acquired by Services Acquisition Corp. International for $265 Million. SACI is run by Steven Berrard, former CEO of Blockbuster. Once the transaction was processed, they called their name to Jamba Inc. In December of 2007 Jamba and Nestle partnered up to make a line of healthy, ready-to-drink beverages under the Jamba brand. On February 28th,2008, Jamba launched a new breakfast smoothie and it began selling baked goods. Jamba’s headquarters’ is now located in Emeryville California. They has over seven hundred locations in thirty states in the nation, including the District of Columbia and the Bahamas. Five hundred are company-owned and the rest are franchised. Marketing Overview
As head of Marketing and Public Relations, I will be speaking about some things we can do to improve on customer service as a whole. In order to improve on Jamba Juice as a franchise we have began to take an evaluation of our competition, Starbucks and Robeks Juice in terms of their customer service tactics. Based on this evaluation we discovered that each of these companies has very strategic tactics to make their franchise simple and easy to operate for the owners. We have also looked very closely at companies that have mastered the art of franchising like Subway, to develop better ways of making the Jamba Juice experience the same in every location. The last step we took in our marketing plan was to evaluate what the Jamba Juice customer wants and develop a plan to make their ideas a reality.
As a very successful franchise Starbucks has created a strong sense of brand awareness. This franchise focuses on five main areas to create a successful business environment. We at Jamba Juice feel that it is important to take these areas and use them as lessons for marketing our brand. The first area Starbucks focuses on is the experience aspect of marketing. Starbucks believes that the overall feel of their company ranging from types of drinks, graphics, furniture and displays is a major reason for their success. As the people at Starbucks put it “attention to small things sends a big message.” This is based on the fact that every customer wants to know that they are well taken care of. Second, paying attention to brand consciousness drives the business. Starbucks believes that their franchise must have a distinct and recognizable voice throughout the company. The main focus is to hone in on the customer and what they value, lifestyle, and their needs. The next lesson that we have pulled form Starbucks is “don’t try to squeeze every last cent out of the customer.” Making the customer feel comfortable and practicing patience and confidence will create brand equity. This in turn will not only keep people coming back for your product, but for your brand. The fourth step in the Starbucks process is “don’t accept conventional price ceilings.” The main point here is to develop and deliver a higher sense of image for both your brand and product so you are able to evaluate your own price range. Last,” Pastiche is powerful.” Making sure the company sends the right signals and hits consumers as well as personnel conceptually, product wise, and by use of graphics will keep you moving forward with both sides of you business.
As a main competitor of Jamba Juice, Robeks Juice has received a significant amount of success due to its organized and efficient operational system. The mission statement of Robeks Juice states “Our passion is to help people lead an active and healthy lifestyle by offering the highest quality of nutritional food, products, and supplements.” To the people at Robeks Juice this is more than their mission statement, it’s their main bases to create superior value. Robeks believes that with a clear and effective mission the process of operating a franchise is easily executed. The main thing that Robeks Juice has over Jamba Juice is the basic fact that they have mastered an effective way to operate their franchise. According to the Robeks Franchise Business Opportunity Review the proper execution of your franchise will add value to the customer and create loyalty. Robeks Juice has created several programs for their franchise such as training programs, marketing programs, common franchise opportunity where they look for entrepreneurs that share the same passion and values. Among these things Robeks has created franchise programs to ensure that every franchise operates the same. In addition to all of these things Robeks juice works hard to make sure each and every customer is taken care of and educated on their products by using an online education program. With an experienced support staff Robeks is quickly becoming the most favored smoothie franchise.
Subway is one of the leaders on the franchise front. With an enormous amount of success in America and several other countries, Subway is a main source Jamba Juice is looking to for advice on operating a franchise. The Subway franchise bases their success on four main categories; value, simplicity, support, and control. Among these things Subway has a streamlined operation that includes a detailed manual to guide the franchisee through every possible scenario. Subway feels that a key to ensure proper success of these categories is taking pride in the people who make it happen. Subway has outlined clear and effective ways to make franchisees embrace their system. These things include quality of product, lower investment, location flexibility, and operational support. One of the main goals for Subway is expansion by franchisee. By 2004 70% of franchisees became multi unit owners. This indicated satisfaction for the owner and benefits the company because they get someone who already knows their program. Subway encourages learning about the performance of the store by speaking with other franchisees who have gained success form the Subway Company. Subway indicates that the main reason for a successful shop is the location and how well it’s run. Other goals for Subway include making sure they are the number one location with the number one customer satisfaction in every market they serve. With a clear list of the franchisee and company responsibilities Subway has been able to execute an effective and very successful franchise on an international bases.
