- If we didn't make a profit we couldn’t survive. That is why a main aim of every business organisation is to make a profit! Otherwise, at Richer Sounds, shops would have to close and staff would be made redundant. However, whereas all businesses have to make a profit, we believe in using that profit wisely. Like all UK businesses, we have to pay tax on our profit. This helps the government to provide schools, hospitals and other public services. So the more profit we make, the better it is for the government and for the general public because we have to pay more tax.
Colleagues also benefit, because every colleague receives a share of the profits, providing they have been working for us for more than three months. In addition, a further share goes to our Helping Hand Fund, which makes loans and grants to colleagues with financial problems.
Richer Sounds also gives away 5% of its profits every year to charity through its charitable foundation, the Persula Foundation. Since this was set up in 1994, over £1.1 million has been given to charities. Good causes, which have benefited include organisations working with homelessness, disabilities, human rights, bullying, multiple sclerosis and animal welfare.
Profit also goes towards financing future developments and improvements, which help us to continue to offer secure, well-paid employment.
Objectives:
- Richer Sounds objectives are the goals they want to achieve over the next 12 months.
- Each January, our Chairman, Julian Richer and our Group Managing Director, David Robinson, decide the ten goals, which Richer Sounds wants to concentrate on achieving that year.
- One goal is always ‘to keep the fun’ and to continue to reward people for working hard. We like to think of new ways of doing this, to keep all our colleagues motivated at work.
- At the end of the year we check how far we achieved our ten goals. We look at which goals haven’t been achieved – and why. We then set new goals for the next year. However, in between times we will also adjust, change or alter our goals – the key point is that we are constantly moving forward.
- This is very important in our business. Hi-fi retailing is constantly changing. Technology develops; new products come on to the market. There are new ways of doing business – such as through our web site. New competitors may enter the market – and some may leave.
- Our aim is always to be the best at what we do, and we can only do this if we keep looking at continually improving the business and setting objectives which will help us to do this.
Goals:
- Open between four and six stores in the current year.
- Develop the audiovisual home cinema range and commence sales of plasma TVs to sell at least two to three of these each week in each store.
- Keep the business fun. We measure the success of this through our yearly Colleague Attitude Survey.
- Keep the level of excellence of customer service above 90% for the company as a whole. We measure the success of this through our customer till receipt questionnaires.
- Control our costs through the cost control group to keep these to budget levels.
I was able to find most of my information on Aims, Objectives and Goals on Richer Sounds website.
4ii) How they communicate:
This Chart can show you the advantages and disadvantages for both of these businesses for their communications of how they transferee information.
For the Companies info about them and how they are keeping in touch with everyone else in the companies maybe even in different places e.g. from America to England. I would have imagined
5) External Influences, Competitors, Economic Factors, Environment and Stakeholders:
The main External Influences:
As you know, all businesses can be affected by changes caused by external influences – and Richer Sounds is no different! The main external influences to which we are always keen to respond are
Actions by business competitors
Changes in economic conditions
Environmental constraints also affect us – but not as much as some industries, such as manufacturers or construction companies.
You can read about the actions we take to monitor changes and respond to them in the sections below.
Richer Sounds Business Competitors:
Because we want to offer our customers the best value possible and the best customer service, we monitor our competitors in three ways.
Each store has to check the prices of competitors in their area and fax a weekly competition checklist to Purchasing.
From time to time, we carry out official ‘benchmarking’ exercises when we check the prices advertised by competitors and see how we compare.
Our mystery shoppers also visit our competitor’s stores, to check their customer service and compare it with ours. As you saw in Operations, our stores must take action if a competitor is offering the same product for a lower price – and undercut the competitor by £10. It must then inform Purchasing, in writing, that it has taken this action. Purchasing will compare this price against the information received by other stores in the weekly checklist and we will then reduce the price nationally if a number of competitors are offering the same item more cheaply.
