Management Case Study: Bon Appetit

Bon Appétit is the on-site restaurant company offering full food-service management at St. Olaf College. St. Olaf’s cafeteria is nationally ranked for its outstanding on-compass dining. We chose to research Bon Appétit here on campus because they not only provide quality products and services, but they are also large contributors to the culture here on campus. They provide a welcoming atmosphere for students and faculty alike and are constantly adapting to suit the desires of their customers here on campus.The companies mission is to authentically create great food that is stable for the environment. In the nineteen eighties the industry standard for college and corporate cafeterias were simply making casseroles and mystery meats, served

The management at Bon Appétit create clear values and expectations for their employees to follow. These core values mold their operations toward being environmentally sustainable for the future. Bon Appétit does not implement common capitalistic tactics to create more revenue. They will not cut corners ethically in order to make a profit. Quite the opposite. Bon Appétit will implement tactics that in the short run create less revenue but at the same time establish a brand their fellow partners want to buy into. This mission statement is embodied by the top end of management which includes current GM Peter Abrahamsson. My partner Laina Bennett and I were able get a tour with Peter Abrahamsson and ask about what values and techniques he implements to create the special culture Bon Appétit has at St. Olaf. Peter Abrahamsson manages three hundred twenty five employees at St. Olaf and operates at three different locations on campus (Stav Hall, The Cage, and The Kings Dining Room). The age of his employees range from eighteen to seventy years old. The employees come from all over the world. There are employees from China working right next to employees from South America. This diverse workforce handles fifteen thousand transactions every week. These thousands of transactions come from students, faculty, and staff at St. Olaf College as well as members of the Northfield Community. Bon Appétit is able to create so much traffic by having a unique selling proposition. There unique selling proposition is that they work for the customer. You will not find the same recipe at two Bon Appétit cafés. They cater their foods to the local customers which are not the same at any two locations, therefore their food is not the same either. The few common elements you will find at all their locations are the responsive services that create fantastic food from-scratch and responsible sourcing