How Chipotle, Pinkberry, and others win big by doing just a few things well
37signals.com
37signals.com
Okay, In-N-Out does a great job. But a Taco Bell kitchen is about the same size, yet produces a substantially larger menu.
How do they pull it off? Middleware. At In-N-Out, they make food out of potatoes, buns and refrigerated beef. At Taco Bell, they make food out of ingredient bags which are processed and packaged off-site. In-N-Out is something that a chef can respect -- Taco Bell is not.
But it's worth pointing out that In-N-Out can thrive only because their market doesn't demand a wide-ranging product. Sometimes markets move in that direction, and the artisans -- who cannot abide using middleware, who want to make everything to their high standards -- have a hard time competing.
That could also be explained by the fact that there are far less In-N-Out locations than Taco Bell, so one store has to handle demand from over a larger area than Taco Bells.
If In-N-Out has the same density of locations as a Taco Bell, the per-store revenues will be quite different.
The many Krispy Kreme franchises in In-N-Out's territory had those kinds of lines out the door once too, but went bust when the lines got short.
Kogi BBQ is the epitome of this model -- they have unfathomably long lines and few locations, but spread their resources around by being mobile.
(this isn't to say Taco Bell's business is poor, I'd just rather do what In-N-Out does)
Articles like this are annoying. There are multiple ways to success, and presenting one as clearly better than others when there are so many counterexamples is disingenuous.
In-N-Out has a simple menu, above average ingredient quality, and treats their workers pretty well. All great qualities. But it's pretty evident, especially when it comes to food, that you can be bad in all those areas and still be successful, and perhaps even outcompete those who are better than you, if you focus on price and consistency, even if the thing you're consistent at is being mediocre.
Its a really impressive company, and one that I think backs up Jason's point. There was an amazing article on them recently that I'm struggling to find, if someone has the link and could post it that would be great (BusinessWeek?).
Everyone is trying to do less and what we end up with is a million little apps that do one thing really well, which is great, but you're still dealing with a million separate apps. The iPhone wasn't just a really great phone, it was a phone, an iPod, and an 'Internet Communicator' but because those things were combined in such a great package it really spoke to people and made it something they would want. Of course the App Store is what is driving the popularity now but that is still because customers can come to one place, the iPhone, and get tons of different uses out of their one device.
I think we're starting to enter an era where users are more interested in packages of functionality that are easy to use and work really well over a bunch of tiny solutions.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I know that I prefer products/applications that let me do lots of things reasonably well in one place instead of getting the 'perfect' thing for each problem I have.
What do you think?
So I think you need to factor in the minimum requirements of the device (or foodchain) and then execute with the highest level of quality.
Chipotle thrives on its simple offering; Cheesecake Factory thrives on its deep menu.
Larry Ellison fought against the "best of breed" concept to promote a unified Oracle Applications. A Cheesecake Factory style package.
The argument for "complex" is that once you've earned the trust of a customer, you can provide the spectrum of products/services that customer needs. You can be counted on to pick up all dropped balls.
(But maybe there is a completely pointless complexity - proliferation of marginal features - which we can simply avoid.)
The only reliable guide is complete focus on the customer's needs.
They had won big with the Wii, turning profits on each console sold while the competition lost with each sale. But now they're facing the problem with the Wii being abandoned in households rather quickly and the decrease in software sales that brings.
DS aside, can Nintendo really be considered as a company that does few things well when the longevity of 1/2 their flagship lineup is in jeopardy?
First I've heard of it, can you point to anything to back that up?
Admittedly my remark about the console being abandoned quickly was a hasty generalization. I took into account some reports from 2007 that questioned the longevity of the Wii and had gathered the percentage of people in Japan that used the system frequently. That and experiences my friends and others I know online have had with their Wiis.
Very simple menus seems to be a hot trend recently.
It's not even clear that Pinkberry succeeded because of its small product offering or due to some other factor. In fact, the first time I heard about it, a fan was raving about the incredible selection of toppings to choose from.
A whole economics thesis could be dedicated to a controlled study of which strategy is actually preferable. This being the internet, simple narratives tend to win over rigorous results.
How can we get a broader, more realistic picture of what's really happening in the economy?
Is it Mexican? Not quite. Is it pretty tasty? For fast food, at least.
"The 2000 census counted more than 530,000 Mexicans in the city of Chicago, with more than 1.1 million in the metropolitan area."
http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/824.html
There are hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurants everywhere in Chicago.
But maybe if they get everyone to try it _once_ as I did, that will define success?
Depending on what you get, I suppose.