We also offer ‘price beats’ in our in-store catalogue. If any customer ‘phones around and finds that the same product is sold in any competitor’s store or on the web, then we will beat any lower price by up to £100 any time up to seven days after purchase. Many companies offer to beat local price competition in retail stores, but very few also offer to beat prices quoted on the Internet!
Economic changes that affect them:
In our business, we prefer interest rates to be as low as possible. This is because of the following reasons.
The bank charges are cheaper for our overdraft.
Customers usually have more money to spend on electronic goods, because they are paying less for their mortgages and other essential items
Customers may be prepared to spend more to buy better quality goods and may use their credit card to do this, if the interest charged would be less.
An increase in interest rates can therefore cause problems. We have to sell more goods to cover our own increased charges for our overdraft – at the very time when customers may want to spend less. However, this is one advantage of always selling good value products. At this time, customers are more ‘price sensitive’ – which is to our benefit!
We try to predict changes in interest rates and build these into our cash flow forecasts for the future, so that we are prepared in advance.
Changing prices, too, would affect us. If our supplier’s prices increase then we have to ‘shop around’ to find better deals. Otherwise we would either have to increase the prices of the goods in our stores or reduce our profit margin (which is as low as we can make it at about 5%). Fortunately, our Purchasing department has a large number of supplier contacts, so that we normally find an alternative source if one supplier is increasing prices.
If the general level of prices increased for electronic goods, then obviously our competitors would be affected, too. However, in most cases the prices of these goods have fallen over the last few years, and this has helped us to be even more competitive.
We are affected by changes in exchange rates because we buy a large amount of our stock abroad. As an example, when we buy from Europe, then the price we must pay depends upon the value of the pound in relation to the euro. We always benefit if the pound is strong, as this means it is ‘worth more’ in Europe. The goods then cost us less. If the pound is falling in value, then we have to take this into account, as the goods will then be more expensive.
Environmental Constraints:
We are fortunate in that our main business activity does not cause air pollution or water pollution. Neither are we affected by regulations on packaging as, although the goods we handled have packaging, this is ‘sold on’ with the product to our customers.
However, we do aim to be environmentally friendly in the following ways.
We are aware that our customers, colleagues and passers-by could be affected by noise pollution if our hi-fi systems were ‘demonstrated’ in the store or if noise levels were too high. To prevent this, we have strict procedures about the volume level in our stores (particularly in relation to the bass levels). If colleagues are working late in a store then there must be no systems played after 9 pm.
If a customer wishes to listen to a system, we use our special demonstration room. All our demonstration rooms are soundproofed.
We include warnings about noise in our in-store catalogues – to advise customers to protect their hearing. We also sell special earplugs that help to prevent damage whilst still allowing the listener to hear all frequencies of sound. We give the profits from every pair we sell to deaf charities.
We give the old Midi systems we receive to charity rather than scrap them. Any customer with an old Midi system can bring these in to our stores and we will accept them in part-exchange against a new hi-fi separates system.
We try to keep waste to a minimum. This includes paper as well as energy (heating and lighting). We make sure all computers and photocopiers are switched off at the end of the day, as well as all the equipment in our stores.
At our warehouse, we use electric forklift trucks (to prevent pollution). Any broken wooden pallets (on which the large boxes are transported) are recycled rather than scrapped. Cardboard boxes are also recycled.
Stakeholders In Richer Sounds:
McDonalds:
The Ownership of McDonalds:
McDonalds originally started off with a salesman (sole trader) Ray Kroc. Ray Kroc opened the Des Plaines Franchise restaurant in 1995. First day’s revenues-$366.12! No longer a functioning restaurant, the Des Plaines building is now a museum containing McDonald’s memorabilia and artefacts, including the Multimixer! McDonald’s has always been a franchising Company and has relied on its franchisees to play a mayor role in its success. McDonald’s remains committed to franchising as a predominant way of doing business. Approximately 70% of McDonald’s worldwide restaurant businesses are owned and operated by independent businessmen and women, their franchisees
About McDonalds:
A popular fixture since they first opened their doors on Grafton Street in 1077, McDonald’s now has 68 restaurants in the South of Ireland with 30 in Dublin and 38 around the country. Of that number 48 are franchised to 30 franchisees and the company owns the remainder. In total their restaurants directly employ over 4,000 people with a significant number of jobs also generated by companies who form part of their supply chain.
