Assignment 1

A Close Look at the Operations and Management of Quick-Trip

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 A Close Look at the Operations and Management of Quick-Trip

Introduction

The United States has many landmark days across its over 300-year history, but one

significant date is the date of Quick-Trip's inception. Born out of a vision of two former Air

Force men, Chester and Holmes, in 1958, Quick-Trip has come a long way to become one of the

more reputable convenience stores in the United States (3). The first of this chain was opened in

1958 in Tusla, in America's home of the "red people," Oklahoma, and which sold only groceries

under a creative mix of sales strategies. Chester Cadieux worked hard to bring the brand to its

feet, hence earning him a right to be the first President and CEO of the brand for almost five

decades before passing the baton to his son Chet Cadieux, who holds the seat to date.

Throughout the chain's history, it has had a reputation of selling good quality

merchandise at affordable prices, a reputation that still stands to this day. By the end of 2010, the

convenience stores industry, in which Quick-Trip operates, had about 147,000 convenience

stores in the US, with the sales in the previous calendar year exceeding the half-a-trillionth mark

(3). Over half of these convenience stores were single-store operations, 80% of which also sold

gasoline and diesel fuels. The convenience store also possesses a culture of growth that permits

for the employees' development and success. The study herein evaluates the story of Quick-Trip

to understand the operations and management of the chain.

Operational Strategy and Competitive Advantage

From the case study published by Harvard Business School, Quick-Trip has an

employee-centric operational strategy, as it invests heavily in the employees and views them as

the resource they are (3). This approach has paid off immensely as the convenience store earned

consecutive listing from 2003 to 2011 in America's Fortune 100 best company for which to

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work. Such investment makes the employees aware of what is expected of them, giving high

returns. Besides, Quick Trip has developed a culture of finding the best individuals to employ,

offering them good wages, and promoting them from within after exposing them to the rigorous

training that equips them with the skills to step up in their careers.

The company's culture is heavily reliant on standardized sales policies, performance

evaluation of the employees, well laid down disciplinary procedures. As a result, Quick Trip's

customers have a good experience whenever they visit the store because the employees

understand their place in the food chain. A closer look at the company's recruitment process

would point to the fact that the human resource department is keen to establish the performance

indicators of a prospective employee. Such indicators include the prospective employees’ retail

experience and level of education, then exposing them to rigorous training of the right sort for

skill equipment. The remuneration policies of the store are also quite generous, and which

include different sorts of benefits.

The competitive advantage of the company also centers on the company's presentation to

the customer. They understand that the people who attract and maintain the clients are the human

resource, hence the heavy investment in the employees' appearance and lead generation. Besides

offering good quality commodities at affordable prices, Quick-Trip ensures that their attendants

are well equipped, and above all, they are presentable. This approach is, of course, coupled with

the opening of ten stores on an annual basis, all of which are attempts aimed at establishing and

maintaining customer loyalty and further growth into new markets. The pattern shows that the

convenience store targets regions with high economic and population expansion rates, like North

Carolina.

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Operational Management and Customer Experience

Most organizations that apply operational management will attest to the practice's impact

on customer experience. Quite rightly so, Harvey et al. connote that the key aspects of

operational management include capacity building and management, quality control, resource

planning, inventory control, and designing of goods and services (2). Such aspects have an

explicit impact on the relationship that Quick Trip has with its customers. The operational

management activities at Quick Trip revolve around activities that aim to deliver good quality

products and services to the customers. As such, these activities have greatly determined the

quality of the services since it becomes an easy task to assess the quality of goods and services,

which provides a platform for customers to engage with the company and procure the best

services they can get.

Similarly, processes involved in operational planning, for instance: resource allocation

and planning, staff scheduling, and work planning, are all vital motivators of employees that deal

directly or indirectly with the customers at Quick Trip. The satisfaction of customers depends on

the level of engagement shown by the employees of the organization and their understanding of

the needs of the clients. For this reason, the convenience store invests a lot of effort in making

sure that they empower the employees by providing them with a good working environment to

give their best.

Apart from the operations management, the Quick Trip convenience stores have some

tough challenges that it grapples with daily. Two of these challenges are the challenge to

convince customers to make more purchases and a rapid technological change. Primarily, the

challenge of convincing customers to make more purchases is one that almost all the

convenience stores face, and they have created creative ways of countering it. For instance, these

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stores stock many things that people can impulse-buy or creating a sales drive. The other

problem of a rapidly changing technological landscape needs to be addressed in the soberest way

possible, including continuous training and updating the company's technologies. Furthermore,

the company can invest in a tech department specializing in updating systems at every one of

their outlets.

