Theoretical concepts relevant to the issues of Eagle Boys Pizza
The present business report tries to link theoretical elements of entrepreneurship related to varied business issues and policies, as it helps to meet future challenges in a competitive business environment. The case study of Eagle Boys Pizza, Australia has been chosen in the present context. A varied range of entrepreneurial skills and qualities are also shown in this report. Based on the success and failure parameters, the report provides a few strategic recommendations to improve the business sustainability along with the identified challenges and threats.
At the foundation of the business, Tom Potter started with a limited amount of capital. Due to the lack of capital base, Tom Potter had to secure his mother Barbara, as a partner in the start-up business venture. On top of that, the expertise was in the domain of bakery, which was another constraint while forming the whole set up for Pizza production (Ibrahim & Mas’ud, 2016).
After the inauguration of Eagle Boys Pizza, the entrepreneur conducted unique market research to open new pizza stores across Australia and meeting consumer demand in varied regions. In this context, Kautonen et al (2013) stated that extensive market research of Tom Potter helped to identify business opportunities in different locations and provided a pathway to get involved in the innovation process. A highly competitive market and lack of adequate expertise were the main issues faced by the company.
In order to enjoy high brand recognition and loyalty, the company conducted extensive market research and advertising campaigns. However, Langlois (2007) stated that maintaining a higher brand exposure was another challenge for the company. In order to increase the brand awareness, the company changed the telephone number to get more customer attention towards. In addition, in the highly competitive business market, continuous exercise on branding and marketing were also found a significant challenge to the company.
The power of the competitor was very high in the selected industry. On top of that, the scope of losing the brand uniqueness was also significantly higher (Sicoli, 2018). Thus, in order to protect the brand identity, the company created an intellectual property (IP) strategy. However, Park & Kim (2017) stated that premature public disclosure derailed the success of a franchise business, which destroyed the brand reputation of many leading Australian fast food brands. Considering the challenge, the brand had to work on educating the employees and franchisees so that the IP values do not get compromised.
Since the simple franchising model was the key success factor behind the business expansion, the company faced issues in managing all busy stores in terms of meeting optimum service quality. At the same time, due to the lesser return on investment from the franchising model, the company faced issues to build new stores (Stokvik et al 2017). However, Wiktor (2014) mentioned that the enormous R&D had enabled the company to understand the growth challenges through franchising business and the company managed to retain its growth.
All the above mentioned issues and challenges can be interlinked with the basic theory of “Entrepreneurial Actions”, which states that knowledge procession and risk & uncertainty are the key success factors of new value creation. The overall R&D and innovation along with the market analysis conducted by the firm led to the key success and significant business growth.
The knowledge, qualities, and skills necessary for successful entrepreneurship
However, the company did some different actions, which was ‘avoiding the risk and uncertainty’, through enormous effort and mathematical calculation. It has helped the firm ensuring a nominal risk zone against the existing market competition. It was found completely different approach during the operation of Eagle Boys Pizza (Uygur & Kim, 2017).
On top of that the prime element of entrepreneurial action ‘Knowledge process’ was missing in this area, as the owner had a different working background. This approach also found completely distinct from the conventional theory of Entrepreneurial Actions.