Exports:
In addition to supplying our own restaurants, Ireland is responsible for annual exports in excess of 74 million euro to McDonald's in Europe and the US. Over 19 companies supply and support the company's network in Ireland with Metroplex Limited established in 1989 as a dedicated distribution service for our products. Exports include: Cheese slices to McDonald's European markets - 46 million euro; Raw material exported to the UK for the production of hamburgers - 11 million euro; Cream and Milk Jiggers exported to UK and jigger ingredients exported to McDonald's US supplier - 1.2 million euro.
Employment
McDonald's employs some of the most outstanding and talented people in Ireland. No matter their reason for joining McDonald's, whether it is their first job or they have been in the workforce for years, we give our employees the opportunity to develop a career that can take them to the very top or skills that they can take into every aspect of their life.
As an equal opportunities employer McDonald's ensures that employees and job applicants are selected, trained, promoted and treated on the basis of their relevant skills, talents and performance and without reference to race, gender, age, family status, marital status, disability, sexual orientation, religion and membership of the traveller community. And we offer great full-time and part time fully flexible jobs at very attractive rates of pay. Average minimum starting rate is €6.35 (£5) per hour, full time, fully flexible.
We also have opportunities in Restaurant Management, Accounts, Equipment, Marketing, Real Estate, Purchasing, Operations, Construction, Human Resources and Training.
Application Forms:
I have decided to use these application forms to help show you how they know to employ the best of Crew and Mangers.
This map will show you 10 of the McDonalds Franchises near Kettering:
Aims, Objectives and Goals
Aims:
- McDonald’s is the world’s community restaurant. They are proud of their long-standing commitment to a workforce that is diverse. They believe in developing and maintaining a diverse workforce that will strengthen the McDonald’s system and will try to maintain as the world’s community restaurant.
Objectives:
- McDonalds will try to be in one of every 100 countries across the globe.
- Social responsibility is an important part of McDonald’s heritage. They have a long track record of industry leadership in community involvement, environment protection, and work with their suppliers to help improve their practices, they are committed to do still more to promote sustainable so that resources and the benefits they provide are available for current and future generations.
Goals:
- For McDonald’s to achieve their goal(s) of being the worlds best quick service restaurant experience. McDonalds must have the best experience for all employees. So they formalized their beliefs into their People Vision and their promise.
Environment
McDonald's recognises it has a responsibility to protect and preserve the environment for future generations and will continue to work in partnership with suppliers who work towards mutually established waste minimisation goals and energy efficiencies.
Litter Control/Patrol
As part of our community and environmental policy, McDonald's was the first restaurant in Ireland to introduce and operate "Litter Patrols" in all restaurants around the country. Every day, often when everyone is still in bed McDonald's staff collects all rubbish (not just McDonald's packaging) dropped in the vicinity of their restaurant. This is continued throughout the day.
Restaurants organise litter-related competitions with local schools and youth groups, litter clear ups in their local areas and part-take in the sponsorship of litterbins.
Comparison of both Richer Sounds and McDonalds Environment
Both companies do aim to become environmentally safe but both in different ways like Richer Sounds reuses products and has a warehouse that uses electronic equipment to prevent pollution and McDonalds uses people from their Franchise for a litter patrol
My Opinion
I think that both of these companies try hard to maintain their positions of greatness against their competitors and in their line of work as a Franchise and Limited Company.
By Christopher Clark Cla0169
