Panera Bread

A key aspect of Panera Bread’s business that protects the company from direct competition in the fast food industry is their product niche, artisan fast food. Fast food chains are often criticized for offering unhealthy foods. But, Panera Bread focuses on a higher nutritional value in their products. Dine in restaurants are very susceptible to drops in consumer spending, so Panera Bread’s

The driving concept behind Panera Bread is to provide a premium specialty bakery and café experience to urban workers and suburban dwellers. Panera can compete at a high level in the quick food industry because of what they offer customers better than their

Panera has three business segments: Company-owned bakery-café, franchise operations and fresh dough operations. The company’s growth strategy was “to grow their store profits, to increase transactions and gross profits per transaction, use capital wisely and put into place drivers for concept differentiations and competitive advantage” (Vincelette & Fogarty, 2010, p7.). In 2009 while everyone else was experiencing the hard economic times Panera Bread was sticking to their strategic plan. Panera did not lay off employees, or worry about closing underperforming stores. Instead, they continued to add menu items and even increased prices on existing items. This strategy worked for them and they were able to take advantage of clientele that came from fine dining. The company has

Panera Case Analysis Austin Howe 10/25/15 In the modern society there are several companies that are synonymous with a type of product. This includes companies such as Mcdonalds being synonymous with fast food and Lamborghini being synonymous with quality cars. However in recent years there have been some newcomers to the industry that have made quite the name for themselves, companies like Chipotle, Panda Express, B-Good, and Panera bread. Panera Bread was founded in 1987 by Kade King, Ken Rosenthal, and Ronald M. Shaich in Kirkwood, Missouri.

According to Peter and Donnelly (2013), Panera Bread’s top competitors are Wendy’s, Applebee’s Neighborhood Bar and Grill, Chipotle, and Qdoba. All allowing the same nice dining experience as Panera Bread Company as well as the quick-service without the fast-food style food. Starbuck’s makes up the largest percent of the market at 60%, Applebee’s coming in at 13%, then Chipotle with 11%, Panera at 8%, and finally Wendy’s and Qdoba each with 4% of the market. Although Panera Bread is not at the top, they are also not at the bottom, sitting well off in the

The main challenge is to determine how Panera Bread can continue to achieve high growth rates in the future. Panera Bread is operating in an extremely high competitive restaurant market which forces the company to improve and to grow steadily for staying profitable. The company’s mission statement of putting “a loaf of bread in every arm” is just underlying Panera’s commitment for growing. They are now in a good financial situation and

Consumer’s preferences are constantly changing in this industry (ex. 3).  Offering more services, such as catering, is a way to catch the consumers interest.  With a growth rate of 26 percent in 2010 for Panera’s catering proves that a new segment is being targeted.  Panera needs to “reach” more consumers through advertising, commercials, and incentives.  We recommend Panera starts with the “health” factor as our analysis indicates in the SWOT analysis of opportunities (ex. 10).  Panera’s catering should also market incentives.  If consumers have an incentive, such as first order 20% off, they would be more willing to try new restaurants.

Its artisan breads, which were breads made with all natural ingredients and an artisan’s attention to quality and detail, and overall award-winning bakery expertise were at the heart of the concepts menu. The concept was designed to deliver against the key consumer trends, specially the need fro a responsive and more special dining experience than that offered by traditional fast food. The company’s goal was to make Panera bread a nationally dominate brand name. Its menu,prototype,operating systems, design, and real estate strategy allowed it to compete successfully in several sub-businesses:breakfast,lunch,PM chill-out,lunch in the evening and take-home bread.

Panera Bread is considered to be one of the U.S. most successful fast-casual restaurants. The company is one of the revolution makers in the industry of fast food, which managed to transform the traditional image and perception of to-go products that are available at an acceptable price on the market. As its initial founding company was established in 1981, Panera Bread managed to gain up to 4.5 billion USD in sales by the year of 2015, whereas the average sales per one store made up to 2.5 million USD annually (Thompson). Nevertheless, the company that once managed to upgrade bread and pastry into a trend of fast and healthy eating, today is struggling with massive competition on the fast food market. Its previous strategic strengths now became a burden that stops innovation and creativity and does not

Our analysis revealed that the restaurant industry is threatened by low switching costs and low customer loyalty. Our analysis revealed that Panera had strengths in buyer loyalty. Panera should first begin steps one month prior to the start of this service using signage and promotion. Next Panera should print menus that displaying the oven fresh option and distribute them at the point of sale. Panera should cross train employees on the oven fresh operational procedures of taking orders and bringing orders to customer‟s cars. Next Panera should purchase or lease 2 to 3 parking spots per location in close proximity to the door with signs for designated parking. Last Panera should place a pre-paid post card with survey questions inside to-go packaging and place customer loyalty punch card in packaging that rewards returning loyal customers. Panera should track the discounts given by customers. Because of the progressive nature of the discounts, Panera can identify its most loyal clientele based on the level of the discount rate. 4. Broaden the product scope and service offering to include a wider array of light entrees, dinner fare, and beer and wine available after 4:30 at select locations nationwide. The new offerings will be paired with community events such as wine-tastings and fundraisers to bolster the perceived dinner atmosphere. Our analysis of the restaurant industry led us to determine that there were a large number of buyers available to firms providing

This case study is about Panera Bread Company and its strategy it wishes to employ to become the best brand name of fresh bread in the United States. Panera Bread’s use of a broad differentiation strategy has helped their profitability and growth and rivals have found it hard to compete with the competitiveness of Panera Bread. A SWOT analysis will reveal the competitive advantage Panera Bread has and why this company is in an attractive situation and what Panera Bread must do to strengthen its competitive advantage against rival chains.

The main challenge is to determine how Panera Bread can continue to achieve high growth rates in the future. Panera Bread is operating in an extremely high competitive restaurant market which forces the company to improve and to grow steadily for staying profitable. The company’s mission statement of putting “a loaf of bread in every arm” is just underlying Panera’s commitment for growing. They are now in a good financial situation and facing growth rates of up to 20% per year in a niche market that has a great growth potential. In the next 7 years the fast-casual market is expected to grow by 500% in sales to a total of $30 billion.

Panera has done well in mastering its menu in patrons favor. This company always brings in new ideas on the menu. This keeps the patrons happy and loyal to the restaurant. Panera also keeps changing their menu every few months, which also goes along the seasons. This makes it really hard for competitors to have the same menu. Panera makes it own dough for the bread, and other suppliers supply other goods. This makes the burden on suppliers at minimum level. This company’s marketing department is very strong. This is because individual restaurant owners have to pay their marketing fees and Panera creates a national wide advisement.

The well-known company, Panera Bread; has been in business since the early 1980s, starting small and expanding with extensive growth successfully to where they are today. This paper will give a snap shot of how the company began, who they are, what they do as a business, and how to continue to compete in their market.

Panera strongly believes in serving food as it should be. The mission is to serve customer qualify food they can feel good about eating at price they can feel good about as well. In the beginning Panera set out with one goal to bake fresh bread for its customer’s every day. This means no artificial preservatives or shortcuts, just wholesome, great tasting food fresh from our kitchens. At Panera every day is an opportunity to improve the company and better serve customers the fresh food they have come to love.