Food Retailing's Operations Strategy

center4500452120Operations Strategy in Food Retailing11540067000Operations Strategy in Food RetailingcenterbottomINstitutional affiliation1154000INstitutional affiliationcenter790007945755Meeting the Challenges of COVID-19Name1154000Meeting the Challenges of COVID-19Nameright23002311402020760098002020
Executive Summary
The Covid-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on many business organizations. Businesses have been required to implement a degree of changes that would have, typically, taken many years with a period of weeks. The challenging period during the pandemic has presented a set of live case studies in Operations Strategy. The present paper focuses on Waitrose, a leading food chain in the UK by examining how the firm has responded to the challenges due to the pandemic. Using the key concepts in Operations Strategy such as operations management, operations strategy, operations performance, production and service innovation, and the structure and scope of operations, this paper analyzes the nature of Waitrose’s response to meet challenges in the time of Covid-19 pandemic.
Operations Strategy in Food Retailing - meeting the challenges of Covid-19
Introduction
Waitrose, or Waitrose & Partners, is a supermarket brand in the UK that started as a small store selling groceries in West London in 1904. It is currently one of the most familiar brands on the streets of the UK that has transformed from an employee-owned retailer to be part of the John Lewis Partnership. The store was founded by Wallace Wyndham Waite, David Taylor, and Arthur Rose as Waite, Rose & Taylor and during this time, it sold a range of fine-quality foodstuffs (Waitrose & Partners Memory Store, 2018). While Waite took charge of procurement, Rose could take care of the accounts and Taylor offered his service on the shop floor. In 1908, Taylor left the store and the remaining two merged and changed the name to Waitrose Ltd, which is a combination of the duo. In September 2018, Waitrose and John Lewis forced their joint marketing campaign to emphasize their employee-owned business model in the middle of the increasingly demanding retail environment. Today, Waitrose exports its own branded goods and labels to more than 50 countries globally, including Spain, Bermuda, Malta, Hongkong, India, and Ghana. With the current period of the pandemic, Waitrose & Partners has aligned its operations to support partners, customers, and communities in different ways. For instance, the store established a community support fund to help vulnerable members of the local community and dedicated a “shopping hour” for vulnerable customers (Waitrose, 2020). During the initial period of the pandemic, many restaurants, shops, and other service businesses were closing down. However, supermarkets remained open and stores in the UK, and the U.S. assured customers that there will be plenty of supply and, therefore, no need to hoard any essential commodities (Sault, 2020). Within the grocery segment, different strategies can be adopted to effectively compete in the market, including price, quality, and value. This paper focuses on the operations strategies that Waitrose has applied to remain profitable amid Covid-19 challenges.
Slack and Brandon-J...