Essay Example on Brand vs. Theming: Which Is Better for Your Business?

Business Dictionary defines branding as a process of creating into the customers' minds an exclusive name and picture for a product, especially through advertisements with a steady theme, and aims at establishing noteworthy and distinguished manifestation in the market that invites and keeps loyal clients. Theming, on the other hand, is defined by Marketing Dictionary as the persistent, fundamental objective that guarantees consistency in designing of the wide product range, that lie in the same group of family, could be in terms of packaging and branding or advertising campaigns. With the modernization in the catering sector and improvement of living standards among people in China, more so in the catering industry, the customer expectations and needs have gradually changed. To meet the improving customer expectations, companies need to cope with the developing pressure of competitiveness bestowed upon them, to make sure there is uniqueness in their marketing methods and they are distinguished by unique features. They have to come up with sustainable strategies of marketing, which are important in establishing a strong customer base, keep up with good customer relation and improve on the company's development.

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"The Haidilao hot pot company in China is a famous catering firm that has attained a commendable success within a short period. The branding and theming have played a very vital role in ensuring a well-established and good relations with their clients, through marketing. The two factors that have impacted the marketing environment of Haidilao hot pot company are the external and internal factors. The external factors have been influenced by factors such as the demand, competition, and target groups, while the internal factors have been influenced by factors such as the objectives of the business, the resources, and profitability" WarrenMcFarlan, Zheng, & Zhao 2011 p.1).

In accordance with OC&C Strategy Consultants (2016), China's restaurants are becoming more alive in the market, with their growth exceeding some of the major markets. The number of Chinese who eat put every week is increasing exceedingly. Haidilao hot pot has taken the lead in the restaurant market, due to its theming of the traditional Chinese culture and its reputation in the food brand. Haidilao has been able to maintain and enhance the brand which has been the most important factor that has helped the company maintain its brand recognition worldwide.

Haidilao hot pot restaurant has faced a lot of challenges, which have turned out to smudge the reputation and appeal of the company's brand. Their brand has been illegally used on several occasions, customers have had so many disputed views on the brand and there have been a lot of negative publicities (Ling-han, Jia-yin & Chao-yang 2013). However, Haidilao's success has been maintained by enhancing the brand image, which largely depends on the ability to maintain both services, the quality of ingredients offered at a reasonable rate and the attractive environments for dining. The ability to respond to any change in the competitive catering market has also highly contributed to Haidilao's maintenance of its good customer relations. Haidilao would not have made it in the competitive global world without keeping up with the emerging global trends.

Haidilao serves quality and safe food, which has been a critical factor in its success. Their system is designed to consist of the supplier selection and management and the restaurant's quality control (Sun & Tang 2013). The effectiveness of the quality control system has helped in maintaining consistency in food quality. The effectiveness depends on factors which include the design of the quality control system, the employee training on adherence to and implementation of the quality control policies and how effective it is to monitor any potential violation of the quality control system (Sun & Tang 2013).

There is always no assurance of the effectiveness of the quality control system, hence the ingredients' quality is entirely not a subject to factors on their control. The efficiency and effectiveness of the suppliers' quality control are beyond the control of the Haidilao quality control system. Moreover, the assurance that the suppliers can have the ability to adopt an appropriate quality control system to meet the strict required quality standards of Haidilao cannot be achieved. Haidilao hot pot is therefore at risk that any failure of their quality control system would have such a huge impact on the brand's reputation and the operational results.

Food contamination is a major risk in every catering industry, therefore Haidilao is not an exemption. It is always hard for them to detect all the defects in the ingredients supplied by the suppliers. Food safety measures have been implemented and inspections put in place to ensure there is close monitoring of food safety and inspection procedures for the main stages in the supply chain, which are the suppliers, the service providers for food processing and the audit providers. A challenge, however, has come up with the global expansion of the business scale, since it is hard to predict if all the employees will adhere to the requirements and follow closely the internal procedures required in all the time (Gu 2016). In the event of any failure to detect any mix up of defective ingredients from the food supplies, uncleanliness or unhygienic standards in the operations causes adverse effects on the brand of the restaurant. This will result in liability claims, public politicizing and criticizing of the brand by competitors and complaints and will lead to penalization from the authorities and courts' compensation award against the business.

