Recreational Food Service is Big Business

In the analysis - Recreational Food Service Is Big Business - by Gary Horvath, President, Recreational Foodservice Division, Service America Corporation and Mickey Warner, Associate Professor School of Hospitality Management at Florida International University, Horvath and Warner initially state: “Recreational food service is very different from routine food service management. The authors review the market and the management planning and challenges that create that difference.” Recreational food is loosely defined by the authors as food for special events. These can be one-time events, repeated events that are not on a fixed schedule [i.e. concerts], weekly events such as football-baseball-or basketball games, or other similar venues. Concessions are a large part of these fan based settings. “An anticipated 101,000 fans at a per capita spending of $5-6 [were expected]. A typical concessions menu of hot dogs, popcorn, soda, beer, snacks, novelty foods, candy, and tobacco products comprises this market segment,” say Horvath and Warner in reference to the Super-Bowl XXI football championship game, held in Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena, California, on January 25, 1987. Some of the article is based upon that event. These food service efforts focus on the individual fan, but do extend to the corporate-organizational level as well. Your authors will have you know that catering is definitely a part of this equation. The monies spent and earned are phenomenal. “Special events of this type attract numerous corporate catering opportunities for companies entertaining VIP guest lists,” the authors inform. “Hospitality tents usually consist of a pregame cocktail party and buffet and a post-game celebration with musical entertainment held in lavishly decorated tents erected at the site. In this case a total of 5,000 covers, at a price of $200 each, for 12-15 separate parties were anticipated.” Horvath and Warner also want you to know that novelties and souvenirs make up an essential part of this, the recreational food service market. “Novelties and souvenirs are a primary market and source of revenue for every stadium food service operator,” say Horvath and Warner. The term, “per capita spending is the measurement used by the industry to evaluate sales potential per attendee at an event,” say the authors. Of course, with the solid revenue figures involved as well as the number of people anticipated for such events, planning is crucial, say Horvath and Warner. Training of staff, purchasing and supply, money and banking, facility access, and equipment, are a few of the elements to be negotiated. Through both graphs and text, Horvath and Warner do provide a fairly detailed outline of what a six-step event plan consists of.

World-Class Service

In the discussion - World-Class Service - by W. Gerald Glover, Associate Professor, Restaurant, Hotel and Resort Management at Appalachian State University and Germaine W. Shames, Hilton International, New York, Glover and Shames initially state: “Providing world-class service to today's traveler may be the key for hospitality managers in the current competitive market. Although an ideal, this type of service provides a mandate for culturally aware managers. The authors provide insight into several areas of cultures in collision.” Up to the time this essay is written, the authors point to a less-than-ideal level of service as being the standard in the hospitality industry and experience. “Let's face it - if we're ever to resurrect service, it will not be by going back to anything,” Glover and Shames exclaim. “Whatever it was we did back then has contributed to the dilemma in which we find ourselves today, handicapped by a reactive service culture in an age that calls for adaptiveness and global strategies,” the authors fortify that thought. In amplifying the concept of world-class service Glover and Shames elaborate: “World-class service is an ideal. Proactive and adaptive, world-class service feels equally right to the North American dignitary occupying the Presidential Suite, and the Japanese tourist staying in a standard room in the same hotel.” To bracket that model the authors offer: “At a minimum, it is service perceived by each customer as appropriate and adequate. At its best, it may also make the customer feel at home, among friends, or pampered. Finally, it is service as if culture matters,” Glover and Shames expand and capture the rule of world-class service. Glover and Shames consider the link between cultures and service an imperative one. They say it is a principle lost on most hospitality managers. “Most [managers] have received service management education in the people are people school that teaches us to disregard cultural differences and assume that everyone we manage or serve is pretty much like ourselves,” say Glover and Shames. “Is it any wonder that we persist in setting service standards, marketing services, and managing service staff not only as if culture didn't matter, but as if it didn't exist?!” To offer legitimacy to their effort Glover and Shames present the case of the Sun and Sea Hotel, a 500-room first class hotel located on the outskirts of the capital city of a small Caribbean island nation. It is a bit difficult to tell whether this is a dramatization or a reality. It does, however, serve to illustrate their point in regard to management’s cognizance, or lack thereof, of culture when it comes to cordial service and guest satisfaction. Even more apropos is the tale of the Palace Hotel, “…one of the grande dames of hospitality constructed in the boom years of the 1920s in a mid-sized Midwestern city in the United States.” The authors relate what transpired during its takeover in mid-1980 by a U.S.-based international hotel corporation. The story makes for an interesting and informative case study.