Marketing Plan for Gourmet Pasta Mania

The signature line of innovative, premium, pasta dishes which include pesto with smoked salmon, pancetta and peas linguini in an alfredo sauce, and fresh mussels and clams in a marinara sauce. Gourmet Pasta Mania also serves distinct salads, desserts, and beverages. It will compete against the well-known pasta producers in the Philippines, especially, the fast food chains.

Executive Summary
Gourmet Pasta Mania will be the leading gourmet pasta restaurant in Region 3, Philippines with a rapidly developing consumer brand and growing customer base Gourmet Pasta Mania will reinvent the pasta experience for individuals, families, and take out customers with discretionary income by selling high quality, innovative products at a reasonable price, designing tasteful, convenient locations, and providing industry-benchmark customer service. The primary marketing objective is to achieve first year sales of 21900 servings each for pastas and beverages and 20 servings each for fruit salad and desserts. The primary financial objectives are to achieve first year sales revenues of Php. 1,644,000.00, keep first year losses to less than Php. 356,000.00 and break-even early in the second year.

Company Description
The company was organized to give consumers another very good option in choosing the best pasta in the Philippines with a foreign culture of products. It will be launched by the family Belacha who are well-known for their love of making pasta in a unique way. Product Review: 1.) Pesto with Smoked Salmon

2.)

Pancetta and Peas Linguini in an Alfredo Sauce

3.) Fresh Mussels and Clams in a Marinara Sauce

4.) Fruit Salad

5.) Buko Pandan

6.) Chocolate Cake

7.) Pineapple Juice

8.) Iced Tea

The pasta recipes are unique here in the Philippines because not many restaurants here in the Philippines offers the same in there menu. The companys recipes are also healthy. These recipes are famous to foreigners and normal Filipino households can now buy these products with their reasonable prices that will give the business another competitive advantage.

Core Competencies
The single objective is to position Gourmet Pasta Mania as the premier gourmet pasta restaurant in the Region III, Philippines area, commanding a majority of the market share within five years. The marketing strategy will seek to first create customer awareness regarding their services offered, develop that customer base, and work toward building customer loyalty and referrals. The message that Gourmet Pasta Mania will seek to communicate is that the business offers the freshest, most creative, health conscious, reasonably priced, gourmet pasta in Region III. This message will be communicated through a variety of methods. The first will be through banners. The banner campaign will be a way to communicate for long time with the costumers. Gourmet Pasta Mania will also use tarpaulin ads in many areas of Region III. This will be particularly effective because the Tarpaulin ads are clear presentation and wider than many other banners in the Philippines.

The uniqueness of the pasta offer is also a competitive advantage because even if the recipes are high quality products, normal households can afford its reasonable prices. Offering high quality at lower prices is a very considerable positioning by Gourmet Pasta Mania. The products are also healthy and can be consumed by those who are health conscious.

Current Marketing Situation

Market Summary Gourmet Pasta Mania possesses good information about the market and knows a great deal about the common attributes of most prized and loyal customers of pasta. Gourmet Pasta Mania will leverage this information to better understand who is served, their specific needs, and how it can better communicate with them.

Market Analysis 2001 Potential Customers Individuals Families Take out Total Growth 8% 12,457 13,454 14,530 15,692 16,947 9% 8,974 9,782 10,662 11,622 12,668 2002 2003 2004 2005

10% 24,574 27,031 29,734 32,707 35,978 9.27% 46,005 50,267 54,926 60,021 65,593

Market Demographics The profile for Gourmet Pasta Mania's customer consists of the following geographic, demographic, and behavior factors:

Geographics Our immediate geographic targets are the provinces in Region 3 with a population of 9,720,992.
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A 21 542.51 square kilometers geographic area is in need of our services. The total targeted population is estimated at 3,440,289.

Demographics Male and female. Ages 25-50, this is the segment that makes up 53% of the Region 3 market. Young professionals who work close to the location. Yuppies. Have attended college and/or graduate school. An income over Php. 40,000. Eat out several times a week. Tend to patronize higher quality restaurants. Are cognizant about their health.

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Behavior Factors Enjoy a high quality meal without the mess of making it themselves. When ordering, health concerns in regard to foods are taken into account. There is value attributed to the appearance or presentation of food.

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Market Needs Gourmet Pasta Mania is providing its customers with a wide selection of high-quality pasta dishes and salads that are unique and pleasing in presentation, offer a wide selection of health conscious choices, and utilizes top-shelf ingredients. Gourmet Pasta Mania seeks to fulfill the following benefits that are important to their customers.

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Selection. A wide choice of pasta and salad options. Accessibility. The patron can gain access to the restaurant with minimal waits and can choose the option of dine in or take out.

Customer service. The patron will be impressed with the level of attention that they receive.

Competitive pricing. All products/services will be competitively priced relative to comparable high-end pasta/Italian restaurants.

Market Trends The market trend for restaurants is headed toward a more sophisticated customer. The restaurant patron today relative to yesterday is more sophisticated in a number of different ways. Food quality. The preference for high-quality ingredients is increasing as customers are learning to appreciate the qualitative differences.
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Presentation/appearance. As presentation of an element of the culinary experience becomes more pervasive, patrons are learning to appreciate this aspect of the industry.

Health consciousness. As Americans in general are more cognizant of their health, evidenced by the increase in individuals exercising and health club memberships, patrons are requesting more healthy alternatives when they eat out. They recognize that an entree can be quite tasty, and reasonably good for you.