Long waiting time and some particular taste and style of some dishes and the quality of service from the staff has been a major drawback in building a stronger brand name. This has brought so many complaints from the customers. Other complaints are related to accidents such as burning in the dining period (Wang & Cheng 2012). Total assurance to prevent all the complaints cannot be asserted, but the complaints are taken seriously, and implementations to reduce these complaints are carried out. Frequent clients' complaints can result in matters of mistrust and risks of the clients losing confidence in the brand, which has adverse effects on the business, hence leading to a decline in revenue and losses. Complaints will attract public criticisms, including negative reviews online in social media, whether or not these complaints are correct. These will affect the business, its brand name and reputation (Shi et at. 2016).

When a claim of food safety that is resulted from contaminated ingredients from the supplier occur, Haidilao should seek compensation from the corresponding suppliers. However, the supply contract does not provide a cover on the profits lost and the direct or consequential losses. Haidilao will, therefore, be responsible to bear the costs of the losses if there is no case that can be asserted against the supplier, or if the insurance coverage is not enough, therefore the amounts cannot be recovered.

Losing the support management team and key personnel, such as the coaches and supervisors, who have the industrial experience and knowledge in sensitive areas have affected the ability to grow and sustain the business (Shu & Zheng 2019). The key goal of the restaurant is not only to attract as many customers as possible, and retain them, but also attract a good number of qualified personnel, be able to retain and motivate them to stay, in order to maintain a consistency atmosphere of quality in the restaurants and accomplish the plans to expand across the world (Shu & Zheng 2019).

There is an intense competition that Haidilao hot pot face, which includes both for customers and management that is experienced and the restaurant's operating personnel (Bao & Li 2016). There is a very limited pool for the qualified candidature (Gu 2016). In the future, it will be hard to attract and retain a team of qualified personnel, therefore much investment is being done in terms of efforts and resources to promote qualified personnel.

It is not always that all the customers prefer the hot pot in all the cuisines. Change in customer's tastes and preferences affect the Haidilao hot pot since, with the frequent changes in the customer tastes and preferences, it is not always easy to address the changes immediately. Moreover, failing to identify, get ahead, and react to the trends risks to a reduced rate of guests and less demand for the restaurant's products. There are updates done regularly on the menu, and the introduction of new dishes often, to adapt to the dining trend changes, changes in tastes of the customers and nutritional changes. For every guest, Haidilao often seeks to provide them with a personalized soup flavor. As the expansion of the restaurants continues, and with so much upcoming trends, it is hard to predict the future of the brand and maintaining its theme. Furthermore, if the customer's perceptions and preferences of alternative products due to health and dietary trends, however much it identifies, anticipates, and act to the changes, there is no assurance that launching of new dishes that are responding to the customer's preferences can be achieved. Haidilao will be adversely affected if its competitors are able to effectively address the customers' preferences and tastes concerns.

To protect Haidilao's brand and theming reputation against the global trending issues, it is highly recommended that the protection begins from the company itself. This can be made possible if brand recognition becomes increasingly important to the workers of the restaurant. The company's brand is so much related to the taste of the food, its quality and safety, and the service offered and the restaurant's environment. also, make a good relation with the customers, (Chen, Shen and Fan 2015) since they are the public that will control the brand's reputation in the social media platforms and protect the image of the company (Ling-han, Jia-yin & Chao-yang 2013).

Improving the technology used by Haidilao will play a major role in attracting more visitors. These include ordering automatically and taking automatic queues, which will enable the restaurant to give a better dining experience to its customers, in accordance with Hsu and Wu (2013). The company will moreover improve on its operational and management efficiency by use of automatic intelligent equipment, use of ERP systems that are more advanced, analytics and big data (Shu & Zheng 2019).

The society today is becoming more fast-paced, and have very little or no time to get to their kitchens and cook. They prefer to make a house delivery order, be it at home or the office. Haidilao has to adapt to the growing trend and join the rest of the world's revolution in the growth of delivery service market (Muller 2010; Bao & Li 2016).

References

Branding. (n.d.). In: BusinessDictionary. [online] Available at: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/branding.html [Accessed 13 Apr. 2019].

Design Theme. (n.d.). In: Marketing Dictionary. [online] Available at: https://www.mbaskool.com/business-concepts/marketing-and-strategy-terms/13734-design-theme.html [Accessed 13 Apr. 2019].

Gu, B., 2016. Effects of psychological capital on employee turnover intentions: A study based on Hai Di Lao Hot Pot. Journal of Global Tourism Research, 1(1), pp.21-28.

Shi, W., Tang, L., Zhang, X., Gao, Y. and Zhu, Y., 2016. How does word of mouth affect customer satisfaction? Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, 31(3), pp....