The last issue we are dealing with in creating better customer service for our company is incorporating the consumer’s opinion into our creation of a better business.
We have taken a survey based on 30 people in order to evaluate what the customer thinks is most important in our company. The survey asks six questions that helped us evaluate how to focus our customer service. What we found out was that 75% of the participants in the survey went to Jamba Juice sometimes. When asked which they prefer 45% of them said Starbucks compared to the 30% who like Jamba Juice. In the third question we found that 80% of the participants thought that service at Jamba Juice was only OK. Not only did most customers feel that way, but 70% of them felt that the Jamba Juice experience was not consistent in every location. On question number five we wanted to find out what the consumer liked about Jamba Juice, what we found was that 45% of them believed that Jamba Juice gave superior value to that of its competitors. In the last question we wanted to know the customers take on how to improve on the company customer service. We discovered that 60% of the participants felt that we needed to focus on the Jamba Juice Company customer service as a
whole.
Customer Survey
1. How often do you go to Jamba Juice?
a. All the time – 15%
b. Sometimes – 75%
c. Never – 10%
2. Which do you prefer?
a. Jamba Juice – 30%
b. Robeks Juice – 25%
c. Starbucks – 45%
3. Customer Service at Jamba Juice is:
a. Excellent – 10%
b. OK – 80%
c. Terrible – 10%
4. Do you feel you get the same Jamba Juice experience everywhere?
a. Yes – 30%
b. No – 70%
5. I like Jamba Juice because:
a. They value the customer – 15%
b. They give superior value – 45%
c. The brand itself is popular – 37%
d. I don’t like Jamba Juice – 3%
6. To improve on Jamba Juice customer service I would:
a. Focus more on the product offering – 5%
b. Focus more on the customer – 35%
c. Focus more on creating a stronger company customer service as a whole. – 60%
Operations/Training Overview
Our new training program for Jamba Juice will improve the overall consistency of the customer service throughout each of our franchise’s, and generate higher profits throughout our company as a whole. Since each franchise is owned separately, each Jamba Juice is operated differently. To maintain consistency, our new training program will be intense, and empowering for our company culture.
Franchise Owner Training
Upon actually opening a franchise, each owner will have to attend a three week seminar upon opening, which is held twice each year where the company discusses the basic Jamba Juice culture, basic and new procedures regarding the company, and the overall Jamba Juice goals, and objectives. As well as learning about the company culture regarding Jamba, professionals will help franchise owners look for managers, or how to hire the right kind of manager for their job.
Management Training
The owners are then responsible for recruitment and hiring of its managers, who will before hired attend a 6 week management training course held at our headquarters, in which managers learn the basic training skills in which they teach their employees . Throughout the 6 week course managers will demonstrate learning regarding
1. How to train employees on how to make smoothies
2. How to apply impeccable customer service
3. Basic Site operational work regarding schedules, payroll, and store procedures
4. Motivational workshops
5. Smoothie making workshops
6. Leadership workshops
7. Basic management principles classes
8. Understanding different behavior styles using the DISC assessment theory
9. Valuing diversity
10. Basic people skills
11. How to teach assistant managers to train employees
12. Maximizing sales
13. The long term company goals
Besides training and learning how to train, one of our number one training goals will involve customer service as well as building loyal customer service management. In looking at how Starbucks maintains a one on one relationship with its customers they try to sell “your coffee, your way.” Hence in which many people start their day by saying”I need my Starbucks.” The key word is “my.” Throughout the training process, soon to be managers will learn about customer service, mainly “the customer intimacy process,” established from the value proposition pyramid. The Bersin and Associated article describes “the product is a combination of the coffee, the store environment, and the employee’s behavior and execution,” as to why star bucks are so successful. We believing teaching our employees to not only make our product right, but demonstrate an intimate customer service approach, our profits will increase, as well a broader loyal customer basis. To keep customers coming back, becoming more like Starbucks using the customer intimacy process, Jamba employees also needs to incorporate a more efficient, quicker way to make the drinks as well. In the article, The Case for Jamba Juice, author reiterates,” Starbucks makes drinks faster. I see lines all the time at Jamba. This means that traffic has increases, but there service model needs to be changed, to increase efficiency. There is no reason why people should be waiting six minutes or more for a drink.” Being Quick yet still personable will be factored throughout the customer service training as well.
The training course will involve a hands on environment which will be taught by professionals involved with training, organizational behavior, site management and operations, and management leaders. They will use visuals such as videos, demonstrations, guest speakers, role playing scenarios, how to make smoothies in a kitchen environment, and ext. After the 6 week training seminar each new manager will be responsible for shadowing another Jamba Juice manager in which ever area chosen as an assistant manager right after their training course is completed. Furthermore, to maintain consistently our training will be ongoing for managers. Once a year managers will attend a similar, yet shorter seminar course for one week paid by our company, where all managers and franchise owners will come together to further go more training, and learn how to train. These week seminars will have guest speakers, demonstrations, and improvisation role playing workshops as well as leadership workshops.