Selection. People are demanding a larger selection of foods, they are no longer accepting a limited menu.

Market Growth In 1999, the global pasta market reached $8 billion dollars. Pasta sales are estimated to grow by at least 10% for the next few years. This growth can be attributed to several different factors. The first factor is an appreciation for health conscious food. While not all pasta is "good for you," particularly the cream based sauces, pasta can be very tasty yet health conscious at the same time. Pasta is seen as a healthy food because of its high percentage of carbohydrates relative to fat.

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Another variable that is contributing to market growth is an increase in the number of hours our demographic is working. Over the last five years the number of hours spent at work of our archetype customer has significantly increased. As the number of work hours increases, there is a high correlation of people that eat out at restaurants. This is intuitively explained by the fact that with a limited number of hours available each day, people have less time to prepare their meals and eating out is one way to maximize their time.

SWOT Analysis The following SWOT analysis captures the key strengths and weaknesses within the company, and describes the opportunities and threats facing Gourmet Pasta Mania.

Strengths Strong relationships with vendors that offer high-quality ingredients and fast/frequent delivery schedules.
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Excellent staff who are highly trained and very customer attentive. Great retail space that is bright, hip, clean, and located in an upscale mall, suburban neighborhood, or urban retail district.

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High customer loyalty among repeat customers. High-quality food offerings that exceed competitors offerings in quality, presentation, and price.

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Weaknesses Gourmet Pasta Mania is not well known. A limited marketing budget to develop brand awareness. The struggle to continually appear to be cutting edge.

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Opportunities Growing market with a significant percentage of the target market still not aware that Gourmet Pasta Mania exists.
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Increasing sales opportunities in take out business. Increasing population is the best opportunity.

Threats Competition from local restaurants that respond to Gourmet Pasta Mania's superior offerings.
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Gourmet pasta restaurant chains found in other markets coming to Region III,Philippines.

A slump in the economy reducing customer's disposable income spent on eating out.

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Target Market
The targeted market have the following characteristics male and female, ages 25-50, this is the segment that makes up 53% of the Region III market, young professionals who work close to the location, yuppies, have attended college and/or graduate school, an income over Php. 40,000, eat out several times a week, and those who tend to patronize higher quality restaurants, are cognizant about their health. The need of these markets that gourmet pasta mania wants to satisfy is the need for a refreshing snack after a whole day of work or study and their need to be healthy. Gourmet pasta mania can correspond to these needs by their healthy recipes and snacks that when coupled with beverages become refreshing to its consumers.

Marketing Mix
Gourmet Pasta Manias marketing mix is comprised of these following approaches to pricing, distribution, advertising and promotion, and customer service. Product Strategy. The product must be healthy and fast-served. Packaging is also important because many of the buyers want it to be taken out so packaging must also be fast. Also, recipes must always be available and fresh so that every customer will leave the store with no dismay because they got what they wanted.
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Pricing Strategy. Gourmet Pasta Manias pricing scheme is that the product cost is 45% of the total retail price.
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Distribution Strategy. Gourmet Pasta Manias food will be distributed through a take-out model where customers can call in their order and come to the restaurant to pick it up, come into the restaurant, place the take out order and wait for it to be completed, or come in and dine at the restaurant.

Advertising and Promotion Strategy. The most successful advertising will be banner and tarpaulin ads. Obsessive customer attention is the mantra. Gourmet Pasta Manias philosophy is that whatever needs to be done to make the customer happy must occur, even at the expense of short-term profits. In the long term, this investment will pay off with a fiercely loyal customer base on who is extremely vocal to their friends with referrals

Budget
In materials buying, the company will only buy ingredients for making these recipes and leave the building of stores in the business plan. Ingredients should always be complete and the company will not offer in the menu, a recipe without the ingredients complete. In production scheduling, the company will produce pastas every day and every time there is an order for that product. Without order, the company will not produce.

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In personnel planning, the company will hire 1 cashier, 3 waiters and 4 pasta makers in every store, giving them Php. 12,000.00 of salary every month for a total of Php. 96,000.00 for a month for the first year of operations. In marketing operations, the company will use percentage of sales method in communicating its product to its consumers. For the first year, 9.17% of sales and 3.66 for the next years.

Schedule
For the first year of operations, the company will implement banner and tarpaulin ads all over Region III, having 1 store in each province. We will have 1 banner and 1 tarpaulin in each province that is near the location of a store. For the next few years, the company will have more and more stores in each province and may add stores out of Region 3, putting promotional expenses to the new locations and decreasing the promotional expenses in Region 3. Also, the salaries of personnel will also increase as the company becomes well-known and the company will hire the best personnel available.

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Monitoring and Control

The Belacha family is the owner of this company so they are the ones responsible for monitoring and control. They will visit stores once in a while in a surprising manner that the personnel on one store dont know that an owner will be visiting them that day. The owners will see the way waiters serve customers, how recipe makers produce their product and how courteous every employee is. The owners will also communicate with the costumers in a friendly manner to know what if the costumers perceived value of their recipes and to know whether the positioning of their company is good and the objectives are met. Of course, not all of the comments or suggestions of each costumer will be known, so, the company will give questionnaires for how the costumers see the company over competitors and how good is the company for the costumers.

References:

http://www.mplans.com/pasta_restaurant_marketing_plan/executive_summary_f c.php http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Luzon

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