From the case study, identified knowledge, qualities and skills that drove the business success of Eagle Boys Pizza, are as follows:
- Ability to assess customer insight
- Business research to assess potential customers
- Learning from the interaction
- Intellectual property management
- Open-mindedness to continuously bring change
- Action driven behaviour
- Confidence
- Optimism
- Self-disciplined
- Creativity and competitiveness
- Bakery production efficacy
- Optimum productivity
- Ability to identify the strength, weakness, opportunity and threat
- Future insight
Contribution of skills and knowledge to the business success or failure:
The use of powerful franchising model is the key factor for Eagle Boys to attain a huge business success in the operating area. It was known to the management of Eagle Boys that it is a challenging factor to control and maintain the several stores operating across the country (www.franchisebusiness.com.au, 2018). Thus, a lucrative franchise system with trained people is required to execute the business process. As per the given case, the management of the chosen firm thus developed a cost-effective franchise model which has helped to execute the store operations more effectively. Supporting the prior statement, Chavan & Agrawal (2002) mentioned that in order to enhance the skills and knowledge of the staff, a franchise training system has been developed along with an assistance program, to train the selected team. A day-to-day guidance process has increased the employee’s skill, knowledge and expertise level to extend the operational aptitude of Eagle Boys ((Blewitt, 2012). In addition, Berkhout et al. (2011) asserted that a consistent observing approach by the franchise business managers has also helped the firm to improve its employee effectiveness, sales and overall profitability. Moreover, strong marketing policy, dynamic product offerings and promotional skill have increased its buying power support in the dependable market of Australia.
From the very beginning the founder of Eagle Boys, Mr. Potter has understood the worth of Intellectual Property (IP) and securing IP rights (IPRs). The innovative designed used for pizza delivering has helped the firm to grab the attention of the target mass (Eftekhari & Bogers, 2015). Supporting the current context McGrath & O’Toole (2016) cited that a unique two-tiered pizza box design was the patent application of its brand innovativeness. On the other hand, the logo and slogan of the firm like ‘Eagle Boys Ready When You Are’ and ‘Eagle Boys Bigger. Better.’ has enhanced its marketing campaign to get success from the business (www.franchisebusiness.com.au, 2018). Adding to this, Burgelman & Hitt (2007) professed that another band innovativeness symbol called ‘pink glow’ is registered as its company trademark with the Intellectual Property (IP) office of the Australian Government. Furthermore, the public relations approach taken by the firm has empowered its success towards achieving a strong entrepreneurship in the Australian market (Blewitt, 2012). Therefore, considering these factors, it could be stated that the entrepreneurship and innovation were the only things that supported the Eagle Boys to build a successful business empire.
The role of entrepreneurship and innovation in relation to the issues
A varied range of store factors represented the root of the business model and helped to meet the requirements of the target people coming from urban and provincial areas (Eftekhari & Bogers, 2015). However, although the decision of selling out Eagle Boys Pizza was found potential for establishing next business line that is gourmet bakery and coffee house, the structural changes made by the new owner of Eagle Boys Pizza failed to extend the franchise operated outlets. The number of franchising outlets also got reduced by 33.5% by the end of FY 2016 as compared to FY 2008. Moreover, after merging with the Pizza Hut in the FY 2016, the overall share value drastically fallen and the brand became fourth largest pizza chain in Australia (Davidsson et al. 2018).
In order to expand its market opportunities more differently, Eagle Boys requires focusing on balancing the local customization with the network consistency system (McGrath & O’Toole, 2016). The operational playbook of its franchising model must command for more using its brand and trademark so that the more execution of the commercial activities could outline an indispensable practice where its every store must imitate to be a part of its single network. However, it is also guided by Berkhout et al. (2011), that every store of Eagle Boys would need to be independent to be accustomed to its local requirements, local customers’ inclinations to determine the brand success. The marketing solution of the firm requires functioning in an equivalent way by allowing the franchise team to control, monitor and influence the staffs as per consumer needs (Davidsson et al. 2018). Moreover, the business model should need to be flexible enough to permit each store adopting the settings according to the market demands.
Conclusion:
After evaluating the case of Eagle Boys, it has been perceived that the entrepreneurs of such franchisee business organization need to be adaptive as per its market trend and industry standard. The switching intention of its founder is the main reason to bring this kind of drastic change in the business model of Eagle Boys. Therefore, before selling the trademark, the management must incorporate some innovative ideas into its franchising model for improving its structural design and foundational principles. It is expected that the innovative research and devolvement (R&D) approach secured through IP rights may help Eagle Boys to continue its growth and well-respected brand position in the Australian pizza market.
References:
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