Value Chain and Its Efficacy on Operation

According to Al-Shammari & Al-Faqir, a value chain entails all the activities carried out

by an organization to create value for its customers, including sales and marketing, services,

outbound logistics, operations, and inbound logistics (1). At Quick Trip, the value chain involves

different processes such as the establishment of Quick Trip Kitchens, fresh food preparation and

delivery, consulting gasoline experts to expand their capacity, and offer a wider range of

alternatives available at each store. Primarily, the focus of these activities is the conversion of

available resources into commodities that make sense to the customers' needs. Also, Quick Trip's

pricing policy ensures that they make substantial profits as the cost of production is kept as low

as possible, thereby enabling them to retain some of the value they create for the client and its

other stakeholders.

As is the aim of every profit-driven enterprise, Quick Trip seeks to have all the

stakeholders contribute positively to generating the final product or service offered to the clients.

By observation, the convenience store is insistent on integrating all of its human resources into

its value chain processes, investing heavily in the employees and offering them partial ownership

of the business to become more invested in delivering quality always. Overall, these activities are

geared towards improving the quality of the products and services offered to the clients.

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Moreover, a company with a good value chain enjoys positive customer feedback thanks to their

good habits of customer satisfaction.

Performance Measurement of Quick Trip's Service Delivery Design

Performance measurement and evaluation in any venture takes many forms, and

definitely, evaluating the service delivery system design at Quick Trip can take many different

forms. For this particular case, one can use the balanced scorecards as a metric for measuring the

performance of Quick Trip. The balanced scorecard uses metrics such as customer perspective,

customer management metrics, internal processes metrics, and financial performance metrics, all

of which evaluate the wider view of the company's performance. The assessment may be focused

on the quality of goods and services, the safety of the company's processes, the working

environment for the staff, the efficiency of the services delivered, and the timing of the delivery

itself.

The different performance measurement techniques have different intricacies; like in the

case of financial assessment of the service delivery may involve, among other things, the

utilization of the available assets, the cost structure of the system, and shareholders' net value.

Metrics of customer perspective are all-inclusive of aspects such as customer satisfaction, among

other things. In a quick trip, two applicable scorecard metrics can be employed to give a clear

picture of the company's performance. These are customer perspectives and internal processes.

Internal processes are pivotal because the company understands that the basic decisions

concerning its output are crucial aspects of operations management. The customers' perspective

is also much appreciated since Quick Trip's customers are their most important stakeholders, and

their opinions matter.

Use of Technology

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 In this time and age, technology determines how far a company goes on matters

profitability. Quick Trip has shown a good transition pace as it moved from the regular brick and

motor shop they initially were to more advanced tech-based operations. For starters, the

company has a digital app for smartphones known as the QT Mobile App through which clients

can easily access company features such as an up-to-date listing, special offers, and so on. The

company's social media presence is also important as it drives sales through such avenues and

generates quality leads. It is also abreast of e-commerce with an up-to-date website that avails

information to the benefit of clients concerning available products and services.

Conclusion

Quick Trip is a testament to the fact that ideas that begin as humble concepts can morph

into huge, transformative end products that help many people along the way. When it all began,

it was a mere grocery store operating a single-store; but for the hard work and diligence of the

founders the company expanded and transformed into a convenience store present in most major

cities across the United States. The operations management techniques applied have been the key

to the company's success, as seen in the case study by the Harvard Business School. Through

effective value chain its practices, the store chain has gained a competitive advantage over its

competition and continues to lead the way for the rest to follow. With the analysis herein, it is

reasonable to conclude that Quick Trip has had success in this multi-billion industry.

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 Sources

1. Al-Shammari, E., & Al-Faqir, T. (2017). Analysis Support Activities Value Chain Model

to the Porter and Impact on the Knowledge Department. Iraqi Administrative Sciences

Journal, 1(1), 60-86. https://doi.org/10.33013/iqasj.v1n1y2017.pp60-86

2. Harvey, J., Heineke, J., & Lewis, M. (2016). Editorial for Journal of Operations

Management special issue on "Professional Service Operations Management

(PSOM)". Journal Of Operations Management, 42-43(1), 4-8.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jom.2016.03.005

3. Ton, Z., & Preble, M. (2011). Quick Trip [Ebook] (1st ed., pp. 1-26). Harvard Business

School. Retrieved 28 April 2021.