1. Draw a process flow diagram for a dine-in customer at the restaurant.

Specify the
activities, and the resources and activity time for each activity. Analyze the bottleneck
and capacity of the process.

Waiting in the Line

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Activity 1: Order/Cook

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Activity 2: Pay/Order Juices
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Activity 3: Sit/Enjoy Breakfast

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Activity 1: Order/Cooking
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From the case we have the following details:

 Number of chefs = 4
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 Activity time/customer = 40 secs

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Capacity = 1/Activity time = 1*60*60/40 = 90 customers

At Activity 1, the restaurant will be able to serve 90 customers/hr.

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Activity 2: Pay/Order Juices

From the case we have the following details:

 Number of Cashiers/employees = 2

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  Activity time/customer is the sum of both receiving the payment from the customer and
serving the juices to the customer
 Average time to serve drinks/customer = 45 secs
 Average time for the payment = 1 min/party
 We also have the information that 1 party has approx. 2.6 customers => 60/2.6 = 23.07
secs/customer

Capacity = 1/Activity time = 1 * 60 * 60 * 2/68.07 = 106 customers/hr.

At Activity 2, the restaurant will be able to serve 106 customers/hr.

Activity 3: Sit/Enjoy Breakfast

 Effective seating capacity is 35.2 (80% of 44)

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 Activity time average is 19 min

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Capacity = = 1/Activity time = (1*60*35)/19=2100/19=111 customers/hr.

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At Activity 2, the restaurant will be able to serve 111 customers/hr.
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Capacity of each Activity:
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Activity 1: 90 customers/hr.
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Activity 2: 106 customers/hr.

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Activity 3: 111 customers/hr.

The Bottleneck is at Activity 1, which is ordering/cooking.

The capacity of the process is 90 customers/hour.
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2. How does the seating policy at Paramount differ from a usual sitting policy? What is
the reason for Paramount to adopt this seating policy?
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The paramount seating policy is unusual when compared to normal seating policy at Dine-in
restaurants. They seem more like a takeaway restaurant than a dine in restaurant. Customers are
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not allowed to occupy the tables until they receive their food, just because they don’t want
customers without food to occupy the tables and block them.
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This is all followed because their seating capacity (44) is very low with the kind of popularity
and inflow they have. The restaurant believes “saving a table disrupts the delicate balance of
people to tables”

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 3. Calculate the average arrivals per hour on a Saturday morning before 11:30, using data
in Exhibit 6. With the arrival information and your analysis of the process capacity,
what is the expected waiting time and queue length (number of customers waiting) on
a Saturday morning? You may assume exponential distributions.

Reneging Total actual

Time No. of cust cust cust
7:00 AM - 7:30 AM 0
7:30 AM - 8 AM 35 35
8 AM - 8:30 AM 45 5 40
8:30 AM-9:00 AM 35 0 35
9:00 AM-9:30 AM 42 2 40
9:30 AM-10:00 AM 42 14 28

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10:00 AM-10:30

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AM 92 19 73

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10:30 AM-11:00

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AM 47 8 39

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11:00 AM-11:30
AM
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Processing capacity/hr. 90
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Avg.number of customers/30 min 42.5

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Avg.number of customers/hr. 85
Utilization Factor 0.94444444
Queuing time 0.18888889
Queue Length 16.0555556
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Formulas Used:
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 Utilization Factor = Avg.number of customers/hr. / Processing capacity/hr.

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 Queuing time = Utilization Factor/ (1- Utilization Factor)

 Queue Length = Utilization Factor^2/ (1- Utilization Factor)
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Note: Please find the attached excel for detailed calculations

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 4. What advice do you have for Michael Conlon about how to respond to the increase in
carryout orders at the Paramount? Why was he tempted to increase carryout? Why
was he tempted to decrease carryout?

Michel colon was tempted to increase the carryout orders because the only problem his
restaurant was facing is the number of people waiting in the queue, he might have thought
increasing the carryout orders will give the people an option to order food from anywhere
and get it delivered. He should have taught that it will really improve his business and
customer satisfaction.

Michel colon was also tempted to decrease the carryout orders because he has a fear that
increase in carryout orders might also increase the queue times as the dine out orders tend
to have greater order quantity than the dine in orders, which might take larger time to serve

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and might increase the queue waiting times.

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Suggestions

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By looking at the Bottleneck of the whole process, to reduce the wait times Colon
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should increase the number of stations in the kitchen and hire few more chefs.
 He should definitely have the Take-away option, because even after increasing the
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number of tables, the next bottleneck is just 16 members above the activity and 21
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members above activity 3. So, In order to divide the customer flow, he should
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employ take away orders.

 As most of his customers are already aware of his huge waiting times at his
restaurant, he should start take-away orders and should have unique advertising
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boards like “Tired of waiting in the lines? We are in Door dash..! Get it delivered
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home”
 He should also try having different stations for Takeaway and Dine-in which will
separate the queues and waiting times, provided he decides to increase the number
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of kitchen stations and chefs.

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5. Based on your reading of the case, why do customers put up with the line (that is, why
do they love the Paramount)? What factors contribute to and detract from dine-in
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customers' service experiences waiting in line at the Paramount? What ideas do you
have to improve the experience?

Paramount break-fast place is one of the oldest restaurants in Boston and has been
operational since 1937. It has received multiple “Best of Boston” awards. It also has a simple
menu and high-quality food, thereby receiving praise from most of its regional customers

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 and local tourists. The chefs were working at paramount for a long time and due to this
people must have got the same quality and taste all the time. People made it habit to visit
paramount regularly/weekly. It has become an attraction to the tourists as well. The way
paramount treats their customers is unique. It was evident at many places in the case, be it
when Colon suggested his customers taking away food to eat the eggs first or serving juices
to the people waiting in the line. Customers will definitely love this kind of experience. But
Best quality food is one of the many reasons that is making people stand in the Queue for
hours.

Factors contribute to and detract:

The waiting time is the important factor that detracts the customers from the Dine-in
option. Even customers can’t have the breakfast in peace because they can see people
waiting for them with food in their hands, which create a sense of discomfort and urgency
to finish the food as soon as possible. Taking away used plates and leftover food from

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between the customer queue is one more discomfort.

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Suggestions to Improve the experience

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An app where customers can order their food and get an approx. time when they can
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dine-in might reduce the queue.
 Separate kitchens for takeaway and dine-in will definitely improve the situation.
 Figuring out a new way to take away the used plates and garbage, so that won’t be
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seen by the customers.

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