stated to the guest before the guest having the meal. After all the meal and drinks been served, the final bill should state clearly all the cost. This is for double conform to all they had ordered.

Payment

Should give the guest time to verify the cost of the meal they had ordered before doing the payment. The payment should be fast, to make a guest feel satisfied with the service.

There is no cashier in Bubba Gump. Therefore, all the payment is done by the server who taking care the table. In this case, the server must have small notes for the changes. This is for the convenience of both guest and server.

Consultation

In Services consultation can be described by the recommendation of food given by the server to the guest. This is to prevent the allergic and prohibition food (“halal”). This consultation can be related with staff behavior which is employee and manager.

In Bubba Gump, it is possible to ask the server to get information about the ingredients of food, if some of the guests had allergic to some foods. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. is specializing in Shrimp. This consultation can be included in top ten numbers 5 which is greet the guest fast and help them find stuff they will love.

Hospitality

Restaurant is part of hospitality industry; therefore, service is another main product after food and beverage. Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. always make customer feel Bubba Gump is like their home (top ten numbers 6 which is Engage our guest…make them feel at home)

Caretaking

Guest needs a safety, in restaurant the staffs should treat guests like treating themselves. Always make sure all the surrounding is great and in proper condition. Meaning there is no fighting with each other. Caretaking can be concern in top ten no 1 which is display overwhelming care and concern for both guest and each other.

Definition of Customer Expectation

According to Thomsett Expectation (1997), Expectation can be translated as requirements which the definition is an information system issue, a mediator between the business need the customer has and the product requested to meet that need. This is the most related question in customer expectation, for the examples; “What” is for functional requirement, “How” is for quality requirements, “When” is for constraints, and “Why” is for added value requirements (Killoran John 2001). Sometimes when guest feel that their expectation of service are fulfilled, they will feel satisfied and happy.

Definition of customer satisfaction

Based on the Business dictionary, customer satisfaction is a goods or services of a firm as measured by the number of repeat customer. Customer satisfaction also based on the customer’s experience of both contact with the firm and personal outcomes (Center for the study of social policy, 2007). The customer satisfaction is very important to the service quality; because the service quality is measure by how high the customer satisfaction in each guest.

The model of customer satisfaction is Transaction-specific-model by Teas (1993) and expanded by Parasuraman, Zeithaml, Berry (1994). This model explains that the owner of the restaurant (manager) should focus the customer satisfaction on three major elements, which are service quality (responsiveness), price and food quality (reliability).

Based on Wall and Berry (2007), Guest is used to judge a restaurant by dinning in, so there are types of clues to judge. Which are:

For the Functional is the technical quality of the food and service

Mechanic is the ambience and the other design and technical elements

Humanic is the performance, behavior, and appearance of the employee.

To deliver a consistent service in restaurant, manager should organize the important situation. For customer perceptions of mechanic clues are positively related to their expectations of the service, while humanic clues dominate the influence of mechanic clues. (Wall and Berry 2007).

Definition of Employee service performance

In general, Employee service performance refers to behaviors that are relevant to organizational goals and under the control of individual employees (Campbell, McCloy, Oppler, & Sager 1993). In service settings, customers have become an important factor in how employee performance is defined (Bowan & Waldman 1999). According to Bowen and Schneider (1988), there are three defining characteristics of service-intangibility, simultaneous production and consumption, and customer “coproduction”-all of which imply that “the consumer experience is important, if not more than important than the consumer good”.

The quality of the interaction between employee and customer is critical in determining customer satisfaction. Therefore, the behavior of the employee plays an important role in shaping the customer’s perception of service quality (Liao and Chuang 2004). According to Kozlowski & Klein (2000) said that individual level of analysis is divided into 2 which are Macro is the store-level-only approach ignores meaningful individual differences, while Micro is the individual-level-only approach neglects contextual factors that can significantly influence and constrain individual behavior. Group can be factors that affect the employee performance of service. For instance is behavior of the employee.

According to Liao and Chuang (2004), Individual differences factor have been identified as important correlates of service performance. This factor would influence on employee services. There are 2 factor influence on employee service performance, which are direct and moderating effect.

Bowen & Waldman, (1999) view standard performance is explicitly on customer expectations encourages employees’ engagement in behavior that are particularly functional in achieving desirable customer outcomes. Employee performance was defined employees’ service performance as their behaviors of serving and helping customers (Liao, and Chuang 2004)

 

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