Employee Training
Every Jamba Juice employee will receive at least 24 hours of training in the first 2-4 weeks. Within this period managers will go over customer service, retail skills, how to make the perfect smoothie, how to use a register, memorizing recipes of all drinks, practicing how to make drinks, and learning how to make drinks to customer specifications and requests.
Human Resources Overview
How should we take the time to learn from our employee’s and customer complaints? We should take in consideration customer feedback that is provided by each given location. We need to train our employee’s in a more efficient matter, so that they can project their knowledge to meet customers’ satisfaction and needs. We need to monitor our franchises for a longer period of time, to provide efficient training and support to the new franchise. Customers are our first priority and we need to build a good relationship with them by offering them consistency in every location. We should ask for more requirements to those seeking to open a franchise from us, to ensure that each franchisee has studied their community wants and is able to deliver the right service. As a successful franchiser, we don’t want to separate customer and community service from marketing. Other successful franchise companies include McDonalds, Blockbuster and Jiffy Lube. They have a great way of projecting their customer service and consistency in each location. McDonalds is Known for their famous phrase “Did you want fries with that?” This is widely recognized and accepted by all communities. To be as successful in customer service as these franchise companies are, we should incorporate a motto or phrase that will widely be captivated by all consumers.
What can we do to make Customer Service our number one priority? In order to keep our customers satisfied, we need to elaborate on longer training programs to those seeking to open a new Jamba Juice franchise, as well as workshops that will focus on building stronger customer relations for our established franchises. We will develop a monthly customer survey at each location, to ensure that our training programs and workshops are effective. Since the most important aspects of customer service are to give them what they need and to avoid complaints, by doing these surveys we will learn more of customers’ expectations, thus enabling us to take corrective actions with consistency. As of now we have a four- week training program for new franchises; however we need to provide a stronger training program to enforce customer service consistency. In order to understand the communities and customers’ expectations, we will have a focus group in each location to help us assess the likes and dislikes of our customers. The focus group consists of our most loyal customers, whom we will provide with a thirty dollar gift card for sharing their experiences at Jamba Juice. By having this survey, we will understand consumers and make improvement to meet their needs in the future.
To ensure the managers are on track of how to manage and enforce their employees to provide excellent customers service, we will develop a workshop to all franchisees. The workshops will be held every two weeks at each franchise store by its store manager. It is focused on customer service and the improvement of each store. Employees will learn to adjust based on information provided by the focus group. The store manager will elaborate on problems that happened in the past and deliver results of customer feedback to the employees, then to find out solutions for the same problems in the future. Firstly, store managers need to ensure that each employee must greet customers when they come into the store. Our customers should feel that they are welcomed to be served, since making them happy and satisfied are our top priorities. Secondly, all employees must know our menu clearly and should be able to answer customers’ questions. Since our drink names are distinct, customers may have questions to these names, such that for “Mango a Gogo”, employees must be able to explain that it is mango juice with banana blended. We must ensure at all times that our employees are knowledgeable. Since we are making healthy and nutritious drinks, we will make and pass down a pamphlet naming the “Secrets of Jamba Juice” to each employee that lists each drink’s name, nutrition facts and benefits to human bodies. With that much info, we expect all employees to fully understand the knowledge of each drink and be able to illustrate the benefit of drinking them. By having these workshops, employees will obtain the knowledge of our drinks and understand how to serve customers right.
To ensure our customers are getting the same service in each franchise store, developing these extensive training programs and workshops gives us the necessary information n to keep Jamba Juice Franchises consistent. Our goal is to have every franchisee and all employees delivering the right service. There's no mystery that making customers happy is good for business, and that is what we desire.
Bibliography
Robeks Franchise Business Opportunity Review www.thefranchise-investigator.com 11/10/2008
The Number One Franchise Opportunity www.world.subway.com 11/14/2008
What can you learn form Starbucks customer service Adam Hanft www.Inc.com 11/10/2008 Nancy Rathbun Scott Did You Want Fries With That? Nov, 10th 2008. http://www.nancyscott.com
Starbucks Nationwide Trading Day: Did it Work? http://bersin.wordpress.com/2008/02/27/starbucks-nationwide-training-day-did-it-work/ Rules Of Engagment at Jamba Juice
http://www.chainleader.com/index.asp?layout=articlePrint&articleID=CA6483031&article_prefix=CA&article_id=6483031